Very successful weekend in Argyll. Driving through Glasgow is no fun – they have a hideously crowded motorway on which the slow lane keeps morphing into a slip road. We came back by the Scenic Overland Route, through Stirling.

Alexander’s vegetables aren’t terribly far ahead of mine, just somewhat. His radishes are bigger and bushier (but look at Roger’s), and his parsnips substantially ahead in that mine hadn’t appeared above ground at all, when last viewed. His maiden apple trees – Kingston Black, a traditional cider variety – have all survived the hard winter and are looking well.

There are 25 of them altogether.

Friday was James-the-Younger’s 7th birthday. A Mystery Project mentioned here in recent weeks turned out to be a Calcutta Cup hat. The match this year – the annual rugby match between Scotland and England – ended in a draw, so James’s hat has half a Calcutta Cup, flanked by the year and the score,15-15. It’s a good fit, and I’m beginning to get the hang of pom-pom-making.

The heavy package was a slow cooker for Rachel. She now works full time, and also hosts language students at home from time to time and cooks for them in the evening. We’ll see how she gets on with it.

I knit very industriously and am well down the foot of my husband’s second large grey sock.

The main event of the weekend was a visit to Pollphail. I’ll postpone the report and pictures, but you can Google “Pollphail graffiti” if curiosity overcomes you. It is a most extraordinary place.

Back here, I’m about to finish the first rank of Green Granite Blocks. Things are going pretty well. I’ve found more flaws in the chart, as predicted by Ron. Areas with no colours specified, and one where the colour was so out-of-keeping (but one never quite knows, with the Master) that I didn’t do it. Not a chart for a beginner.

In other KF’s I’ve knit, it has been possible to cut off a length of wool appropriate to the size of the block of colour about to be knit, and use the Master’s technique of just letting it hang, and pulling it through the tangle where necessary.

This time, that doesn’t quite work, because the blocks are big. The front panels are 15 stitches across, on big needles, yarn held double, so even two arms’-lengths are soon exhausted. My friend had wound a lot of the yarn into little “butterflies”. I tried to use them at first, but they got tangled.

Now I wonder if maybe I couldn’t use them at least for the front panels of the blocks, of which there are only five across the width of the sweater. A little googling produced this delightful video illustrating the technique. I could even think of winding two yarns together into one butterfly. If I weren’t quite so constantly joining in new yarn, there would be less waste, fewer ends to deal with finally, and the knitting would go faster.

Report tomorrow.

And watching the video led to the discovery of this eBay shop selling original KF kits with the proper, now discontinued, yarns.

Well, we’re all set, I think.

All of my driving these days is done on familiar roads, so this will be something of an adventure. Previous visits to Alexander have been accomplished by public transport, or someone has driven us, or a combination – being picked up in Glasgow. Both Alexander and Rachel (who is driving up today from London) offered a Glasgow pick-up this time, but we plan to take that heavy package under which I recently struggled home from John Lewis – I’m not going to carry it another step. Well, out to the car.

The sun is shining, and the route should be easy. Edinburgh to Glasgow, the motorway sweeps us through the city and across the Clyde, then straight ahead to Dumbarton and on up the west side of Loch Lomond. At the top of the loch, at Tarbet, turn left. That’s about it. I won’t be able to navigate the last mile and a half to the house, over unnumbered roads, but my husband has a faultless memory for geography. And if he fails, which he won’t, I can ring Alexander up on my mobile phone and he will talk us in. I remembered to charge it last night.

So off we go. Back here Tuesday, insh’Allah.

The Green Granite Blocks proceed nicely. I’m about halfway through the first set of blocks, and should soon be far enough along to photograph them. I had a look in Ravelry yesterday and, to my surprise, found no Green Granite Blocks at all. For a website that offers two examples of Pagoldh’s Portom sweater (“the Grandson sweater”), and Joanie Newsome’s jabot pattern, that seemed odd.

I found the Rowan left-over bag easily enough. There’s lots:

Flipping through the Master’s work, I think the fun thing to do would be to take one of his big, basic patterns from “Glorious Knitting” – I've always liked the Carpet one – and divide the yarns into two piles by tone. Maybe one day.

Chevron scarf: You’re right, Jean – blocking was as easy as hoped, pins all around the outside, nothing more was needed. The pattern is essentially feather-and-fan, and I noticed as I was pinning that on one long side, I was sticking the pins into the k3togs, and on the other into the centre stitch of M1, K1, M1. I need to think about that.

I’d better get going.

Gretchen, that is simply the most brilliant thing I have ever heard of (comment yesterday). Shouldn’t your friend patent it and make a fortune and open the door to Kaffe’s patterns to everyone?

I’m coming along nicely. The only way I have ever managed to deal with the yarns as I proceed, is the one The Master recommends – cut off about a yard at a time, so that you can just pull it through the tangle. It can be a slow and wasteful system, especially in a pattern like the Green Granite Blocks where the colour sections are large enough that a yard won’t do. For James’s sweater, I think, I could cut lengths appropriate to the task – and soon learned what they were.

Mary Lou, there is a sort of rhythm in intarsia knitting, at least if the pattern is geometric. I once tried one of Kaffe’s (few) patterns with cloud-like shapes. It might have been “Ancient”, in “Kaffe’s Classics”, and it was a Rowan kit. I hated every stitch, and abandoned it after about six rows – ripping back and using the yarn to knit his “Afghan” pattern in a big jacket for Helen. Very successful.

He says himself in the introduction to “California Patches” that “all of the designs here have a natural rhythm to knit that can quite quickly be committed to memory…” I sort of imagine myself weaving, or doing embroidery, when I’ve got into the swing of one of his patterns.

When “Glorious Knitting” first came out, I thought the same as you – I can’t do that stuff, beautiful as it is, and I’m not going to try. But then the “Crosspatch” vest turned up very cheaply, a Rowan kit in the January sales. And I got hooked. (Rowan kits often used to figure in the January sales, which has probably got something to do with why Rowan doesn’t do kits any more.)

Ron, I’ve found one flaw in the chart so far, a section for which no colour was specified. I’m sorry to hear your friend had such a struggle. I think I’d recommend anyone to start with Tumbling Blocks or one of its variations.

If I finish this one, that leaves one more kit in the stash, that vest based on the Ravenna mosaic. (It’s called “Mosaic”, and it’s in “Kaffe’s Classics” too.) Will that feel rhythmical to knit? Or is it too intricate? I love it, and must find out one day.

Somewhere in all that stash must be a bag of Rowan left-overs, the subtly-coloured fine yarns you can’t get any more. Maybe they could be combined into one last Classic Kaffe. Looking through the books again, I find lots that I admire but have never attempted. I am also inspired, by “California Patches” itself, to think again of his striped patterns.

I wondered for a while yesterday just when it was that I knit “Mini Roman Blocks” for James. The photograph I posted yesterday doesn’t come with a date. But then I remembered – I was knitting one of the sleeves on 9/11. I interrupted the pattern with two rows of purple. You can’t see the stripe in yesterday’s picture, so here is another one, in which it’s just visible, low on the right sleeve. It is supposed to be on the left sleeve but James has put the sweater on backwards.



And, oh yes, here’s the Chevron Scarf. Once wet, it was exactly the right size, no violent blocking necessary. There is no substitute for wool, like the man said. It looks curiously shortened in the picture, but I can assure you, it's the full five feet.

The chevron scarf is knat, and the ends tidied. I’m hoping for time to block it today. Preparations for our weekend in Argyll are assuming the proportions of an ascent of Everest (cf Helen C.K.S.’s friend) but I think I can manage it anyway.

Thrashing about for something to restore my enthusiasm for some aspect of life other than visiting Argyll and vegetable-growing, I decided yesterday to tackle Kaffe’s Green Granite Blocks, from “California Patches”. I think maybe it’s going to work.

The yarns were given me, many years ago now, by a dear friend – not an official Rowan kit, such as they used to put up for many of their patterns, but one assembled by a department store. Let’s not mince words – by Harrod’s. Until yesterday, the yarn was still in a Harrod's bag. My friend had done the initial ribbing.

The first job was to identify the yarns and lay them out. During my early Kaffe Fassett years, my husband gave me a wicker basket-y/tray-y thing, meant for butlers to keep cutlery in. That’s what I use. That’s how I met the friend I just mentioned. She wrote to the Knitlist asking how people kept yarns in order when they were knitting Kaffe, and I wrote in describing my wicker thingy, and we corresponded, and one day not long after that she came to Edinburgh and came round for coffee.

