London today. Blogging should resume next Wednesday, the 31st.
KF Socks
Our doctor’s appointment system is too good to allow for much knitting these days, but at least I got the second sock cast on and joined into a circle while I waited to see if the flu injection would prove fatal. I’m ready to get cracking this morning as the train pulls out of Waverley Station.
What follows may be either (a) entirely wrong or (b) something that everybody else figured out in childhood. I’m not really very good at this kind of thinking.
It occurred to me that if I had started my KF socks with the second ball – there was a 50/50 chance – I wouldn’t have needed to unwind nearly so much of the first ball, to match the stripes, as I would need now, doing it the other way around.
If that’s right, it may mean that if you’re keen on matching the stripes, it would be a good idea to unroll a few yards from both balls before starting, and see if you can find an economical starting place. And perhaps mark the spot for the initial slipknot on both balls, to ensure utter identicality. Maybe I’ll try that, when I embark on the other colorway.
Miscellaneous
The Yarn Yard October Sock Club selection arrived yesterday (more beautiful than ever). Natalie couldn’t post it until the postal strike was over – and when she did, it took a full eight days, first class post, to get to me from a starting point just outside Edinburgh. The postmark is unusually clear.
KF Socks
Our doctor’s appointment system is too good to allow for much knitting these days, but at least I got the second sock cast on and joined into a circle while I waited to see if the flu injection would prove fatal. I’m ready to get cracking this morning as the train pulls out of Waverley Station.
What follows may be either (a) entirely wrong or (b) something that everybody else figured out in childhood. I’m not really very good at this kind of thinking.
It occurred to me that if I had started my KF socks with the second ball – there was a 50/50 chance – I wouldn’t have needed to unwind nearly so much of the first ball, to match the stripes, as I would need now, doing it the other way around.
If that’s right, it may mean that if you’re keen on matching the stripes, it would be a good idea to unroll a few yards from both balls before starting, and see if you can find an economical starting place. And perhaps mark the spot for the initial slipknot on both balls, to ensure utter identicality. Maybe I’ll try that, when I embark on the other colorway.
Miscellaneous
The Yarn Yard October Sock Club selection arrived yesterday (more beautiful than ever). Natalie couldn’t post it until the postal strike was over – and when she did, it took a full eight days, first class post, to get to me from a starting point just outside Edinburgh. The postmark is unusually clear.
Fishwife, the yarn at Jenner’s is good, and there was a lot of it on Monday, but nothing to make the pulse race. I would have left empty-handed if I hadn’t gone in search of something specific, that extra KidSilk Haze. I think maybe you should save your breath, unless you have a particular project in mind. That is an interesting idea, that they are going to replace their own department with an in-store concession, but I bet it’ll be Rowan.
The scenario was played out, rather more rapidly, at Rackham’s in Birmingham in the mid-'90’s. Move yarn dep’t upstairs, replace with a little Rowan shop, close down altogether. We shall see, as I said yesterday.
Of course, if it’s not going to be Rowan, that’s another story.
Since Blogger has got its act together at last, here is the long-promised Araucania swatch. It's nice, isn't it?
When I was posting the Club yarn I did, for a fleeting moment, think to myself "I wonder if I should hand deliver this?" And then I told myself I was being very silly.
ReplyDeleteWith hindsight I think I could have toured the entire country and delivered them all by hand, and perhaps even managed a trip to Italy as well in the time the PO took!
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And now Rackhams has once more got a knitting concession!
ReplyDeleteI still have quite a few bargains from when the Rowan stall closed down last time (lots od cotton glace) and also from when Beatties short-lived store in toen closed - did better this time, I think, lots of rowanspun 4ply, and also 4ply soft, eacha t least enough for a swetaer (And I've also made a felted bowler out of the rowanspun).
The colors in your swatch are yummy.
ReplyDeleteI was in Jenners again today, and asked the most knitterly of the floor staff about what's coming next. Yes, it's going to be more Rowan, as you guessed, but because Rowan have changed hands, the distribution method is going to change. Hence the sale.
ReplyDeleteSeems a bit Irish to reduce all their Rowan stock to clear it...then restock with the same yarns! Their loos is our gain though...I cleared them out of several colours of Kid Classic.