Oddy

Last month, my grandmother, Oddy, passed away after a short illness. She was 95 years old. When I was 5 or 6, she taught me how to knit. I can remember perfectly the yarn I learned with - it must have been Red Heart (or some similar 80s option) in what I thought was a perfectly lovely red, white and blue ombre. I don't remember the actually learning of the stitches, but I can see perfectly in my head the hideously uneven, messy scarf-like thing I made with it, all garter stitch, with tons of dropped stitches and yarnovers and such. It was horrific. But it was also the first step down a road that has lead, 30 years later, to my current pursuits at spinning and designing, and knitting socks for my husband, and sweaters for my daughters. She gave me the ability to keep my loved ones warm with the work of my hands. And given that I come from a long line of intellectual-type folks, being able to make something, to create, is a phenomenal gift. We leave today to go up to Maine for her memorial service, so it seems fitting to write a bit about her here.

When I was pregnant with Devil, I got a blanket in the mail from Oddy. Although she'd been living in a nursing home for quite a while and was clearly fading, she'd started a baby blanket for her first great-grandchild. I believe my aunt finished it, but it's always been a gift from my grandmother, and both of the girls have slept with it.

Baby Devil

Last Christmas, we were home in New England, and she got to meet the girls, Boo for the first time. Devil was a little concerned about being in a place that looked and felt to her like a really, really big doctor's office, but Oddy gave her a present and they bonded. On our way out, she walked down the hallway next to Oddy's wheelchair, holding her hand.

My grandmother had a phenomenal memory (she was the defacto family historian because she remembered everything), she could out-etiquette Ms. Manners herself, and she was a terrible cook. She once asked me if I wanted to "come out", which meant something entirely different in 1988 then it means now. And she taught me to knit. Thank you Oddy. You are very much missed.

A note from the management

In case anyone wants more details about the move/life in the UK, I've started another blog here to keep folks updated.

And the book lists will now be making their appearence over here, with my fellow Intercontinental Book Mavens.

Just trying to keep things organized that's all. Now back to your regularly scheduled ridiculousness.

FF: Keeping my sanity

As you may have gathered, things around here have been getting a wee bit out of hand in the last little while. What with the packing and house leasing and travel arrangements being dealt with, my energy for anything even remotely strenuous knitting-wise has been below minimal. Maybe even into negative number territory. So I've been consoling recharging my batteries with simple things; garter stitch and spinning a cubic buttload of singles.

This is 1 lb of Corriedale I dyed at Yarn School last fall that has been calling out to me for a while now. It was the first thing I jumped on in the Dye Lab, and my first experimentation with the color wheel. Adrian's suggestion was to pick 2-3 colors that were on one side of the color wheel, and one from the opposite side for contrast. I went with Violet, Purple and Brilliant Blue, with Pumpkin Orange as my contrast. I was pretty pleased with how it came out, and the singles are lovely.

dark stormy day photography is a pain in the butt

I'm spinning long draw from the fold, not worrying too much about wpi, just trying to keep things moving along. I've filled five bobbins already and am on to number 6 - I may have to start winding on to TP rolls pretty soon, since I think this is my last bobbin. My goal is to finish up the last of the fiber before the wheel gets packed up this weekend. I may or may not make it, and if I do, it will be because I was up too late trying to finish it up! I hope to have enough for a sweater for moi out of this stuff, but we'll see - I have very poor skills at calibrating yardage vs. FO.

Don't be surprised by a fair bit of radio silence for the next little while. We'll be diassembled/in transit for most of the next three weeks. I'll be able to pop in a bit for the next couple of weeks, but there probably will not be much knitting or spinning to report on, just packing and moving and plane rides with small children. Oh Joy.

A leap of faith

I am far from the first, or one hundred and first, or even possibly the one hundred thousand and first knitter to have ever made this observation, but Elizabeth Zimmerman was some kind of genius. How else can you explain how something that looks like this,

becomes this adorable little number.

Pattern: Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmerman, Knitting Workshop version
Yarn: Knit Picks Swish Superwash in Natural (dyed yellow, orange and green) and coral (overdyed red). I'm not sure of the exact yardage, but probably somewhere around 350 yds.
Needles: US 7/4.5 mm
Comments: I intended this for approximately a 6 month size, so I used worsted weight yarn. Loved the construction and the knitting - mindless garter stitch and spinning are just about the only things my brain can tolerate these days, so this was perfect for the evenings. Total knitting time was approximately a week.

Buttons are small wood ones from my stash.

I ran out of the requested colorway, and had to dye another skein to finish it off, but I think the red fits pretty well with the handpainted stuff. I was worried I was going to get pooling, but somehow I managed to avoid the worst of that.

I love the miters and how they look with this yarn. Very cool.

So when I blocked this thing, it grew. Quite a bit. Now it looks more like a one year old size. But so be it - the niece will live in Boston, so hopefully she'll get some use out of it next winter and spring.

Things that happened this weekend

1. My children and their Halloween Trick-or-Treating friends bounced around like pink/purple/blonde bits of fluff scavenging easter eggs out of our backyard.

2. We had really, really good Thai food and Guiness for dinner on Saturday.

3. I finished spinning up the first half of 1 lb of dyed Corriedale for my first major spinning project.

4. Ironman got a new bike,

which means...

5. I now have a new bike*! Well, new to me anyway. 

Hopefully this will motivate me to actually do something with said new bike, thereby getting my generous rear in gear. So to speak.

In any event, yippee!

*Both my wheel and my bike are now Canadian. Awwww.