The next job was to get the ribbing back on a needle, and figure out just how far along we were. That proved easy – she had finished ribbing (and tidied the ends) and done the increase row. I ripped that out, as I needed to do one calm row to start off with, and a calm row of st st wasn't allowed.

And this morning, during my osteoporosis-pill-half-hour, I got half way across the first row of actual knitting.

I don't dare move it into a better spot for photography. If you've ever knit Kaffe, you'll understand. The pattern is essentially an easy one, with big blocks defined by three kinds of colour, dark, medium and light. Not unlike the wonderful Tumbling Blocks in some respects. The chart makes it look awfully fiddly, because he keeps introducing gradations of colour within the big blocks. I think I have decided that I will do that, but not necessarily slavishly.

The blocks have to be established de novo six times each for front and back, only three times for the sleeves. Those are the really slow rows. The rest should trot along pleasantly enough.

This one is a classic Kaffe, from the glory days when Rowan produced a large palette of fine yarns – designed by him, I think – which he could use double, thus vastly extending the already generous range of colour. He has to work with a restricted palette and broader brush these days.


The pattern as written starts at the lower back and goes over the shoulder and down the fronts in one sweep. I knit one like that once, the Islamic Stripe Patch sweater from “Kaffe Fassett at the V&A” and I didn’t like the idea so I won’t do it again.

I think my most recent Kaffe was James’s Mini Roman Blocks, also from “California Patches”. Do I still have the patience? My idea is to make it a five-day-a-week project, and do some small and easy ones on the side, like the preemie jacket.

Wonderful day, yesterday. It was breathtaking to see what five days can mean, in May. Seeds have come up, and potatoes have appeared – I was beginning to wonder where they were – and apple blossom. Little plants nurtured on the Edinburgh windowsill have visibly prospered, some more than others. The weeds have gone into high gear.

Actually, I thought the apple tree would have been wiser to wait. The other one is hanging back, prudently. The weather man said on the radio just now that there was frost in the glens last night.

So I watered and weeded and even thinned some things which had come up quickly and thickly. And could have stayed forever.

Why is it such a joy? Like knitting, vegetable growing (at least the way I do it) is a frugal-seeming occupation which in fact represents a net expense. That is, I doubt if we get enough to eat to cover the outlay. So it’s not that. Flavour, yes, very nice, sorrel soup and forced rhubarb and freshly-dug potatoes and lovely broad beans, and peas and spinach in the years when we get it right. Those two depend on the man-from-del-Monte moment, and we’re not always there for it.

But I don’t think it’s that, either, any more than one knits for the sake of something to wear. It’s the quality of the happiness, and for whatever reason, it’s better than growing mere flowers.

For peas, this year (as well as mange tout) I’m growing something called the Victorian Colossal Climbing Pea. The nurseryman’s instructions (scroll down) are to build a tepee for it, as one does for climbing beans. Does that imply that this pea climbs like a bean, by twining? and not like a pea, which clings with little tendrils? I await the result with more than ordinary interest.

I have built a tepee, as instructed. The peas have germinated, perhaps even 100%, and look very cheerful. I figure that if they decline to twine (as I expect they will) I can tie string around the tepee at various levels, and they can hold on to that.

As for knitting, I should finish the Chevron Scarf this evening, and perhaps even get it blocked tomorrow. I’ve lost oomph, for the moment, and am not sure that the projects I have in mind (preemie jacket, KF jacket) are likely to restore it.

Comments

Kristen, I keep thinking about what you said about “Let the Right One In”. I wonder if I missed something, at the end. Why was she there, at the swimming pool? Did they plan it? They must have. Is that what you mean?

Tamar, the heavy package from John Lewis wasn’t knitting wool! Honest! It was connected with this weekend’s projected visit to Argyll, during which should also be revealed a mystery knitting project from some weeks ago. Pics next week, with luck.

Here are some for now, knit-free. Nephew Theo and his new wife Jenni were in Beijing recently, accompanying the Treasury Secretary. Jenni is an important member of his team. Here is a picture of a serious-looking conference. James Miles of the Economist is the man with his hand over his mouth. I’m afraid I don’t know which one is Timothy Geithner. That’s Jenni, upper left.

Here are Theo and Jenni and James and his family after what looks like a well-enjoyed dinner. James and Theo in front, with James's daughter Kirsty. The back row is Rachel-the-Younger, James' wife Cathy, Jenni, and Alistair, who's getting tall.

Final stripe of chevron scarf is in the process of being cast on. Last lap.

The weather has eased, slightly. Yesterday was, at least in Edinburgh terms, seriously hot. Princes Street Gdns – we went up to the Royal Academy for their annual show – were pullulating with people, all rather enjoying themselves. Too hot for us. Then I picked up a heavy package, pre-ordered, at John Lewis, and nearly perished carrying it home.

Today is grey, and cooler. I look forward to watering my little plants tomorrow (no blog) when I go to retrieve the pears, especially the plants that haven’t appeared above ground yet. Despite a century of gardening, and much manure, the soil remains essentially light and sandy and quick-draining.

And I find I have nothing else to say this morning.

Kristen, I wish you were here so that we could talk about “Let the Right One In” a quattr’occhi, as I think the Italians say. I envy you having seen it in the cinema. Our television screen isn’t very large, although modern and digital and all that.

I thought the upshot of the film was love – is that just an old woman’s reaction? When the girl first appeared, she told Oskar, “I can’t be your friend”. And he needed a friend badly, not having any and being bullied at school. At the end, they were friends, despite everything. Love had got past horror, on both sides.

I hope I haven’t spoiled it for anyone else by saying too much.

It was awfully good on snow, almost as good as “Fargo”. And on colour, the lack of. And the camera so often moved back and distanced us and itself from the climax of horrific scenes, esp. at the end, in a way that made it seem less terrifying than the events might have been otherwise. But maybe in the cinema they were horrific anyway.

Anyway, that doesn’t get us very far with knitting.

I’m now nearly finished with the fifth stripe of the chevron scarf, and should at least cast that one off today. The total object looks awfully wide and short – I must hope that severe blocking will correct that to some extent.

I got an email from somewhere yesterday saying that a between-season, “early fall” VK is about to appear. It looked promising, and I think in general that VK is where the design is, at the moment. I hope they intend to send it to subscribers. I hope they intend to send it to subscribers in GB, where the magazine is now called “Designer Knitting”. K1 Yarns will have it, if all else fails.

I need to finish my scarf while the description of it in the sidebar is still accurate, with its reference to the “current VK”.

Gardening

The weather, after being uncharacteristically cold for months, has suddenly become uncharacteristically hot. My little plants will be wanting water, and I’m glad I shall be seeing them on Monday.

One of the treats of next weekend – when we are planning to go to Argyll to celebrate James-the-Younger’s birthday – will be observing Alexander’s vegetables, and even more, his newly-planted cider orchard. (No kidding – maybe his largely unused barn could be converted into a granny flat.) The trees arrived in January when Argyll was frozen solid. More than that, all of GB had been frozen solid for several weeks at that point, so they must have been out of the ground for a while. I don’t know anything about their progress since.

As for vegetables, Alexander has twelve professionally-constructed raised beds. He tends to look at my garden and say, “Anyone could grow vegetables in soil like that” (the area has probably been a kitchen garden, off and on, for more than a century); I tend to look at his and say, “Anyone could grow vegetables on the west coast” (where it’s distinctly warmer).

Stripe Five embarked upon – good progress. Current plan is to knock off the preemie jacket for the Games next.


Jeanne and FiberQat, thanks for the pointers to Maria Erlbacher’s “Twisted-Stitch Knitting”. (The link is to Schoolhouse Press.) I have held back because I’ve got the three German books of which it is a translation. They’re pretty clear, and there was a time when I had German up to reading-knowledge standard, so I think I could puzzle out any passages I wanted to if I set myself to it.

On the other hand, I see – looking it up just now – that Meg claims to have augmented the technique section “a bit”. And it’s not very expensive. Perhaps…

Vegetable-gardening

Rosesmama, I am proud to report that I sowed the sorrel myself, a couple of years ago. I didn’t expect much, as perennial seeds tend to be a bit more reluctant to germinate than annual ones (which can be stubborn enough…), but up it came. And up it comes again, first thing each spring. And it’s delicious. Boil some new potatoes you’ve just dug from your plot, toss them with butter and shredded sorrel leaves until they wilt. Ambrosial. That’s from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. Who, incidentally, is one of the authors on the list of the agency granddaughter Hellie now works for.

