The garden, yesterday 

Potatoes, earthed up 

Safely Back

...and I'm glad I won't be doing that again until I have at least one new eye, but all in fact went well on the driving front.

I got the body of Rachel's striuped Koigu finished, the second shoulder joined, the sleeve increases calculated, and a good start made on the first sleeve. Pic soon.

The news from the garden is less cheerful. In fact I have never been so disappointed, this time of year. This time last year, I was nibbling the firstsalad leaves. This year, no lettuce, no rocket, no carrots, no French beans, and a very poor showing from a number of other things. Saddest, perhaps, the courgettes, boring to eat but such fun to grow. There were two or three seeds under each of the eight plastic bottles you can see in the picture. I have exactly two seedlings. The runner beans, which are meant to climb the tepee behind, aren't all that much better. Three of the eight canes are empty.

I suspect a multiplicity of causes (pace my friend William of Occam). Slugs for the lettuce, cold for the courgettes, maybe even pheasants for the French beans. I planted a whole lot more seeds -- for many things, it's still not too late -- and sprinkled slug pellets with a liberal hand. My sister-in-law and the Prince of Wales would be distressed to hear it, so we won't tell them.

The tatties are looking good. I earthed them up to their green eyebrows, as I won't be seeing them again for a while.

And I cut a lot of grass.

 

Reply to Pam

A tammy (or tammie -- I seem to spell it differently on different days) is a Tam-o'-Shanter (whatever that means), one of those dinner-plate-type hats with Fair Isle patterning.

The tammy -- first picture 

Princess Shawl

I got a full repeat, and a bit more, of the Princess shawl edging done yesterday. Imagine another five years of blog entries like that one, and you'll see what we've let ourselves in for.

I surmounted the first disaster, too -- the discovery of an errant stitch cavorting merrily downwards. I unravelled three or four rows, got the stitches more or less back on the needle, and succeeded -- that was the hardest part -- in figuring out where I now was and how to proceed. I have never used a "lifeline" in lace knitting -- where you run a contrast thread through the stitches so that if the Worst Happens, you have a known, fixed point to unravel back to. But I think, if I go on with this, it might be a good idea to start doing it when I get to the huge and beautiful border.

I heard from my cyber-friend Janis this morning -- the one who is thinking of doing a Knitalong with me on this thing. She wonders how a bride  would wear it, given that it is a triangle. I think the long top edge would go on the head, secured with a crown of some sort. She also wonders, why not just knit it as written with the larger yarn, and let the result be as large as it wants to? That's an interesting thought. I think I know enough now -- from having dressed the beginning of the edging -- to calculate pretty closely how big that would in fact be. I'll hit the calculator one day soon, and find out. Janis asks that the next time I photograph the edging, I put in some object to provide a sense of scale. Good idea.

Other Knitting news

The tammy proceeds. Picture above. I don't think I could knit the Princess Shawl full time. It's mentally exhausting, in a curious and rather exhilerating sort of way. That may change as I get further into it, and when I have my new eyes installed. Meanwhile, the tammy continues to seem both coarse and boring. I'm glad it won't take long. It should become marginally more interesting when we get to the decreases on the crown. For now, the Fair Isle patterns are so easy as to seem insulting. My fault, for going for a ready-made pattern.

I had a look at the Knitting Curmudgeon (http://www.knittingcurmudgeon.com./) when I was cruising the knitting blogs yesterday, and found a reference to myself, an honour which stunned me. My friend Selma knows both her and Queer Joe, and says that in real life the Curmudgeon is rather sweet and Joe rather bitchy, in both cases unlike their blogs.

Non-knit

We're off to the country today, to rejoin my vegetables (and the over-grown grass). Blogging should resume next Wednesday, the 15th. I'll be glad to stop wrestling with cobwebs for a while and get back to Rachel's striped Koigu. When we get back here, I will probably have forgotton all I have so far achieved with the Princess border, and have hands too roughened by toil to knit it, anyway.

Thomas and James 

I had trouble surfing my favourite blogs this morning, so maybe I won't be able to post this, either.

There's now some colour in the tammie, and there should be more by tomorrow. For today, we'll have a Grandchild Picture, celebrating Jamie's second birthday. His father Alexander sent three yesterday. I chose this one for publication because it includes my friend Thomas-the-Younger.

Knitting will persumably remain in a quiet groove for some time. I have set myself, vaguely, to do half-a-repeat of the Princess Shawl edging pattern daily. Effectively, forever. I did a full one yesterday. I posted to the Heirloom Knitting group; no response, except that a brave soul in Sweden took me up on  my offer of a cone of Japanese silk. She'll be sorry.

