tychoish, now without a net

I’ve been a bit off the fiber arts these past few days. For starters, I discovered a stain on my Latvian Mitten sweater which is all but finished. (I just have to sew down the hem.)

It’s a tea stain, which are particularly brutal to get off. My last sweater that I made with this yarn currently suffers from a few more honestly derived tea stains. There’s also something about this yarn, I’m convinced, No other seems to stain so easily. Is there something about superwash? In any case, though I think the stain has mostly come up (salt, who’d thought?) and it’s on the back of the sweater sort of under the arm, so again, not a big deal, that whole mess has put me off knitting just a bit. I’ll get back to it in time. I want to get the hem sewn down by the weekend, which shouldn’t be a problem.

There’ll be more latvian dreaming stuff soon. I promise. How are people doing on this one?

I also finished this little spinning project I’d been working on for a great while. It’s 3ply merino DKish weight yarn. Light blue marl. I’m loving it, though I don’t have a clue what I’m going to do with it. This of course means that I’ve already started spinning up my shetland roving which I’m hoping to turn into three-ply of a similar weight as well. It’s nice fiber, unlike anything else I’ve ever spun, but it’s going well. One thought is that I could use the blue merino at least in part for hems. Which seems like a foolish waist of hand spun. I’ve made a rule that handspun (once it’s spun) doesn’t count as stash, so it could sit around for a while.

I’ve decided that I’m going to try and spin 100 gram skeins of yarn, by measuring off 3 33ish gram lengths of roving and spinning one on to each bobbin and then plying. I think this will give me reasonably sized skeins, it’ll break up the spinning in an interesting way, and I’m less likely to have leftovers of any quantity (I know this isn’t a huge issue, but I’m a bit neurotic.) This decision made me really rather happy. I also decided that I’d not use the lazy kate that came with my wheel except for holding bobbins when plying. All other bobbin holding will be done by the basket that I use to hold my fiber as I’m spinning. Somehow these decisions were incredibly liberating, and I think that realization is kind of worrying. Anyway, I think I should end this before it degenerates any further.

Onward and Upward.

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tagged: knitting • spinning

Ok I’m finally going to clear this business up about the 320/340/342/344 stitch count on the latvian dreaming sweater project

I said to cast on, 320 stitches, the charts cover 342 stitches, and I’ve been saying that you need 344 stitches. What gives?

Well, I want to avoid having the bottom edge of the sweater flare out. Casting on fewer stitches keeps this from happening. Elizabeth Zimmermann recommends casting on 90% of K (or 344), and that would give us something like 310 or 309. Meh. For starters I know that 320 is divisible by 4. Also, in laziness, it’s easy to cast on 320 stitches, because it’s divisible by 80 and therefore also easy to increase evenly across, because it’s so evenly divisible. The dirty secret of making KnittingMath easy for you and yours is choosing good numbers.

Secondly, I don’t want the lower edge of the sweater to pull in as much as I want it to not flare. Often people suggest casting on with a smaller needle and not having one at hand (and not much liking my US 0s anyway,) I’m just casting on fewer stitches. Feel free to modify this point if you like.

I should also admit that in the first draft of the pattern (the key number was 340, good thing that draft never saw the light of day: I didn’t realize that I needed 4 extra stitches for borders and turning stitches,) so I thought increasing 10 stitches on the front and the back would be really easy. But no matter, it’ll still work out.

That answer your question?

I’d like to see pictures and hear reports of your projects as they develop. Also, if you make any cool modifications I’d totally like to hear about them too. I know that I’m still ahead of the gang with the knitting on this one, so I hope that by dragging out the cast-on and the bottom rib, I’ve been able to let at least a few of you get your yarn and get caught up. It’s also let me get done with my last sweater, but next up we’re going to increase so we can begin the color pattern.

I see math in my future.

Knit in good health! I’ll be in touch. You be too.