I realised as I unpacked and put everything away yesterday that I have left three pears on the kitchen windowsill in Strathardle. Maybe it was what is called “Freudian”, because I’m going to have to go back and get them. I think I have probably mentioned here before the time I left a banana in that same position. The field mice of Balnald invited their sisters and cousins and aunts from up and down the glen. The mess throughout the house was unbelievable.

I don’t think pears will be as attractive, but I can’t face a fortnight worrying about it. I’ll make a day trip on Monday. And assuming I don’t have to spend the time cleaning up after mice, I can put in a useful couple of hours whispering encouraging words to my little plants and watering and weeding them. The herbs have got themselves in a fair tangle.

Jeanfromcornwall, that’s interesting about the overlapping words for spring onions. Language: I was much struck, watching “Let the Right One In”, at the sound of Swedish. One can recognise quite a few English words, as in German, but unlike German the lift and intonation of a sentence sometimes sounds unexpectedly like the English equivalent.

Tamar, it’s a good film. Well-written, brilliantly directed, “sensitive” would not be an inappropriate epithet. The familiar vampiric elements are all there, but unexpectedly employed.

THREE new followers!

We are safely back, very tired – and the job is done.

The beans have been planted out, the seeds are in. The plastic bottles will afford some protection, not much, against a touch of frost. And against wind, until they get blown away themselves. There are four different types of beans, two climbing, two dwarf. I put in seeds of all four types, as well.

When we left yesterday morning, they had survived three nights in the wild, and were looking fine. And every day brings us nearer to June. Frost in June is entirely possible, but we won’t think about that.

In the nearer of my “raised beds”, you can just see some baby lettuce and pak choi plants which I fell for in a favourite hardware/garden store in Milnathort on the way up. They, too, have survived several days at large. And since baby lettuce and pak choi are like chocolate to slugs, I have some hope that maybe this year the nematodes are doing the job I paid them for.

We ate some rhubarb – and you should have seen what they were asking for “British field-grown rhubarb” in Waitrose last week – and some sorrel soup and some nettle soup. All were delicious. I can’t claim any glory for the nettles. We don’t have many, and our neighbour has a lot, all in the perfection of spring growth, so I pinched some of his.

Peas and broad beans were coming up nicely. Not much else. This year, as well as being the Year of the Bean, is also the Year of the Spring Onion. It is supposed to be easy-peasy, a beginner’s vegetable, but they will NOT grow for me. This time, I have taken advice of the Fishwife – you can’t do better than that – and also have gone in for multiple varieties and successional sowings. Ishiguro and White Lisbon, a red one, Cipollotto da Mazzi from Seeds of Italy (I don’t know what that means), garlic chives, and Siberian bunching onions from Victoriana nursery.

The Siberians and Ishiguros have come up, at least patchily. So the next question is whether they will now just stand around, 1/2” high and fine as a hair, all summer long.

Not much knitting. I finished the back of the Araucania sweater and attached the yarn to the front (it was circular up to the armpits). I realised after a while that I had far too many stitches, and after an interval of anxious calculating, realised that I should have started the front by casting off 11 at each side. I thought the cast off’s I had done for the back counted for both.

Especially since it happened so long ago, and the pattern (Sweater Wizard) was a bit vague about numbers at that critical point. The mistake has been retrieved, and and all is well. Just not very far forward.

Here in Edinburgh, I am casting off in pattern the fourth semi-detached stripe of the Chevron Scarf. I worked on this last night while watching “Let the Right One In”. It is very good, even if you don’t, in general, go in for vampires.

Ribbing finished, and a few rows of plain sock added. That’s that, for now. We hope to go to Loch Fyne for the Bank Holiday weekend at the end of the month, as I must have said. The sock will go along, and the visit will afford, if all goes according to plan, three no-cook evenings, which should speed things forward a good deal. If that doesn’t finish it off, I’ll have another think.

I continue to enjoy thinking about Travelling Stitch, and looking through the stitch books. I wish there were an Eng lang book on the subject – I used to hope that Candace Strick would write one. I was introduced to the subject (and to Candace) by taking her class at Camp Stitches in ’99.

A book isn’t really needed. We’ve got Meg’s pattern, and her invaluable DVD, and the German stitch books which include illustrations of complete garments (and stunning they are). An English book would have little to add, but it would be a comfort. I suppose part of the problem is that the work is so very slow. Knitting up a bookful would take a while.

I found the hat pattern in Woolgathering – it was last year, so that didn’t take long, in the same issue as Cully’s lattice hat which remains on my HALFPINT list.

Miscellaneous

Moorecat, thank you for the preemie size chart. Gosh, they’re small, those little people.

I subscribe to Knitter’s Review, and this morning got this interesting discussion of how to purl 2 tog tbl.

The new IK turned up while we were in London. I like the Jali cardigan a lot, both for the lattice pattern and – even more – for that welted front band. Would it really work? Could it be knit in Posh sock yarn, when my fast ends? The article on buttonholes in this issue might be helpful, too. I’ve never felt entirely happy with my buttonholes.

Non-knit

Thank you, those who visited Mungo’s blog (in sidebar). He’s got a new post up today. Commenting is hard work, I agree. I added myself as a Follower and for some mysterious Eastern Mediterranean reason Blogger has chosen a picture of Mungo’s brother Archie to illustrate me.

Well, we’re off to Strathardle today, with the beans. The forecast – that’s a site James recommended – suggests warmer, from tomorrow. Let's hope so. We should be back sometime in the middle of next week.

The big news today is that my grandson Mungo now has his own blog, “Harry in Athens”. “Mungo” doesn’t work as a name in Greek, so he’s “Harry” when he’s there, which is, of course, most of the time.

I found an email from him late yesterday afternoon, asking how to set up a blog. I sent him off to the Blogger home page, and in the twinkling of an eye, it seemed, he had done all that. It is delightful.

He’d love comments, and it’s not entirely easy, because clever Blogger has put all the apparatus of the blog in Greek. My education was classical, and it included occasional references to dimly-understood characters called scholiasts, who wrote commentaries on the ancient authors. Their comments are called “scholia”, hence their name. It is a rare word in English, if not actually obsolete, but it was with one of those little tingles down the spine that I discovered last night that the word for “comments” on a Greek blog is ΣχOλIA. (I did it! I wrote it in Greek!)

Ancient Greek and medieval Greek and modern Greek (what Mungo enchantingly calls “normal Greek”) are all the same language, much altered through the years. Whereas Italian, although clearly derived from Latin, has evolved into a different language. But what are my criteria for those statements? It’s a very interesting question.

Knitting

Today is my osteoporosis pill day – that dread early half-hour in which I can’t even have a cup of coffee, and am not allowed to go back to bed. I regard the time as mine to dispose of, though, and today I spent it watching the beginning of Meg’s Bavarian Travelling Stitch DVD. It’s chock-a-block with good things, including a large circular swatch which is simply taken for granted.

Interestingly, I thought, she stumbled as anyone might in trying to pronounce "Uberlieferte Strickmuster". But her father was German. He must have turned his back on his native language altogether.

She says there was a Woolgathering with a Travelling Stitch cap. I must try to find it.

And thank you for the comment about Rowan Extra Fine Merino, Vivienne. I regard the matter as settled, although I didn’t get in to John Lewis yesterday to fondle it. Congratulations on that wonderful baby.

Jenny, no, the Games programme doesn’t say anything about the dimensions for a preemie sweater. About 12”-14”, I should guess. The real tinies are presumably kept naked in incubators in conditions as womb-like as possible.

I’ve got fewer than 20 rounds of ribbing left to do on the second sock, and will push hard to finish today so that I won’t have to come back to it, post-Strathardle.

Non-knit

The radio said this morning that last night and this morning were the coldest temperatures recorded for May in 15 years. Those beans have a tough future ahead of them.

The beans survived another couple of hours on the doorstep yesterday. I think I will leave them out there a while longer today, as long as it’s not windy. We have decided to go north on Thursday – the forecast for the weekend promises a slight improvement, warmth-wise.

I finished the first sock, and got ten rounds into the dread ribbing of the second. My husband tried it on – the toe is a bit too long; easily fixed. I used my usual formula for the toe shaping, and thought as I did it that, with 72 stitches instead of my usual 64, it was going to come out long. A 64-stitch sock has 22 rounds in the toe; I’ve done 25 (I think).

