Type A

Happily, I managed to finish my third metamorphosis body, this one using patterns ABCD, and Madeline ToshSock, in an amazingly bright Nikko blue yarn. Again, blocking was magic!

This is the blocked body, lying on the blocking area. I love how the wires curve to allow for some waist shaping. Later I smoothed out the lines by spreading out the sweater and lightly spraying the lines with water and letting it dry.

Here are the unblocked photos for comparison:

Ruler shows length to be about 20 inches. (blocked was more like 29!)
Here is the try-on , unblocked:

I forgot to take blocked try on pics, and went directly to knitting the sleeves, which involves putting the body in a draw-string bag so it won't get in the way while I'm working the sleeves ( in the round, on DPNs).

Unfortunately, last month I developed another episode of repetitive strain symptoms, so I stopped knitting for a couple of weeks. This made me really frustrated! And didn't seem to help much, despite some icing and all the rest. So lately I've been getting physical therapy 3 times a week, with chiropractic, and exercises, heat, ice, etc. It is sort of helpful, but apparently my neck discs are impinging on my nerves,  so that just exascerbates the whole thing. Jane Brody in the  NY Times had an interesting article about tendonopathies: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/01/health/01brody.html?_r=2&ref=science

So, how could I stop knitting ( or typing)after this? Impossible. So, I'm taking frequent breaks, stretching, icing and trying to knit differently ( knitting backwards instead of purling, doing some rows in continental instead of my usual english style), supporting my arms and using "aircast" arm bands sometimes to isolate the painful muscles. It is slow, but I am determined! And I'm reading more books, which is the one thing I can't seem to do and knit at the same time...so, we shall see. But if you don't hear much from me, it is due to my laying off the typing for a while.I do want to hear from you, though! So, email me!

Greensleeves

Here is the Green Cardigan with the addition of sleeves. They ended up a bit short on my model, but that way they won't get in the way of her violin playing! But I think I could have been more agressive with the blocking.
As I told my son the other day, In theory, theory and practice are the same; in practice, they are not.
Hence the great utility of trying on one's knitting as one works. But the tricky thing with lace is the blocking element, which can sometimes be predicted ( with a good swatch) but sometimes not.
My blue pullover seemed very happy as a tunic, so for now it is merely finished off at the sleeve edges. I still have my third skein in case I decide to add sleeves later, but for now I really like it as a sleeveless tunic.

As the green cardigan is not my size, I thought it was a good idea to start a new cardigan for myself, so I started the Metamorphosis Cardigan Type A. Andrea designed a slight variation on the B lace, which makes a lot of difference in the look. I will add some photos of that next time. You can also see it on Ravelry here: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/knitbird/metamorphosis-3

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...

Metamorphosis Casts On!

We have been very busy lately knitting swatches and collecting yarn and beads for the Metamorphosis Project, the collaborative effort of Andrea of BadcatDesigns ( http://www.badcatdesigns.blogspot.com/) and myself. Andrea is designing the gorgeous lace patterns and I am designing the sweaters to go with the lace.

It has been so much fun to watch the ideas manifest in form. I am knitting 2 sweaters to test the concepts, one as a pullover with the yarn above ( for myself! Of course it is blue...) and the other as a cardigan in a lovely green, which happens to fit Andrea's daughter and beautiful model BadKitten.

You can still join the fun by going to BadCat's blog and following the instructions there.

The green cardigan is really lovely, and uses a merino fingering weight yarn called BB Toes, which we all fell in love with at Stitches East. It is available at https://mochasfiber.com/ , and blocks out into a drapey smooth fabric that really shows the stitches well.

Tomorrow we will release the first chart and the instructions for the beginning of the sweater, which is a top-down, seamless raglan style yoke. The beauty of this is how the lace pattern flows seamlessly around.

I have done the calculations to size the sweater from 34 inch chest up to 60 inches, and it has been interesting to see how the design can be upsized. I have kept Andrea busy desinging her amazing charts so we can have shaping and flare in the sweater, and I think it will look lovely on a range of sizes. Being top-down, you can adjust the lengths as you wish.