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tagged: latvian dreaming

I’ve probably beaten the discussion about linear and non-linear writing methods, wikis, and the computer programing metaphor to the ground and you’re all probably tragically bored with this, particularly if you’re here for the next crumb of the pattern for the latvian dreaming, but no matter, here we are. I listened to the interview with ward cunningham recently, and I’ve been thinking about these things for a while so it surfaces yet again.

I’ve said a few times that I have a hard time “writing non-linearly,” that I feel as if I’m too story/narrative focused to really be effective in writing stories and essays in a modular or nonlinear sort of way. I’ve also had a hard time working on using wiki-like software as a personal notebook because alone I don’t tend develop ideas and thoughts in the right sort of way to make these systems useful for any meaningful length of time. In fact I think I started this blog (almost a year ago) because I thought that the blog was a format for notebook that mirrored the way that I often thought about things (and indeed my paper notebooks are very blog-like).

But I wanted to cover new ground in this entry. I’ve been turning over a couple of new ideas in the past few days. First is the notion of “refactoring” in agile/extreme programing. Basically, this is the notion that when writing code, if you’re not writing linearly, it’s important to go through the code and “refactor” or reevaluate older code to make it more efficient and work better as the larger program changes and develops. Cunningham said (and it’s true) that once you’ve written it once, going back and moving chunks (scenes/objects) around so that they make more sense. I’ve always thought about editing in terms of passes, and because I’ve never really written modularly, I don’t really edit modularly (which is, near as I can tell the only way to do it.)¹

The second concept, this comes from wiki “theory” for lack of a better term is the notion that nonlinear documents (like wikis) grow and develop structure as they need it. Cunningham, on the podcast said, “wikis always seem to be as big as they need to be,”² and while I don’t know nearly enough about chaos theory to be fully articulate about this, I think that this is a very bottom-up or “chaotic” system that asserts itself over the larger document is pretty powerful and useful, if you’re not fighting it. In my experience wiki’s that I’ve tried to build have all fallen down as I’ve tried to create structure before creating content, or anticipate my organizational thinking ahead of time. The lesson? Let organizational systems develop organically, even if you don’t trust this, and adjust later rather than forcing a system that probably will cause collapse which is in the end more work for less payoff than the first option.

I think both of these lessons (refactor early and often, let nonlinear documents structure themselves) are ones that I can take to both my writing and digital note taking projects in the future. Maybe these were things that you all had figured out already, alas, maybe this is why this is my blog and not yours!

Just saying.

Onward and Upward!

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tagged: productivity • writing

So at the end of the entry on friday–in short–I said to cast on 320 stitches, using an elastic method in your background color, join being careful not to twist, and knit 2.5 (ish) inches in K2 P2 bi-color (corrugated) ribbing. This time around I’m purling in the background color and knitting in the foreground or contrasting color.

But wait, you ask, “you said the key number of stitches was 344?” Yep it is. And then you ask, “Why cast on fewer stitches? and why did you choose corrugated ribbing? and while we’re at it, I think I want to have a hemmed edge or make a cardigan and not a pullover!”

In response: Hang on, I say. This week we’re going to cover all these issues. Starting today with why I’ve chosen this ribbing and why I decided to do this. Tomorrow we’ll cover the stitch count issue.

A lot of my sweaters of late have had provisional cast ons, followed by turned hems. I’m putting ribbing on this one, because it’s been a while since I’ve done a sweater with a ribbing, so this seemed like it would be the case. Also, for some reason that I can’t explain I’d never done the “cast on in the color your going to purl in” trick, even though it is in retrospect pretty obvious. By doing it this way, you’re not purling into stitches of a different color, and this keeps the ribs more “clean looking.”

Also, I think that this pattern is very small scale, and a little bit of a different texture seemed like a good idea.

If you want to put a hem on this one just cast on 344 (provisionally) with a crochet chain and the background and start into the pattern on the next row. You could knit the facing first, but I’ve always found that hems sew down better when done last.

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tagged: latvian dreaming

Ok, it’s been a quiet weekend, as I half predicted. I did get some writing done and other work done, but nothing is quite ready for prime time yet. I fear that I’ll be done with six entries all at the same time tomorrow afternoon, and that wouldn’t do at all. And I haven’t posted a general *how’s the tycho doing” report in a while, and I haven’t been writing these things here much.