The Future

Jenny, thank you for the pointer to the Baby Sachiko Kimono sweater (Ravelry link). I had already seen it in my search of Ravelry, and put it on a mental short list, without grasping the important point you make, namely that it is written for worsted so that I can probably downsize it for a preemie by using a finer yarn. Perhaps some of the sock yarn, I’m afraid there’s lots, left over from last year’s ASJ? Anyway, I’ve downloaded it, and it’s the one -- my 2010 Games entry.

I thought a lot yesterday about that Bavarian Twisted Stitch jacket. Current yarn choice is Rowan Extra-Fine Merino DK. The next time I’m in John Lewis – and there is a prescription from Boots to be picked up this very day – I’ll try to have a look at it. The Rowan website mentions stitch definition specifically. The colour range is very good. “Blood”, I think. Maybe “red wine”.

The pattern – in Meg’s book “Knitting” – has a good paragraph about the importance of swatching and blocking. Bavarian travelling stitch is essentially ribbing writ large, and she points out that you can stretch it out and block it flattish, or not. Unless I've missed something, however, she doesn’t say that the swatch has got to be circular.

Bavarian travelling stitch is hard enough by itself; it’s next to impossible on the flat, because there is action in every row. Maybe this point is covered in the DVD.

I’ve still got my circular swatch from the Grandson Sweater, waiting to be turned into a hat.

Politics

This is a most extraordinary situation. Seeing the three party leaders at the Cenotaph the other day, I was reminded of Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Gondoliers”. One of them is king – but which?

Emily, my son Alexander has been arguing your very point with me – that there are more Labour voters in England than you might think just to look at all that blue on an electoral map. I believe it is true, however, that if you remove Scotland from the equation and just count the number of constituencies won by each party, England will be found to have chosen a Conservative government, not just this time but in most post-war elections. But I’m not going to do the arithmetic.

David Blunkett was extremely sensible on the radio this morning on the absurdity of the idea of a “progressive alliance” with a Labour Prime Minister, in the present situation. David Blunkett.

It’s still cold – snowing, in fact, in various bits of Scotland this morning. We mean to go to Strathardle this week – but when? It would be nice if the weather would ease a bit, and worth waiting a day or two if the forecast promises improvement.

I put the beans out on the doorstep for a couple of hours yesterday, and they lived to tell the tale.

Compare the picture I took on Thursday and posted on Saturday, and you'll see why I'm anxious about their getting out of hand. The ones in the little coir pots in front are called Cherokee Trail of Tears -- they're supposed to be the beans the Cherokees took along. They're a climbing French-type bean, flat, not pencil-shaped. One or two of them have sent roots through the bottoms of their pots already.

I also reached the toe-shaping of the sock. It feels rather firm – have I been using smaller needles than usual? I should finish today, including Kitchener’ing. Then my husband can try it on and see what he thinks of a shaped instep. I’m glad I chose sober for the auxiliary yarn.

The Future

I am enjoying thinking about what I will buy/do when November comes. Sock-type yarn from Posh Yarn for something loose-fitting and completely simple. And then perhaps attempt Meg’s Bavarian Travelling Stitch cardigan – I’ve got the DVD; I’ve got the books (Bauerliches Stricken in three vols, Omas Strickgeheimnisse in one). That would need a high-twist DK – Ravelry should help.

And I’ve been over there this morning, looking for a preemie pattern for my Games entry. Searching for preemie patterns produces, among them, a few intended as burial gowns. They will be knit and donated, I am sure, with love and sadness, but the idea is also sort of blood-curdling. (A baby can be buried in its best everyday clothes – it doesn’t need a shroud. I think what horrifies and rather frightens me is the idea of planning for a baby’s death.)

I want to do a kimono-style wrap-around thing and will confine myself in future to searching for that with the idea of down-sizing on my own. And I’d better get back to the stash cupboard and start looking for yarn.

Those beans I showed you yesterday are growing with great speed – they’ll have to go out in the cold, cold ground within the next 10 days whether they like it or not, else they’ll start falling over or twining around each other. Every spring, when it comes to sowing beans, I feel a great sympathy with Jack. Who would choose a cow over those beautiful, shiny, astonishing things?

In past years, I have been in the queue at opening time for the Christian Aid Book Sale – it’s the only way to get the gems. By the time we got there yesterday, the dealers had swept in and carried off the Vogue Knitting Books my Friend on the Inside had told me about, and some other choice items. She, Lindsay, was there behind the counter, well padded against the severe cold.

What dealers? Why don’t they deal with me?

I bought a couple of old Rowan winter editions, and my husband came home with a couple of bagfuls from the Art and the Languages tables. I overheard a bored wife tell her husband where she was going, and ask how long he wanted to stay at the sale. “Eight hours?” he said.

There are thousands of books there, donated from this bookish city. The truly astonishing thing is the way they have been lovingly and intelligently sorted. The knitting counter had quantities of those old leaflets from the 60’s, sorted into piles of Babies’, Children’s, Adult’s, Accessories. That’s Lindsay’s job – she’s also got to recognise the treasures and price them appropriately, as well as turning out in the cold to sell them on the day.

It was at the Christian Aid sale, some years ago, that I found the Paton’s leaflet for the shawl I knit Rachel before she was born. Somehow or other, the copy I owned in 1958 had escaped me, and I had been hunting it in charity shops for years.

As for knitting, I press on with the sock. I have opted (without asking) for caution, in my choice of a yarn to finish off the foot, now that the original has run out. Pic tomorrow, perhaps. I am more than halfway between the end of the gusset shaping and the beginning of the toe – it shouldn’t take much longer.

Then the 50 rounds of ribbing for Sock 2, then I will happily lay them aside. There is no doubt that despite Oliver shaping; despite the pleasant variations in the Socka yarn – like an old grey cat; despite Knit Picks, knitting a big grey sock is on the boring side. I was right to press on while I had some momentum going.

It’s cold here – the action of Evelyn Waugh’s novel Scoop begins on a “biting-cold mid-June morning” in London. This is just the sort of thing he was thinking of. Either that, or the state of the country, or even perhaps the state and prospects of my knitting, have enveloped me in gloom.

The things that are happening and are about to happen are in some ways like the things that opened the door to Hitler. There is no sign of him about that I can detect, but we do need a leader of some sort.

And I wonder, a bit, how strong the union is. All this hung parliament stuff is entirely due to Scotland and Wales. England, as usual, voted Conservative. The Conservatives are a feeble fourth among the parties in Scotland, and it is our reliably Labour seats, especially in the west, which keep Labour in business. Things are much the same in Wales, only less extreme. All very disquieting.

Vegetables

I worried, while we were away, about what would happen to the seeds I had left behind on the dining-room window sill. Those little cells dry out quickly. But they’re fine. I carry them anxiously about from one window to another, looking for sun and turning them to try to keep them straight. They couldn’t possibly spend even an hour on the doorstep, in this cold. They are mostly French beans, some dwarf, some climbing – my big effort for this year, along with spring onions.


We hope to go to Strathardle next week, and now I am worrying about planting them out. Even with individual cloches (made from sawn-off plastic water-bottles) and even waiting until the end of our stay, will it be too cold for them? But on the other hand, when will we be back? – especially if we go to Argyll at the end of the month.

Knitting

I am moving down the foot of my husband’s sock, Oliver’ing away. (That’s a Ravelry link.) Today’s excitement will be finishing off a ball of yarn, particularly gratifying in my present state of abstinence, and particularly exciting because I started out with only two balls of the grey so the foot will have to be finished in something else. I’ll have to involve my husband in the choice – something sober or something crazy?

Ron, I never got very far with the circular sock needle. It sort of hurt my wrist, as many have found. I felt that it could be mastered, and would certainly speed things up. I meant to return to it – perhaps it would be most useful in the plain bits. But Knit Picks came into my life at that point, and I now can’t bear to put them down to renew the experiment.

Non-knit, non-vegetable, non-political

Today is the opening day of the Christian Aid Book Sale, a famous Edinburgh event. My Friend on the Inside has already told me that there will be a good selection of Vogue Knitting Books – but not the one I’m still looking for. Still, we’ll hobble up there after breakfast, and I will hope for something to cheer me up.

Thank you for the responses about Walpole's poor cat. I can tell you that the lip of that vase is wide enough for a cat to perch on – especially once she knew that there were goldfish in there – but not to “recline” on.

There are a dozen things I want to say in response to your comments – saddest of all was yours, Susan, about “Jabberwocky” not being recognised. I have long thot that the Alice books are the last true bit of common culture left, Shakespeare and the King James Bible having followed Gray into the shadows long ago. Your comment inspired me to look it up in French, Gretchen. Clever.

