Monday, October 09, 2017

Paradox has been leaping about and this time has affected the font.

In general, however, things are improving on the cat front. Perdita’s attitude today has been that we must be adults about this. We have been afflicted with a kitten, but that is no reason why we can’t go on living more or less as before, with occasional growling. It’s not my fault (a major concession).




I worried, a day or two ago, about not bonding with Paradox while trying so hard to reassure Perdita. No danger there. She follows the script for Engaging Kitten so strenuously (lap-sitting and purring and all) that no one could fail to bond with her.

Knitobsession, thank you for “Purradox”. It took me a long time to grasp that my husband’s P-names for cats were also puns of that sort: “Perth”, who died young in a road accident in Leicester in the late 60’s; “Poussin”, the cat with whom our children grew up; and – after a gap – “Perdita”.

Knitting

Miss Rachel’s Yoke is at the exciting point where the next thing to do is to join sleeves to body. I need to tackle that one early in the day, as it involves much sliding of stitches around needles and counting them.

Tracy Purtscher’s “Dimensional Tuck Knitting” was delivered here today – I think you in the US have had it for a couple of weeks. It is extremely interesting. Going back through the EYF class list – is anyone teaching this technique? – the only one I can find is Nancy Marchant.

Tricia, could you tell me a bit more about her brioche-with-tuck class? Maybe I should switch. I’ve still got five days before the classes go live. Or, of course, I could do both! and cut out something else. What an enterprising woman! Within a year or two, there’ll be Craftsy classes on tucks and EYF classes and all. For the moment, maybe there’s something to be said for learning from the first leading knitter (other than Purtscher herself) to have engaged with the technique.

If I applied myself, even at my great age, I could probably work it out from the book. But a teacher helps.

Jane, I do admire your calm and sensible approach to brioche knitting – work through Marchant’s Craftsy class and only then attempt the Soutache. Whereas I plunged straight in.

Fruity Knitting tomorrow? Let’s hope so. Three weeks is a long time to wait.

6 comments:

  1. Anonymous8:41 PM

    You've just found the name for your next cat—Purtscher! A husband who puns is a treasure—what a good memory to have. CarolG

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  2. The “tuck” stitches are formed by doing more than one brioche yarnover on a stitch in successive rows and then doing, in Nancy's terminology, a brk or brp stitch, to knit the stitch together with all its yarnovers, which causes a tuck in the fabric. I hope that makes sense. She has also invented (with the help of Stephen West!) a notation for describing the stitches for pattern writing purposes, which is very clever. Various patterns can be achieved by varying the placement of the tuck stitches and how many yarn overs they are given. Sadly, I didn’t find the resulting patterns much to my taste, but other people in the class seemed to like them more. The explanation of them was very clear and we learned exactly how the tuck stitches were formed and what could be done with them. Happy to answer any other questions you have.

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  3. I’ve now had a look at the EYF programme and the Tuck into a Brioche Cowl is the same title as the class I did at SWW. To me, it’s misleading as it suggested we would be learning to make a Brioche Cowl, not a tuck stitch Cowl. I wish I’d done the Beyond Basic Brioche class instead, but it was still good to take a class with Nancy.

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  4. I don't how sensible the approach is, but I do know that I've started over more times than I can count. I finally made it through the swatch and am attempting the sample scarf for about the third time. Oh well. I am more interested in the process than the product here.

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  5. You are right that the real Abdul was a great deal less sigh-worthy than the gorgeous actor in the film. I never undestood what Victoria saw there but then I couldn't quite see how she was so attacted to Albert either. I do believe that photography back then somehow extracted he sitters'sparkle and turned them into lumpy grumps.

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