Non-Knit

Since going to that movie last week and realising how much worse my sight is than it was the last time we went to a movie, I have been increasingly worried about the irresponsibility involved in driving about when I can't see very well. I've lost count of how many Decisions I have made about this eye thing, but yesterday I made another -- and made an appointment to see an Eye Man privately (and at enormous expense) on the 18th. I hope he will be able to do the operation(s) quite soon thereafter; this month, anyway.

We're going to the country tomorrow (irresponsibly). If we get back alive, that'll be it, effectively, until I get my new eyes. The Thessaloniki daughter and grandchildren will take up residence there in mid-July. Helen will be able to drive down to Edinburgh to fetch us. There should be lots of people about all through August who could do that, and with any luck I'll be back on the road myself by the end of that month.

So that really leaves only the month's gap between mid-June and mid-July, when we normally would have gone up there once for a few days. I must see if I can find anyone to cut the grass -- a month's grace is longer than I care to allow it. The vegetables will have to fend for themselves. I think it's probably just as well to be here in Edinburgh for the G8 summit anyway, to defend one's furniture and one's stash from Geldof and the anarchists.

The Princess shawl, eventually 

Nice, innit? Even in this somewhat fuzzy picture.

Yesterday I took the first three repeats of the Princess shawl edging pattern off the needles and blocked them. I am delighted with the result. I really like this yarn. I like this fabric. Yesterday, too, I broke through some sort of pain barrier, and I like the knitting more and more. Which is not to say that I have become any less slow and clumsy.

Trouble is, Sharon is right of course -- if I go on knitting the pattern as written in this yarn, I'll wind up with something that would cover the Millenium Dome. How many n's in "millenium"?

I think the thing to do is to forge on, however. It is easy enough to calculate that if I knit a mere 70 or 71 repeats of the edging, I will have a strip as long as Sharon got with 85. If I then pick up stitches along the straight edge, I will have enough stitches for nine "feathers" in the beautiful border, instead of Sharon's eleven. So far so good. I can't see any way to take any rows out of the border without desecration, so I'll wind up with a rectangular piece -- there doesn't seem to be any shaping in the border -- rather deeper than designed, but not grotesquely so. As I suspected, most of the discrepancy in the gauge between this yarn and the original, is in the stitch count. The row count is off too, but not nearly as much.

Then the border is ingeniously gathered, and attached to a triangular centre which starts effectively with a single stitch in the absolute centre of the central feather, and widens out. The re-sizing of that might take care of itself -- famous last words -- since I will start with fewer stitches. Finally there's a border across the top.

I will have years to read and re-read the pattern and think about these things as I go along, but go along is what I think I'll do. At least that's what I think this morning. I'll write a post for the Heirloomknitting group to which I belong, and which Sharon reads, so that she can cry out in horror if need be.

Meanwhile the ribbing for the tammy is finished, the crown increases done, and after a few more boring plain rows I should get to start some simple colour stuff today. Picture soon.

Vivat! Senator Biden

...who thinks the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay should be closed down.

What the EU needs, incidentally, is a body like the American Senate -- two or three people elected from each member state, and meeting in open session. At the moment we are run by the Commission which has members appointed by each member state, and which meets in camera.

 

My lettuce -- latest! 

The thrilling pace of knitting news in the last few days has subsided somewhat -- except that the new Knitting magazine turned up yestrday, earlier than I expected.

I've got five more rows to do of the third repeat of the Princess edging. Then I think I'll dress it, and will thus I hope be able to offer a picture before we go to the country on Wednesday. I still like the way it looks, but it's tough going. I am beginning to gt a sense of how the pattern works -- that's when one starts to make mistakes, of course -- but it's a titantic struggle for mind and eye and hand. Turning from it to the initial ribbing for the tammy, feels like knitting an overcoat. Shetland jumper weight.

So for todaywe'll have a nice restful picture of the doorstep lettuces and rocket.

Here is the pattern I shall attempt 

I was wandering around, having my usual morning look at favourite blogs, and stumbled through the undergrowth towards this one: http://www.dooce.com/ It's not about knitting at all, but it's entertaining. Read her profile.

Princess

I've finished two repeats of the edging pattern -- only 83 to go. I still like the look of it. I wonder, if I go on, if I'll ever learn the edging pattern? I reflected last night that it's perhaps a bit silly to embark on this without at least trying the yarn that Sharon herself used for the exemplar, given that I revere her above any other British knitter,and that all the world's goods are now available at the click of a mouse. So I ordered a ball, and we'll see. DMC Crochet Cotton #70. Never heard of it, don't like knitting with cotton. But Sharon normally knits with wool, too -- and cotton would be more durable. We shall see.