There are also 3 shawls which will use the same lace patterns and combinations of those, so it is wonderful to see how Andrea has concocted such lovely patterns.

Christmas Handwarmers

Last year I knitted an alpaca scarf for each of my brother's three daughters, and had fun trying different combinations of reversible cables. This year I decided  matching handwarmers might be fun, and I found some worsted weight alpaca that matched the colors of the scarves. Over the summer, I  had participated in BadCatDesigns Summer SwatchMe project ( http://www.badcatdesigns.blogspot.com/ ) , so I have a wealth of lovely  14-stitch lace patterns to play with. I decided to use the same dimensions for each set, but vary the lace, so here is my generic formula:
Fingerless Gloves: Worsted Version: 7 inches long
Aslan trends Alpaca; 100gm/220 yds. Need 40gm, or about 100 yds for a pair.
Size 6 Double pointed needles, and size 4  DP needles.
Cast on 42 sts ( 3 reps of 14 sts)

Knit one round,
Purl one round

Start lace pattern.Repeat 3 times around ( once for each needle)

Work 40 rounds (e.g. 2 1/2 reps of 16 rows).
Bind off 8 sts, continue around
Cast on 8 over the bound off sts on next plain round.
Work another 8 rounds ( e.g.½ rep).
Switch to size 4 needles and work K2P2 for 8 rounds. BO in pattern.

I decided not to make thumb gussets, so these can be pushed down to the cufffs if needed for extra wrist warmth when you are wearing gloves with them.
I hope they love these as much as I do!

Transformations

What is it about knitting that so appeals to me? I think it is all about transformation and possibility. I love the idea that I can start with an image in my mind and then , through the slow and steady application of a skill, involving problem-solving, geometry, chemistry, or just plain magic, gradually see my imagined idea appear in reality. The transformation of a hank of soft, lovely yarn into a fabric has been very captivating, and I know I'm not alone because there are at least a million folks out there who love this metamorphosis activity so much that they have joined Ravelry.
A few months ago I was invited to participate in a design challenge with Andrea of BadCatDesigns, who blogs at http://www.badcatdesigns.blogspot.com/ , and designs the most gorgeous lace shawls. I have been following her for some time now, and last summer participated in her Summer Swatch Me project. So Andrea and I are now collaborating on a lace  knitalong idea, which will debut on January 1st, and be called Metamorphosis KAL!

Stay Tuned!

Holey Cowls

It has gotten cold here in New York, and I wasn't happy with any of the scarves I have. I needed a cowl. What is a cowl, you might ask? I think it is like a big snuggly turtleneck, or maybe a circle of warmth that you pop over your head. Like a scarf, but not dangly. The wool goes where you need it most! It shouldn't take much to make it, so I thought perhaps I could design one quickly. I remembered I had a skein of electric blue Big Wool which I had purchased for $3 at the LYS sale in the summer of 2009. The largest needles I had were 13s though, and I didn't think I wanted to run out in the cold to buy some 15s. Pencils were even too thin to use for DPNs. In the end I went with knitting really loosely on the 10.5 DPNs I had, and switching to my 13 circular when it was big enough.

This idea was a welcome break from the secret project I've been working on, which involves fingering-weight yarn, lace and much smaller needles.I thought it might be fun to make another one, so I got out the Noro Cashmere Island  I bought a while ago. That yarn has long color repeats, as is a feature of Noro yarns, and it was so pretty  that I had been saving it for something special. I thought it might be fun to double strand it  and see how the colors interacted. Plus I could knit on large size 11 needles and have another really fast project.
I decided to call these "Quick Leaf Cowls" although I thought of them as Holey Cowls, but that name has already been used!

The Cashmere Island yarn is 60% wool and 30% casmere with 10% nylon, so it is soft and warm. And my cat loves it! He likes anything Noro, and carries little balls of it around if he gets the chance. I forgot, and left a ball of grey on the table, so it ended up in my bedroom this morning, in a tangle on the floor!

I've uploaded the pattern to my Ravelry store in case you need some instant gratification, too...Now it is back to the Winter Project...