(James took his son Alistair camping at Xanadu once – and I also know someone – an anthropologist -- who has been to Timbucktoo.)

Enough of this.

London was hard work, but very successful. (And, yes, we saw quite a few elephants.) My husband is pretty breathless these days, and can’t walk very far. Every journey had to be planned with that in mind. Rachel and Ed, despite heavy work schedules, were terrific about driving us about when they could.

And the Transport for London website, despite eccentricities, is good at revealing the possibilities for various journeys, and even pinpointing bus stops. The schematic information posted at bus stops is good, too. (I dread visiting Glasgow these days – a much smaller city, whose centre is a grid, where I find such information extremely hard to come by.)

We got through the shows on our list – it didn’t really include anything much out of the top drawer, for once, although there were a couple of Mondrians in the International Avant-Garde show at Tatmo. I think the show I liked best was Christen Kobke at the National Gallery. We didn’t get to the British Museum for the Kingdom of Ife and may have missed the best thing in London thereby. My husband is rather down on Van Gogh; hence his absence.

As for knitting, I polished off Ketki’s socks, as hoped, and sternly absented myself from Freecell long enough to do the ribbing – 50 rounds of it – for my husband’s new sock. Once that was done, my beloved Knit Picks took over the job. (That’s an American link, but they are available directly from British sellers too. I am eternally grateful to Kate for telling me about them.)


My current notion is to press on to finish this sock and do the ribbing of the second one, before reverting to the VK scarf. We hope to go to Loch Fyne for the next Bank Holiday at the end of the month to see the Loch Fyne Mileses and Alexander’s vegetables, and Rachel and Ed who hope to come up from London for the occasion. With the ribbing already done, a couple of days would be nearly enough to finish the socks.

Not about Politics

We’re back, and it was a great success. I’ll tell you about it tomorrow – today is needed for convalescence.

Do you recognise these lines?

'TWAS on a lofty vase's side,
Where China's gayest art had dyed
The azure flowers that blow;
Demurest of the tabby kind,
The pensive Selima reclined,
Gazed on the lake below.

Her conscious tail her joy declared;
The fair round face, the snowy beard,
The velvet of her paws,
Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,
Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,
She saw; and purr'd applause.

They are from Thomas Gray’s “On a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes." You can read the rest of it here, along with his “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”, if you like.

I ask because, while we were in London, we saw the very vase on whose rim Selima had perched, and were both deeply moved. It belonged to Horace Walpole, whose cat she was. It’s in a show at the V&A.

When we got back, we asked Rachel, who didn’t know the poem. Later that evening, we spoke to my sister in CT via Skype. She had actually embarked on a PhD in Eng Lit at Yale long ago, before she chucked it in and turned to medicine. She didn’t know the poem. The next evening Rachel’s daughter Hellie came to supper, who read Eng Lit at Newcastle and now works for a literary agency. (Very happy – she’s having a great time.) She didn’t know the poem.

What is the use of a common culture, if no one knows what you’re talking about? Please, someone, tell me you recognise those words.

A good day’s vegetable-growing. Vaut le voyage. Now I am tired, and must spend today re-grouping, as far as possible, and resting for the assault on London tomorrow. Knitting is packed – what book to take? I’m too near the end of Hornet’s Nest to rely on it.

(When I read Warrender, I am impressed by how early everybody gets up in the morning. In Steig Larssen, it’s how much coffee they drink, and all that easy angst-free sex. Warrender won’t do for London – too much Sweden, too soon.)

In the eight days I had been away from Strathardle, and despite leaving it under a cover of snow, spring had done that thing it does. Sprung. All the trees faintly misted with green along the motorway, and when I got there I found the seedling weeds. And that sudden feeling of the power and generosity of the earth.

There was not much actually to see, just the baby weeds and the feeling. The radishes are up, good old radishes, and I brought a few sticks of rhubarb back.

I watered in the nematodes. Fortunately the day was wet enough that I didn’t need to follow on with more water – we have to carry water from the house, for historical reasons too dull to go into here. That would have prolonged the job quite a bit. I got the potatoes planted. I stopped at a garden centre in Blairgowrie on the way to see if they had parsley yet, and they did, so that’s in. I planted peas, and some parsnips, and a few more spring onions.

I would have liked to add some more broad beans, and a bit of salad stuff, but time pressed. No pics. I could have showed you the baby radishes, but it was raining gently much of the time and I didn’t think that would be good for the camera.

As for knitting, I have cast on stripe four of the Chevron Scarf. I’ve got the hang of the long-tail cast-on now, picking up and putting down yarn and needles. And I finished a whole ball of Koigu on Monday evening, as hoped.

I was sufficiently alarmed by JeanfromCornwall’s comment about the possible waning of KF sock yarn that I went to my favourite supplier, Modern Knitting, and there found, I am glad to say, the complete range still on offer. There’s many a slip twixt the computer screen and the stash cupboard, I know, but I was glad at least to see no “out of stock”’s listed yet. They’ve got a lot of other wonderful things, too, if you want to be tempted by sock yarn.

Half-way through stripe three, of six. I’ve reached the point where it gets boring – I’ve done it, so to speak. Now it remains but to grit my teeth and go on doing it. One substantial consolation is that very soon, I will actually finish a ball of yarn. That happened often during the knitting of the Grandson Sweater, and I think I finished some red in the construction of the ear-flap hat for Beijing (which still hasn’t turned up there). Otherwise, not. No wonder the stash stays the same size.

And if I go on from here to Kaffe, the same situation will prevail.

And, Jean, yes, it’s going to be a bitch to block. My hope is that with a pin in each of the external points, and the whole thing stretched, the internal points won’t need individual attention, I can dream. It’s not terribly complicated, catdownunder. Feather and fan stripes, with the ingenious twist of semi-detachment.

And, yes, Mary, I’m afraid the doorstep was wet when I took yesterday’s picture. It wasn’t actually raining at the time, and the moment was brief. I don’t think any harm was done.

Non-knit

We sat down yesterday to face the question of going to London – my husband remains keen, although I’m not at all sure he’s up to it. He’s very short of breath, these days. I’ve been sort of dragging my feet and preferring to talk about something else – I don’t like leaving my vegetables this time of year, anyway.

However, he is determined. And when we sat down with the list of London exhibitions, and had nearly decided to go in June which might never happen, he kept sighing for the Gorky expo at Tatmo which goes off soon – so we’re going this week. Rachel, unfortunately, has room for us, in her household which involves much coming-and-going. I’ll go up to the station this afternoon and negotiate tickets.

I will try to fit in a day trip to Strathardle, all by myself, in advance of this. A couple of hours in reasonable weather (which we’re more or less having) should let me water in the nematodes – they expire on May 10 – and plant some or all of the remaining potatoes and perhaps a few seeds. So if I’m suddenly not here for a day, that’s where I am.

London should let me finish off Ketki’s socks and start another pair – some relatively boring ones for my husband next, I think, to make the KF yarn last longer. I noticed the last time I wandered around the yarn dep’t in John Lewis that they didn’t seem to have it any more, and tried to suppress a feeling of panic.

And Rachel has Free Cell on her computer.

I have never had an outage – is that a word? is it the word I want? – that lasted as long as yesterday’s. It was a disconcerting experience, like one of those dreams in which you need to say something and can’t speak. I don’t even have Free Cell on this computer to keep myself occupied – I deleted it, some years ago, in a burst of Lenten virtue. I found myself slightly surprised during the course of the day that knitting doesn’t need an internet connection.

During a previous period of glitches, minor by comparison with yesterday, I had made a note of some telephone numbers, so I was able to phone Customer Services. “We are aware…engineers are investigating…” It was a comfort. In the afternoon, the message was upgraded to “engineers are still investigating…” The first person who answers when you phone Demon Customer Services is a Scotsman who sounds slightly surprised at being pressed into service to make such a recording. He’s very reassuring, as no doubt he is intended to be.

(I phoned Virgin Money once, about an ISA. While waiting to speak to a human being, I heard the familiar voice of Richard Branson – “thank you for phoning Virgin,” sort of thing. How long did it take him to make that recording? Ten minutes, at most. It was an absolutely brilliant piece of marketing.)

I am well launched into Stripe Three (of six) of the Chevron Scarf. In repose, completely cast-off, it measured 48”. We’re aiming at 58”. It’s not an impossible gulf, given, especially, the open nature of the pattern.

