Today is my sister’s 70th birthday. That’s a big one. Happy Birthday, Helen.

A different Helen wrote yesterday saying that it was wonderful to see the Calcutta Cup emerging from the ribbing. So it is – I’m now doing the penultimate row. Gauge seems good, although I’ll keep measuring. I told the Sweater Wizard 7 ½ sts to the inch. Then the total had to be increased slightly to accommodate an 18-stitch pattern repeat. I wouldn’t be entirely sorry to see 7 ¾ stitchs to the inch, and have gone down a needle size from my Fair Isle usual with that thought in mind. 7 ¼ would be bad news.

But that’s not the point.

I knit this sweater for Rachel 30 years ago, when she went up to Cambridge.



It’s from Pam Dawson’s “Knitting Fashion” which was one of the milestone books in my knitting career. Front and back are identical – I put O TEMPORA O MORES on one side, and Archimedes’ “Give me a place to stand…” in Greek on the other. (The reference is to the principle of the fulcrum and lever – “Give me a place to stand and I will move the earth.”)

I don’t think I have ever knit so much text. But much or little, the experience is the same. The knitting seems completely irrational, without system or symmetry, but what emerges, makes sense. It’s sort of exciting.

Kathy, what happened to the gansey was that I got worried about size, and laid it aside until Ketki came for the Games, in late August, so that I could try it on. The picture below, which I’ve posted before, shows it being tried on Helen earlier in the summer– daughter Helen, that is, who is not the same person as either of the two Helen’s mentioned above. I filled in the time with a plain vanilla Malabrigo vest for myself – I seem to have deleted all the pictures of that. And then of course I broke my arm, and both these projects were stranded in Strathardle. The vest is virtually finished. If we get there next weekend, I’ll polish it off.



And then go back to the gansey. At the worst, it will fit Helen, and I can start again on one for Ketki, with more information.