Hat

I realised as soon as I wrote the sentence a couple of days ago, about knitting a Fair Isle tammy, that that was in fact the thing to do. So the Cranberry Squares idea, in Koigu, has been abandoned, a pattern (Starmore, I'm afraid) selected, and odd balls chosen that seemed to bear some relation to her colour words. "Ochre", "dark lavender", that sort of thing. They don't look too bad, standing in a row.

The trouble with struggling on with Cranberry Squares was that, if I did in fact eventually give up, I would have several little squares of Koigu which would have to be abandoned, as the lengths of yarn would be far too short for useful unravelling.  I regard Koigu as I might spun gold, so that seemed a good reason to desist. Tammies are quick and fun.

Lang Leve Nederland

Tineke supplied the words I needed the other day, to express the Dutch equivalent of "Vive la France". Here they proudly are. I am somewhat Dutch myself, having lived more than a third of my long life as Miss Smits. I have a memory, which probably isn't entirely true, of my father and his three brothers sitting silent and grim-faced over the radio, in their mother's house, as news was broadcast of the German invasion in 1940. Did it happen over a weekend? Memory assigns that mental image to a Sunday. Were all four brothers really there? Never mind. Lang leve Nederland.

Finished! 

Still working through yesterday's knitting excitements...

And, indeed, there's one that hasn't been mentioned yet. My order from Heirloom Knitting arrived. With it a note from Sharon saying that she doesn't think the fine merino yarn she sells (of which I had ordered one ball, for testing) will be suitable for the Princess Shawl without alterations to the pattern. "Alterations" meaning "simplifications" -- the yarn is too thick. I sat down and started at once, nevertheless. I used a 2.5 mm needle, coarse by Sharon's standards, fine by mine. Sort of meeting in the middle.

I've done nearly one and a half repeats of the edging. It's not just that I love the yarn,and that (unlike the silk of my first attempt), I can actually do it, but I also like the way that tiny scrap of lace looks, hanging on my needle. The silk just looked like a mess. I think the thing to do is knit four or five repeats and then take it off the needle and dress it and consider the future. Even just smoothing it out on my knee, it's obvious that Sharon is essentially right -- the row tension is not bad, but the stitch tension is too big, that is, the edging is wider than it should be.

Finished size doesn't matter all that much on a shawl, of course, but this one, knit Sharon Miller's way, is huge. One doesn't want it much huge-er.

So Death has, for the moment, retreated from the sitting room, but still with that familiar grin on his chaps. You've started, but will you have time to finish?

Clapotis

I hope to dispatch it to granddaughter Hellie today. I've printed out the first two pages of the pattern again. I'll send them to her for the sake of the photographs. This has proved to be a rare instance of knitting that I actually like better now that it's finished than I did while things were going on. Silk is utterly unyielding and therefore surprisingly harsh to knit. This yarn is only half silk, but even so the fabric seemed sort of stiff and uninteresting. But with the last ladder laddered, it becomes wonderfully slithery. I hope she likes it.

The pattern is still up: it's at http://knitty.com/issuefall04/pattclapotis.html

Odds and Ends

That still leaves the issue of the hat for my Games entry. I've come to a decision on that one, which I will reveal tomorrow. I'm still winding yarn, Merging Colors and Pioneer. I thinned my doorstep lettuces yesterday, and weeded them. I've added my friend Janis' blog to my Favorites list:  http://defi-knitly.blogspot.com/.

The first mitred square 

I don't know how to say the equivalent of "Vive la France" in Dutch. I would if I could. I flew to America with my eldest granddaughter Hellie when she was 11 or so -- her first visit. We arrived in Boston and as the plane came down I told her about the Tea Party which had once taken place in the water below us. So it is, this week. The EU is a great idea but too many of us clearly feel as I do that our destiny is being usurped by unelected men in suits.

Lots of activity on the knitting front in the last 24 hours. I finished my Clapotis (and I mean finished-finished, ends and all). I heard from Judith, expanding the idea she had advanced in the apparently unreadable comment. Many thanks for this.