And, Lisa, I think I would say it requires only a fair amount of patience. I did use the long-tail to cast on the third stripe. It was a bit complicated, keeping the two balls of yarn separate when I had to abandon one of them, every so often, to connect to the previous stripe. And also having two ends of the circular needle, plus my left thumb, to knit with. I was getting into a rhythm towards the end, and will persevere with the method, because it certainly makes the succeeding row easier.

Meg, thank you for your kind words (Comment, Friday) about the colours. My first thot had been to use different Koigu reds for each stripe, drawing on my extensive collection. But then I found I had enough of this colour-way for the whole thing. It’s quite like the illustration in VK, and I’m very happy with it, too.

And, Susan, thank you for the nudge – I will write up the jabot. (And congratulations on the weight loss. I love the pic of the scales and the stone. I have maintained my own loss, two-stone-plus-very-slightly-more. It’s tedious, sometimes, keeping up the discipline with no reward of additional loss, but on the other hand I often think of how heavy two stones are, and how nice it is not to be carrying them about. I can feel the difference.)

A sudden lack of connection to the world – panic sets in. I’m still connected to Ground Control, but can’t reach anywhere on the Net. ISP trouble, right?

I was over there in Ravelry when trouble struck. I realised yesterday that if I wanted to find out about Irina Poludnenko, I had better look for her there rather than Googling her name in the wider world. I’ll learn, eventually. She’s done some good things.

While on Ravelry yesterday, I added the Chevron Scarf to my own pile of WIPs and FOs, and was impressed with how Ravelry has moved on. In my early days there, I laboriously catalogued my entire stash as then constituted, uploading pics to Flickr and then retrieving them for Ravelry. Now it’s seamless, straight from my computer to theirs, just like here on Blogger.

And yarns can now be fetched from stash for new projects.

And one’s projects can now be Organised. I mean to do that, although so far haven’t thought of any categories to organise them into.

So this morning I decided to add the Grandson Sweater and the ASJ to my page, and was engaged on that occupation when the outside world vanished beneath my feet. Most disconcerting.

The scarf progresses well. I’m knitting the final row of the second stripe. Of the three transitional rows – casting off in pattern; casting on again attaching to every 12th stitch of previous stripe; knitting 1st pattern row of new stripe – it’s the third that’s tough. Getting hold of stitches from the cable cast-on for the M1’s and even for the k2togs is hard.

So this time I’m going to attempt to employ a second ball of yarn again, and do a long-tail cast on. Will it work? I ought to find out this evening.

I also mean to measure length while it’s cast off, just to get a general idea. The pattern is aiming for something just short of five feet and my impression is that I’m in the right ball park.

I have a couple more things to say, but they involve on-line reality checks which are outside of my grasp. Nor, of course, can I post this. When you see it, it means I must be back with you.

And here I am -- at teatime. What a day!

Tamar, thank you. It is a good thing you don’t have a blog of your own, so that you can devote serious computer time to knowing where the find the answer to everything. I am very grateful, and very comforted. (See comment yesterday – the problem was how to find my way around on the Stirling campus at Knitcamp in the summer, when I arrive breathless and need to find Franklin's class.)

Good progress with the scarf. I’ve started the second stripe, and although the process of casting off, casting on and picking up, and resuming the pattern over the cast-on stitches, is all a bit awkward, it’s do-able. And the fact that the scarf suddenly looks like the illustration is a great incentive to proceed.

I found that, for myself, the way to do the casting-on row was to *pick up the next stitch for joining and keep it there on the RH needle while cable-casting-on 11. Then knit it.* Repeat indefinitely.

The designer is called Irina Poludnenko. I google’d her without finding anything else that interested me. She seems to work mostly for Tahki Stacy Charles. although searching their website for her name yields nothing.

The computer is being unusually sluggish this morning.

Here’s the scarf so far – I’m casting off the first stripe, and should at least, today, progress as far as casting on the next. How easy will it be to hit the precise point required for the joins – the stitch between two M1’s? Blocking this baby is going to be as bad as lace – every point will have to be pinned.

Knit Camp

I continue uneasy, if only for having spent so much money and having absolutely nothing to show for it. The Ravelry group is some comfort – the enthusiasm of the knitters will carry things forward despite the organisers, to some extent. All I really need from on high is an indication of what building(s) on the Stirling campus will be devoted to classes. I have a nightmare of getting there half an hour early and not being able to find Franklin.

What bus to take (if I arrive by train), where to find it, how often it runs, where it will put me down – all that I can find for myself, if need be.

Annie Modesitt said the other day that classes are filling up FAST. But she said that a month ago, and registration has been open since the first of the year, so it can’t be true. A recent Q&A on the Ravelry group would seem to hint that no class has yet sold out.

I wonder how they mean to deal with classes that don’t attract enough punters. Do they just say, Sorry, Franklin, we won’t be wanting you after all? (I choose his name per impossibile; but there are others who might suffer that fate.) Can you treat famous knitters like that? What does Knitter’s Magazine do when not enough people sign up for an advertised class at Stitches? Many -- most? – of the teachers are American. Who is paying their air fares? Annie is fussy, and won’t teach for Stitches, so they must have offered her what sounded like a good deal.

As far as we hear from the organisers at all, it is all about the Knit Camp T-shirt and choosing a list of Ten Iconic Knitting Patterns and, in short, rather girly.

Non-knit

We went to a “hustings” last night at which appeared the candidates for the parliamentary seat of North Edinburgh and Leith. It was rather interesting. Worth being reminded, as this election gets more and more American, that what actually happens in Britain is not a vote for Cameron or Brown or Clegg or Salmond, but for some un-famous soul to represent a relatively small geographical collection of people, including oneself. I don’t think we have gerrymandering here.

None of the candidates was remotely slick. All were politicians, wittering on from their internal scripts about schools! and hospitals! and scrapping Trident! The audience was more interesting – large and angry and frightened of a future which will soon involve paying down the deficit.

My sister and her husband have bailed out and taken the offered refund for their non-refundable air tickets, figuring that there’s not much point in flying to Paris and then trying to reach GB if most of the population of these islands is over there, too, waiting to be evacuated from the beaches, Dunkirk-style. Roger and Helen will take awhile to recover, and then try again, maybe in June.

It’s sad. But at least Roger is there in CT with his vegetables at this vital time of year.

A good day, yesterday, involving much napping. I think we both feel much restored.

I’ve made a good start on the chevron scarf. I could never have done it without Gretchen’s comment of January 5, after I had had to make two attempts to cast on the Grandson Sweater. Her notion is to tie two balls of wool together, when doing a long-tail cast on, and use one for the stitches and the other for the long-tail. With 411 stitches involved, as here, that was a Godsend.

The scarf – for non-VK-owners – consists of six six-row stripes. End of story. Except that each stripe is cast off when complete, and the next one cast on and at the same time attached to its predecessor once every 12 stitches. The pattern is good old Feather and Fan, with the increases done as M1, lifting the bar between the next two stitches and knitting into the back of it. The pattern is a 12-stitch repeat, and is offset by 6 stitches in successive stripes. The points of attachment for successive stripes are likewise offset.

I’m using Koigu, which must be very close in size to the specified yarn, “Claudia Handpainted Yarns Cotton Ball” of which I have never heard. Koigu has slightly more metres to the gram, and I’m knitting on a 3mm needle as specified on the ball band, not 3.5 as the pattern says. So my result will probably be slightly smaller – but wool, on the other hand, may block more obligingly than cotton. I’m not worried.

There doesn’t seem much point in attempting a picture until I have attached the second stripe.

Thank you for advice about the Games. I still don’t feel that I’ll attempt another knitted toy, but I’ll look at Alan Dart. Interesting what you say about the judges feeling that Mrs Miles shouldn’t win too often, Mary Lou. They’re not supposed to know. You submit your entry with a tag attached, folded over and sealed. It’s only opened, revealing your name, if you win.

BUT in ’08, the category was “child’s sweater with motif”. I re-knit the VK dinosaur sweater which I had done many years before for Thomas-the-Elder. Here is the '08 version on his cousin Thomas-the-Younger.

It was unplaced – clearly, “with motif” didn’t mean “with motifs”. So the tag was never opened. But in conversation at breakfast at their b&b the next morning, Rachel and Ed met some people who had admired the dinosaurs and who mysteriously knew that “she won last year”. The walls have eyes, in a village. And of course committee members are already on duty during that delicious early-morning time when one brings the family entries down and submits them to the Home Industries Tent. It's the best bit of Games Day, just as exploring the contents of one’s stocking is the best part of Christmas.