I know that the post of the beginning of the latvian dreaming sweater might have happened a little fast, so I’m going have a series of quick posts that explain my reasoning here. Also, if you’re interested in doing a cardigan, I’ll cover that as well.

So here goes on the report, as much for archival purposes as anything

My grandmother had her right knee replaced a couple weeks ago (those of you who were playing along at home will remember that she broke a knee cap in January; that was the left one, which seems to be quite alright at the moment). My father and I–despite cold symptoms (his) one working voice (mine) and minimal preparation (ours)–trekked across the state to visit her in rehab. Turns out she’s doing great, but it was a really good thing that we were able to visit and help her out a little.

Then this weekend my entire family has to go to a wedding. Feh. I hate weddings, a lot. Though the couple in question lives locally, they’ve decided to have their party half way across the state. And we live in the midwest, so that’s a schlep. And since my father is going to be the best man (ugg) we can’t exactly swoop in for the ceremony grab a nosh at the reception and swoop out. Two nights we have to be there. Have I mentioned that while I think I live in a pretty nifty little city, the rest of the state is… somewhat less interesting. Mom and I are brining our spinning wheels, and are going to sit around in some yarn fiber store and cuss. If I post some rant against weddings and marriage, don’t take it personally.

On Thursday morning it’s May day, which means I have to get up at the crack of dawn, put on my morris dancing gear and dance the sun up. If the sun doesn’t rise, blame me, in other words. If you’re in St. Louis, email me for directions!

Then, from the wedding I’m going back to stay with my grandmother so I can help ease the transition back from rehab. That’s another week, though I hope that I’ll be able to get settled this time.

I have to rush back here on that friday, because I think I have to work and teach a knitting class that weekend. And then. As if that weren’t enough, I start my summer job that Monday. Which means I have a lot of things to take care of before that happens. The job is cool, it’s a shame that it isn’t more long term. My main focus of this summer–other than writing another novella and knitting 3 sweaters–is going to be finding a job for the fall and beyond. No pressure.

That’s the state of the tycho. I think I need another cup of tea.

Onward and Upward!

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tagged: Announcements

So I’ve been talking about this project for a few days, and thinking about something like it for much longer. And I think, enough fooling around, I might as well post the “getting started” entry. You need not get started this instance (but you should! peer pressure!), but just in case you were ready for it, here it is. A proper introduction and the first little chunk of the pattern…

I want to knit a sweater with you. It’s a big project, probably best suited to winter knitting, but I’ve never let something as predictable as the weather get in my way for such things. I might need a fan for knitting the sleeves and the end of the body as summer approaches, but I happen to have one or two around for that possibility.

This sweater is like many of my others, two color, stranded all the way across, simple vertical lines, and I’m thinking a simple drop shouldered look. Maybe shoulder straps. I’ll decide later.

I know that I’ve already started, don’t feel behind! feel glad that I’m going to be ahead of you, I’m here to make your mistakes for you. I’ll be posting regularly about my progress and my design decisions, and when I’m done maybe we’ll make a “real” pattern of it.

The charts I’ve chosen and modified (a bit) are from Joyce Williams’ Latvian Dreams: Knitting from Weaving Charts. (2000; Schoolhouse Press); which is an amazing book that I highly recommend. Amazing stuff. I’ve chosen a few of these charts that are small enough to memorize and arranged them so that there’s a vertical line. They all even repeat every 16 rounds. Better yet, because they’re weaving charts, the top half (rows ~10-16) are the same as the bottom half (rows ~2-8), which makes it even easier to memorize.

Here’s the download link for the pattern materials packet. And please do note that there’s a pattern up on ravelry here.

Coming up below the fold: a description of what’s going on at the beginning of the sweater (sizing, yarn choice, casting on) for those of you who want to get started right away… Tallk of options like hemmed edges and cardigans come later, particularly if there’s interest.

Continue reading Latvian Dreaming

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tagged: knitting • latvian dreaming