Whole Lotta Lace

This month has all been about Lace! I worked on my two Metamorphosis sweaters: one, a cardigan in green BB Toes yarn, and the other a tunic in Knitpicks Bare ( silk and Merino) that I dyed myself with a combination of colors including Brilliant Blue, National Blue and golden yellow.
These sweaters were made to illustrate the concepts we have been working on in the Metamorphosis Knit Along ( see http://www.badcatdesigns.blogspot.com/ for more details).

This green one will have sleeves, which will be shown next week; the other one I left as a sleeveless tunic so I could wear it to Vogue Knitting last month. Here is a shot of the lace hem:

I also released my new pattern ( available at http://www.ravelry.com/ at http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/leaf-lace-vest-2) for the Leaf Lace Vest which came out very nicely:

 I sized this one for sizes from 34 to 62 inch chest, as I had worked out the math while doing the Metamorphosis project, and this one works the same way.Or maybe it is the other way around? I designed the Leaf Lace vest in 2007, so it has been percolating a long while.

In other exciting news, I am the featured guest this week in Math4Knitters, a podcast by Lara Neel, available for your listening pleasure here:
http://www.journalgazette.com/article/20110206/BLOGS2601/110209890
So, lots going on lately!
The one good thing about all of the snow and ice storms we have had this winter is the knitting I can work on! I hope it warms up soon, though, as I am tired from all of the shoveling...

Buckyball Day

As today is the 25th anniversary of the Buckyball

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fullerene

I thought it would be fun to share my month-long obsession with making beaded beads, using wire or fishing line to string crystals in various configurations. You can make dodecahedra, icosahedra, octohedra, etc very nicely using Czech crystals or Swarovsky crystals, and weaving them into Platonic or Archimedean solids!

Here are some of the ones I've made this month:

I first learned how to make these from this website: http://mydailybead.blogspot.com/

and then have been playing with this idea for a while. It is very addicting!

I also finished a vest:

Leafy Lace Tunic

Here is what happened to the leaf lace vest I started a while back. I began from the top, using Cotton Classic, size 9 needles, and Leaf lace, and joined in the center to get a pullover. When I got to the waist, I ran out of yarn, but I wanted a longer sweater, so I rummaged around in the stash, and found one skein of a similar color, and two skeins of the darker teal, so I figured that if I changed the lace pattern when I changed yarn colors, it might turn out to be interesting. I used hexagon mesh, then transitioned to an arrowhead pattern, then transitioned to a lace edging #49 from Lavori Artistici a Calza 11. Then I single crocheted two rows around the armholes and a row of SC2, chain3, to make a picot edging , which also finished off the hem. Below is a snapshot of my neice Allie modeling it. I thought it needed something, so I knit an I-cord and added that. Lots of fun to wear, and fun to knit! I have yet to block it, though, as I'm waiting for it to stop raining.

Pattern Recognition

My resolution for the new year has to do with documentation. Writing patterns is one of my goals, even though my current main love has to do with devising and making up my knitting as I go along. Enough people are starting to ask me for patterns that I think it is about time to delve into writing down some of the stuff I've made. Trouble is, I do take notes, but sometimes I just have to re-knit stuff to know exactly what I did, as I kind of make decisions as I go along. I suppose I have an attitude that I can figure out anything I want to make now ( except I have yet to comprehend lace circles in a very deep way, but I'm seeing that as a long term goal, too!) and I'm willing to rip liberally if necessary. Writing patterns, however, is a whole 'nother game. It involves setting down in formal terms, using a specific,universally acknowledged code, something that is inherently a process. And since I borrow liberally from every source I find, mutating and metabolizing it to suit my intended effect, it becomes difficult to acknowledge my sources. I just can't always recall where I found a particular idea! When I'm doing this for myself, it is not a problem, but when I consider doing this for someone else, a lot of issues come into play. Anyway, recently 2 people asked me to write up patterns for sweaters , one of which I've made, and the other was a formilization of an idea I'd been kicking around in my mind for a while. I really appreciate having " test knitters"; someone who can knit along with my directions and give me feedback about my instructions, as sometimes what seems obvious to me can be opaque to someone else! So, Thank you Jackie and Patti!

So, I've been working this week on The Leaf Lace Vest. I've gotten it written up to Row 9, and above is a photo of that. Cotton Classic, size 9 needles. As it leans on the ideas of Evelyn Clark, especially in her excellent book "Knitting Lace Triangles" http://www.evelynclarkdesigns.com/ ,I would encourage you to get this book! Evelyn graciously encouraged me to write up my pattern, and I am very grateful to her for her marvelous designs and her clarity of thought. Now all I have to do is find the time to learn charting software, and I'll be good to go! Graph paper and pencil is still my friend...