Where to start? – ah, with ChinaDoll’s question. We had a spectacularly wonderful week, as sometimes happens, blue skies, sunshine all day, both of us outdoors all day. No cloud of ash overhead, no smell of sulphur, no smarting eyes, no spectacular sunsets, even. It is hard not to veer towards the conclusion that the Snark is a Boojum. My sister and her husband were meant to fly from Boston to Nice on Sunday evening for a meeting connected with their recent work in Africa, to be followed by some long-awaited family visiting.

At the moment, they are still in CT, re-booked to fly from Boston to Paris tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

There had been a great storm in Strathardle in our absence. We lost a venerable and beloved tree. It was a gean, prunus avium, and we will replace it this fall. It comes under the heading of native woodland, and my husband is anxious not to get something from a garden centre, grown in Holland. I think that won’t be difficult.

From our west lawn -- it fell rather neatly outwards:

From outside. Everything beyond that gate is our neighbours' land:



After scrambling through the tree, looking back towards our bit:


I got a lot of preparatory work done for the ’10 vegetables. The ground was very workable, but it was still cool to the touch, and there is no sign yet of this year’s seedling weeds. Both of these symptoms mean not to press ahead too fast with one’s own seeds, but I put in some radishes and spring onions and spinach and beetroot, just because the sun was shining. And a few potatoes. Plenty of seed left to re-do it all next month.

When we were there in February and March, you will remember, the ground was literally frozen solid. For the February visit, I had taken along some newly-purchased sea kale thongs and also some luscious-looking Jerusalem artichokes given me by the Fishwife. (And if you want to see what a vegetable plot should look like in April, just go have a look at hers.)

All I could do was collect earth from the many molehills – for some reason, not frozen – and store the things in two big flowerpots. The sea kale, last week, turned out to have turned to mush – a rather expensive failure with which to kick off the vegetable-growing year. I’ll put peas in the spot prepared last autumn for sea kale. But the artichokes, in their pot, were happy as Larry, perhaps happier, with roots and sprouts. So I planted them.

Yesterday morning, we woke up to this.


Knitting

As for knitting, I pressed on, but not very hard, with the Araucania sweater. I’m now an inch and a half short of the shoulder in the back.


And last night, I started casting on for the VK Chevron Scarf, 411 stitches. Most of the experience of knitting it – if I persevere; no guarantees at this stage -- is going to consist of casting on and binding off, so I might as well try to enjoy it.

I got a look at this year’s Games Programme while we were in Strathardle. The knitting classes are “knitted toy” and “article for a premature baby, to be donated”. I won a Knitted Toy class with Sam the Ram in ’07 – it’s far too soon to have that again, and there’s no point in my entering. The thing for the baby is worth doing, and will be quick, and do-able from stash. So I’ll do that. My husband’s sister, who had the bad luck to be present in Sam’s year, thinks I am fiercely competitive. I think I am entering because the Games are more fun if one participates, and so that I can set the grandchildren an example of grace in defeat. Who is right?

C’e lo fatta! as I think we say in Italian:

Slow and steady. I put gathering threads in each tier, and drew parallel lines on the backing before I started, in the interests of achieving straightness. Now I need a ziplock bag and some of that acid-free tissue paper I got for the Princess, if I can find it. What one doesn’t want now is a moth.

Jamie Oliver’s tray-baked salmon was absolutely right for lunch yesterday. So that’s that done. And I’m glad we postponed Strathardle until it was behind us. The weather is less spectacularly vernal this morning, but still along the right lines. I have high hopes of actually getting started on things. When we get back, it’ll be time to start growing beans on the windowsill. That’s always fun.

I even got some Oliver’ing done on Ketki’s second sock yesterday evening. A good day all round.

Next I’ll attempt that VK scarf (see sidebar) in Koigu. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. And then probably go on to the KF jacket.

The further I proceed with this yarn fast, the more depressed I get at the absolutely unchanged aspect of the stash cupboard.

Back next Tuesday or so, insh’Allah.

Little to report.

We had a nice day with the Loch Fyne Mileses. Alexander agrees that the tree-climbing stunt was just that, pointing out that such a tree is of substantial diameter at the base, so that a plumb line dropped from the top, can’t hang straight.

The fish pie was nice -- here’s the recipe, Holly -- but the little boys didn’t like it. (Alexander: “They don’t eat food.”) Ketki had some emergency supplies.

I often wonder how cats fared during the war

and the same question might be asked about young children. Both groups survived.

As for knitting, not much. I was kicked-by-horse tired in the evening, and made do with rounding the heel of Ketki’s second sock. I’m just at the point where the Oliver shaping starts. That’s great fun, so firmness and self-discipline will be required this evening if I am to start assembling the jabot.

I’d better get on with today’s lunch party. The weather is suddenly, gloriously spring and I have high hopes for some energetic vegetable gardening in Strathardle, starting tomorrow. Alexander has got his radishes in.

“Ducks in a row” – that’s it, of course. Thanks, Moorecat. I love the one your husband heard, too.

Here’s Tier Five, finished.

Here’s the complete jabot, pinned together. I had a while yesterday, after doing the pinning, when I wondered if I hadn’t gone Over the Top with a fifth tier. It looks better this morning.

The only way to go from here, is on. Unpin everything, tidy the loose ends, and start attaching, layer by layer. I could have embarked on the process last night, but I was frazzled by a day which ended up with only one duck in position – Delia Smith’s Luxury Fish Pie is made and refrigerated. I’ll leave it out to get to room temperature while we’re at Mass, and put it in the oven while we drink Prosecco afterwards with our friends, as we did last week.

Last night, I retreated to Ketki's KF socks, and reached the heel flap of the second one. Thank God for socks.

This morning, I must cut up things for a salad, and arrange the dining room. Two more ducks.

Something completely different…

I don’t know how long the BBC will keep this one up, but for the moment here is a clip about the measuring of a tree in Argyll which has been pronounced the tallest in Scotland, or is it GB? We saw the item on the news on Friday evening, with additional material which doesn’t appear here, and lacking the scene for which I include it, namely Alexander and his sons, standing under the tree, peering upwards like the men of Galilee on the first Ascension Day. Their bit lasts less than a second, I would say, but they are perfectly obvious, in the foreground, the boys wearing red. It’s right at the beginning – you don’t have to stay around for the tree-climbing.

(The tree is in the arboretum on the Ardkinglas estate, and that’s where the Loch Fyne Mileses live.)

In the item as shewn on the news, the men came down from the tree and stretched out their rope on the ground and measured it. I will ask Alexander about this when he gets here today. Surely trigonometry – available since the Enlightenment if not since Archimedes -- would provide a quicker, easier and probably more accurate measurement.

Thanks for the help with pdf files. Live and learn. I tried the Help section of my daily word processor – Word – and found that I could buy a pdf attachment. (My system is pretty old and creaky.) But then, I thought – I’ve got another word processor, Word Perfect, which I use to get my husband’s Word Perfect files, created on the DOS machine he uses daily, believe it or not, into a format usable by the world.

Word Perfect will load his files and convert them into modern Word Perfect, thence to Word, and Word presents them, when necessary, to the world. When I bought this computer those little square not-floppy floppy disks were just on the cusp, and I was surprised when the machine was delivered without a drive for them. If I’d thought that was a possibility, I’d have asked the nice man at Dell to put one in.

I don’t like to boast – well, I do. I installed one with my own hands.

Anyway, just now I loaded Word Perfect and asked it about pdf’s. It is perfectly happy to produce them without additional payment. So that’s that problem solved.

The discovery of Google Document, thanks to FiberQat, is another plus. I don’t know how I’d ever use it, but I’m very glad to know it’s there.

Knitting

Tier Five of the jabot is nearly finished – a repeat and a half of the Doris edging pattern to go. A busy day looms: Alexander and Ketki and their sons are coming tomorrow for their delayed Easter visit, and Monday is the lunch guest who’ll get Jamie’s tray-baked salmon, and Tuesday, insh’Allah, is designated for Strathardle at last, to get started on the ’10 garden. (Spring is suddenly, definitely here. Only a fortnight ago an Intercity train in the Highlands got stuck overnight in the snow.) Today I need to get the birdies lined up, or whatever the phrase is.

But I’ll try hard to get Five finished and blocked, so that assembly can begin tomorrow.