The Clapotis:
I think the pattern is fine as written.  I am sure it has enough drape if
you can use the exact yarn specified. The problem is when substituting yarn
how do you know how much yarn to use? A tension square really does not help
that much as you are looking at length and drape and flow.
I decided to use stash and worked out this 5/5 system to get the drape I
wanted and it seems to be successful with whatever yarn I try. Yes it is a
system of fifths 1/5 for the start and increases and one 1/5 for the
decreases and end and then a MINIMUM of 3/5 for the middle bit and it all
seems to be in proportion. If the recipient is very tall you could add a bit
more in the middle. You just knit the increases until you have used up 1/5
then start the middle section, use the 3/5 then commence the decreases with
the last 1/5 and it all falls into place.
I just found it easier to weigh it all when knitting mainly as I had only
200g of Jaeger Luxury Tweed for the 1st one and managed it fine (40g
beginning 40g end and 120gfor the middle) So it then seemed sensible to
weigh for the rest!!
I do hope this is clear. Please note I am not trying to take over the
wonderful design or offend the designer. I was just trying to figure out an
effective way of using stash and not running out of yarn!

AND I heard from Sharon Miller:

Regarding the Princess Shawl Pattern: as you may know, this was a special ‘Limited (to 250 copies) Edition’ pattern, which has now sold out.  We hope to make it available again but have committed not to do so before 3^rd November 2007 and how and in what format it will be in is still to be decided.

So what about the link which Ingrid supplied and which I posted yesterday? I'll look into that.

AND I started the Cranberry Squares hat from the Winter '04 edition of Knitter's. I have made the first mitred square, see picture above, and I didn't enjoy doing it. It was fiddly. As I've remarked recently, knitting is no fun if it's no fun. Morning, as so often, has brought some consoling thoughts. Try shorter needles. Try marking the centre decrease so that I don't have to keep peering and counting stitches. I'll give it another go this evening, and if I still don't like it, I'll scrub it, and knit a Fair Isle tam instead. The Games program just says "Hat --any craft".

Well, there's more to be said on most of the subjects above but that's plenty for now. My baby lettuces on the doorstep are now showing their true, red leaves -- and they have weeds!

 

 

The Clapotis, being knit; and the Pioneer yarn, being wound 

Today should see the Clapotis off the needles.

Two people (two!) have wrriten to me to say that they can't read Judith's comment about the Clapotis. I can read it fine, but I can't copy-and-paste it. She says that the Clapotis pattern as printed doesn't provide enough drape or flow. She finds it works best if the two end triangles -- the increase rows at the beginning, and the decrease rows at the end -- are each 1/5 of the total amount of yarn used, and the middle section therefore 3/5ths. She divides her yarn by weight before starting. Judith, if that's a travesty of your system, write me an email (jean@jeanmile.demon.co.uk) which I will be able to copy and paste into the blog.

Ingrid wrote from Sweden -- I am read on two continents! -- to say that the Princess shawl pattern is available: http://www.heirloom-knitting.co.uk/projects11.html. I just hadn't explored the Heirloom Knitting website with enough vigour. I gave up when I didn't find it next to the Unst Bridal Shawl.

I did lift the Pioneer off the swift onto a chair, successfully. I haven't finished winding it yet, but it's going much better. I put the first Merging Color on the swift, and that's going well too. I sort of like winding yarn, up to a point. It puts me in touch with my ingredients.

Non-Knit

I mentioned an article in last Sunday's Independent about posting pictures to Blogger. When I went to cut it out on Monday, it was gone. Newspapers usually stay around this house for a fortnight, as we often go back to retrieve things, but my husband had for some reason bundled that one straight out the door into Monday's collection. Nor did Googling on "posting pictures to Blogger" help -- just endless references to Blogger's help pages, which I have been reading and re-reading for months, and equally endless citations from user forums, complaining about how difficult it is to get pictures into Blogger.

But yesterday morning, as I was drifting in and out of sleep and listening to the early-morning BBC -- my favourite non-knit time of the day, from 5:30 to 7 am, roughly -- the word I needed came to mind: Flickr. I hadn't even tried to remember it, when reading the article. But there it was. I've looked up the website, but haven't explored it yet.

It sounds as if we are going to have to do some battening down of hatches here in Edinburgh, for the G8 summit meeting. Why can't they do it by video link and save us all millions? Two thousand US marines are coming to defend GWB, we are told. Bush spent a summer or two in Glen Isla when he was a lad, staying with cattle-raising friends of his old man. The newspapers were speculating yesterday about whether he might go back for a visit, while he's here. Glen Isla is only a hill or two away from our glen. They'll close down Perthshire altogether if Bush is there. I like to wonder whether the youthful Bush was brought by his hosts to the Strathardle Highland Gathering -- "the Games" -- on the fourth Saturday in August. It could be, although I think Glen Isla have games of their own, so probably not. My next knitting, which I will surely be able to cast on this week, will be the hat which will be my Games entry this year.