To change the subject –

I was glad to see that the Twist Collective spring-summer collection is with us at last. There’s nothing there for me, I don’t think. It’s all a bit form-fitting, no swing jackets. But I followed up the ad for Sweetgeorgia yarn. Wow! I found the website a bit hard to navigate – what look like links, don’t seem to link to anything. But click on the changing picture of yarn at the top, and you’re in. Anything you want, I gather, will be custom-dyed.

So that’s a good one for my Dream List. I continue to follow Posh Yarns closely, too.

Tier Five progresses well. The Leaf Lace pattern looks fancier than Razor Shell, and goes particularly well with the Doris edging. That’s what it is, Stacey – Heirloom Knitting p. 74, chosen for narrowness. I agree, it’s doing the job well.

FiberQat, I’d love to put the jabot instructions on Ravelry. I hesitate a) because it wouldn’t quite be a pattern, like Joanie’s. I’d refer to Heirloom Knitting and the criteria for choosing patterns from the book and the rough size each tier should be, and the yarn and stitch numbers and needle size I used, but that’s not quite the same; and b) because I don’t know how to create a .pdf file. Maybe I should find out.

Or would I need one?

When I was cruising around recently looking at Koigu jacket patterns, I found an entrelac one. I don’t really think I want it – the effect is too Michelin Man. But I clicked on download-free-pattern, only to be told that the designer was currently stuck on figuring out how to do a .pdf file.

(As the clumsy among you must know, if you type in “Ravlery” by mistake you arrive at a site at least somewhat knit-related; I’ve been there often but never really explored it. What a good idea! And what a compliment to the original!)

Postal services

The ear-flap hat still hasn’t reached its addressee in Beijing. The Chinese are funny about packages. I’m glad I’ll be able to hand over the jabot in person.

Here in Edinburgh, I’ve been waiting too long for packages from two of my seed suppliers, and for a sweat shirt from CafePress. I’d worry if only one thing were missing, but with that many, they must be somewhere in the system. I’ve got plenty of seeds, anyway.

Viruses

My friend’s viral message turned up on schedule this morning; the deluge related to 13/11/9 seems for the moment to have subsided.

Comments are instructed to turn up in my email in-box, as well as being appended to the blog itself. Most of them come in with your internet identities as Sender, but some are Anonymous. The bad ones are always Anonymous, so I click on that word with a certain sinking of the heart. It is particularly gratifying when, as yesterday, it turns out to be you, Ron.

Hard to get started, this morning, and now time’s nearly up.

Here is Tier Four of the jabot, being blocked:

It looks very like Tier Three.

Here is the jabot with four tiers pinned in place – that’s really enough, but for Chinese superstition.

I am well embarked on Tier Five. It is slightly larger than Three and Four, and uses a different lace for the central rectangle. The rectangle won’t show at all – it’s just to amuse me. And I’ve chosen one, Leaf Lace, HK p. 65, which is chock-a-block with K3tog’s, and slo-o-o-ow. Still, it makes a change.

And when it comes time for sewing, as it will soon, I will repeat your comment as a mantra, Mel, with every breath I draw: slow and steady. If I need gathering threads and/or basting threads, I will put them in. The ball isn’t until November. There’s no hurry.

I have discovered that Blogger allows me ten fixed pages – I mean to write out the procedure for jabot-knitting and have it permanently available. Or as permanently as this transitory medium allows. I think maybe I should do a page for Lizzie’s First Holy Communion veil, which was repeated and improved for Rachel and Kirsty in Beijing. That page already exists, as part of the detritus from my abandoned website. It’s just a matter of bestirring myself.

The point being, of course, that I don’t think there are patterns for either “out there” – except, now, Joannie’s jabot pattern on Ravelry.

Non-knit

What else? – I’m having a nice time with Steig Larssen. Never mind the danger that I might let slip a spoiler – he completely gives away Volume 1 in Volume 2, and even more so, 2 in 3. You’ve got to read them in order, or you might as well not bother. And it’s not entirely easy, now that all three are in paperback and the titles absolutely indistinguishable. I don’t remember any other thriller author doing that – little teasers to induce you read the earlier books, yes. This is different.

I didn’t hear from my friend’s virus yesterday, and rather missed it – but one has turned up this morning, so that’s OK. Comments continue to pile in for Friday the 13th of November last year. I’ve never had a deluge quite like this. I remind myself – slow and steady – that I don’t need to rush off and delete them in Blogger every time one pops up in my inbox. They haven’t been published. They can wait until I get around to zapping them.

And – it’s spring. It really is, this week at last. Next week, we hope for Strathardle. Maybe I can get started on this year’s garden at last.

My husband fully appreciates the resources of the internet, but I am the one who is sent to draw from the well. I have just spent the better part of an hour trying to find out what Lady Salisbury meant when she said, of an artist I won’t name, that he had the manners of Brancas. I think I’ve got it – not only who Brancas was and what his manners were (that was fairly easy), but how Lady Salisbury might have known about him.

It took time that might better have been spent blogging.

Tier Four of the jabot is finished. I hope to block it this morning. It will dry quickly, and I ought to be able to pin it in place in time for this evening’s Knitting Session, so that I can make a final decision about the dimensions of Tier Five. I’ve already made a good start on its lower edging.

The day is rapidly approaching – this week may even contain it – when I’ve got to take needle and thread in hand and sew this puppy together. I’m nervous of that moment. I am no seamstress.

This and That

Moorecat, thank you for the kind remark about our green room. It was scary, I remember. The painter himself thought we’d gone a bit too far, and we weren’t sure until the work was pretty far advanced that we’d got it right. And, yes, a squirrel swift.

I hate shopping except in LYS’s and bookstores – well, food-shopping isn’t too bad as long as my husband stays home. But he likes antiques and hardware and, in general, the pursuit of anything he has determined to find. Currently, an umbrella stand for Strathardle.

We saw the swift in an antique shop and it was only after we got home that I realised I wanted it, and phoned them. This must have been in my Knitlist days: I didn’t even know that it was a “squirrel swift” until people there told me.

It’s been very useful, not least because a job can be suspended in mid-operation. The current one has been in that state far too long. It was, I think, part of the original plan for Ketki’s Calcutta Cup sweater of 2008, discarded after swatching. The plan was discarded; the yarn is still with me. I must finish winding it, because Koigu-winding looms, and after that the KF jacket.

Donna Druchunas has a link on her blog to an appeal for funds for the Musk Ox Farm. I’d like to know more about what has gone wrong, and what the business plan is. But it is dreadful to think of it coming to an end.

I’ve started Steig Larssen #3. No spoilers, I promise. Reading Wallander, one is much impressed with how early everybody gets up in the morning. In Larssen, it’s how much coffee they drink.

Do I have anything at all to say about knitting today? Well, I am putting the side edges on Tier Four of the jabot, which should therefore be finished today. That’s something.

Viruses

Billi-Jean, I think you’ve cracked it. I was stuck in a five-year-old time warp, assuming the virus had to live in my friend’s computer. But his address list is out there with msn (just as mine resides with Google), and that must be where the fence is down. I did get another one yesterday, but there is nothing so far this morning.

When I had KLEZ.H its finest effort was to send me a message from “James Miles” inviting me to click on a website to get rid of itself. What would have happened had I done it? Things could hardly have been worse at that point. But I didn’t -- there was something about the prose style of the message which suggested that it had not been written by any “James Miles” I had ever met, let alone the one I brought up. I should have saved it.

Food

I am a bit embarrassed to be reminded that I have mentioned Jamie’s tray-baked salmon before. It was Greek Helen who pointed it out to me. I had the book, but hadn’t spotted it. How well you put it, Gerri – “impressive enough that a guest feels a guest”.

The official Oliver website doesn’t give it – I looked just now -- although a similar one is there, from “Jamie’s Dinners”. That’s the volume, out of all of his, which I have duplicated for the very short cookery-book shelf in Strathardle.

Sunday

Our niece Clare has just indulged herself in a digital camera. She sent me these pictures from Sunday’s gathering.

Brother and sister:

In the foreground you can see the composed salad, the quails eggs concealed under layers of potatoes and avocados. I wouldn’t say the flavour is distinctly different from hen’s eggs. It’s the size that’s fun. Notice the flagon of cider in the background.

Knitting Ketki’s sock:

Trying to get the rabbit to work:

That’s the green suede jacket I bought at East at Christmas time. As sometimes happens with absurd extravagance, it’s utterly wonderful, rarely worn, and I love every moment I spend inside it. And a year of blameless living has reduced me to a size which makes it no longer acutely painful to look at pictures of myself. That’s a plus.