My 11 minutes have been more than accounted for just taking care of the business of keeping machines in good order.  Though I’m close to 3 inches on the foot of the Class Sock having picked that up for a few this morning.  I was up early because of snow removal needs.  I’ve Facebook messaged & chatted with two Superba users one who thinks I may just need to lubricate and the other who says its good because she doesn’t use alot of oil (I went lube lite to start myself).  So I think the Superba issue is sorted out.  I called Knitting Today and left a message checking on my parts order for bring the Mid-Gauge back up to snuff and then….

I was browsing my list of blogs and see that MAO posted and that her Pattern of the Month (POM) is taking subscriptions YAY!!!  I went ahead and signed up VERY exciting.

So, now that the dust is settling on those efforts I’ll spend 30 minutes on a quick clean up on the house so I have dishes to eat off of then it will be back to the knitting machine for real live swatch knitting!    I cannot wait to knit some awesome socks!

Reminder for those of you who aren’t on FB or the email lists.  MK World Fun Chat Session is Thursday 2/3/11!  We’ll have a fun hour and will easily fulfill the 11 at 11 for tomorrow.  I’ll be knitting socks during the meeting, at least that is my plan!  Bring your show & tell!

Seriously I think this is the only one I ever knitted for myself.

The other nice thing about the raglan style is you can add design elements to it with very little effort…. a little twisted stitch on the sleeve and armholes adds details that you just can’t put on some of the other shoulder styles.

way back in 07 or 06 I did this raglan shoulder with twisted stitches.

There is another thing though. I hate… no no not hate… I don’t love patterns that include Raglan styling. We all know we are challenged when it comes to repetitive decreases that are done every so many rows such a pain the behind. Oh oh and then there is the neckline to be concerned about at the same time! Ok there really is no way to easily do it without mapping it out for yourself. At least this is what I do for myself. This is a way that I check the pattern as well and make sure I understand the designers intent. I am not a designer. I do periodically write a pattern that has an educational purpose but I don’t write the good stuff. No talent for creativity that works well for others. Maybe no guts no glory? That is another topic.

My point was that it would be nice if patterns were written more specifically providing the decrease/row count information in a line by line manner. It can be fun to work all those decreases out but sometimes you are so excited to have the opportunity to knit something that you just want to dive in! Well you aren’t supposed to. You are supposed to read and understand a pattern before you knit it up. SO.. what do you do when faced with a bunch of shaping? Here is another Poll.
Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

Starting off the New Decade right!  

I’ve been working on a project that required a great deal of planning before the knitting started.  In this podcast episode I discuss a few of the areas I felt were critical.  Surely you can add to the topic and I ask you to add to the topic.   Comments, messages and discussions as a result of the podcast are what I hope for.  I hope you will participate in making these podcasts better by participating!!!

The poll winner for book review last episode was Hand Manipulated Stitches for Machine Knitters by Susan Guagliumi.   After twenty years  its still the most referred sourcebook amongst machine knitters.

In addition to a short very biased review a special guest joins me for some discussion. So without further ado… get the podcast! Its available on iTunes now too!

Some additional links as promised in the podcast.
You must visit www.guagliumi.com  to catch the latest news on her upcoming book MORE Hand Manipulated Stitches make sure to click on the Signups/Stuff  link and get the lastest from the source!  You will also want to check out the Knitting Patterns that are for sale in downloadable form.  Then stop off and download the fantastic free downloads that Susan has made available to us from days gone by. 

You might also decide to visit:  Nashua Knits, Cascade, Berroco, and BT Yarns all of which are discussed in the podcast.  I hope you enjoy!

^Right Click & Save Target as for the podcast!

WOW.. thats pretty much all I have to say…  but I say a WHOLE bunch more in the podcast that is being published along with this entry! 

Here are some links, I discuss the event in depth in the podcast.  There are things I forget to mention though.  I just want to say a public THANK YOU to each of the Demonstrators and Vendors!  You’ll find their links permanently to the right in short order.  You should visit the links as you read this though.  Add them to your favorites.  There is new info at each site as to seminars and new products.  VERY WELL DONE!  WOW!

Please support these folks in their future efforts!

Silver Needle’s Fingerlakes Machine Knitting Seminar  Next year’s event is April 23rd & 24th 2010!  MARK YOUR CALENDARS!

Carolyn Barnett - FABULOUS INSPIRATION!!!

Ileen Levy - AWESOME IDEAS & SHOPPING! 

Mary Anne Oger - AMAZING!  has anyone seen the magazine site recently?  Thats kind of fun! I just went there to make sure I got the link right. 

Charlene Shafer - ROCKING MY DESIGN A KNIT WORLD!                                  Charlene brought our attention to a new Tamm yarn … called Bebe… which is offered in many solid and variegated colors.  Check it out!

BT YARNS – FOR YARN SHOPPING!!!  In addition to their sales check out the neat new clip for attaching patterns to our yarn masts!

All the attendees!  All of you.  There are no words for the fabulous attitudes and camaraderie that I hope we all experienced.  Without you these events cannot be a success.  This was a great event and I appreciate having met and enjoyed your company.

My pictures have not come out well so if you care to share pictures please comment!

Without further ado…

I have to say. I love Mary Anne’s pattern which for those of you that do not know..the Take A Turn Sweater pattern is available for free. Its a great way to have a look inside Knitwords without the bucks. This is a fabulous pattern and I learned a great deal from my knitting (repeatedly due to lack of and or malfunction of yarn). Frankly…. if you machine knit Knitwords is a must have.

I’ll be honest. I lag behind and do not own every copy. I’d like to and am waiting for them all to be available in electronic files. Its just me I hate paper. My computer is far more organized than my knit zone.

OK so thats my February MK GAM KAL project. Unless I whip off a pair of socks (which I really really want to do) on Saturday.

Not Proud

Not Proud

This sweater rocks enough you need to see both sides at once!

the Front

The back

The introduction was amazing. Janet is knitting some amazing things as one would expect. I expected my jaw to be on the floor and it was… I didn’t expect it to fall through the floor however. Janet is knitting exceedingly complicated jacquard works of course and pictures she has a lovely piece done up of her daughter. She knitted her curtain pattern into the most beautiful coat. I would love that coat. I loved her curtains, it was one of the first things I noticed walking into the room Toile is the style. In this incarnation its red and white the red pattern is people doing a variety of activities… this pattern or one very similar is found in dishes. The good old dishes that you might use for Sunday Dinner and Holidays. I found a definition of the style on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toile if you look at the Toile de Jouy heading there is a good description of the types of scenes I am talking about. Deirdre Packer on the KMaholics list came up with the name I needed. I am sure Janet actually said it but I drew a blank earlier. Thank goodness for helpful knowledgable people!

This is the coat (and yes… you can see where the pattern came from) thanks again to Gail B.

What Janet has done is taken photographs of textiles in her home and created her fabrics from those photographs.

Janet has several alpaca. One of which reminded me of Keith Richards (yes the rolling stone). A variety of goats cashmere and angora. Of course… we don’t get angora from angora goats what do we get ladies? She had one Angora Rabbit … omg … made me drool. Next to alpaca, angora is my favorite fiber. I hope to be able to knit (eventually) a sweater from a wool angora blend that I have helped harvest and spun myself. I know where to find the wool, I’d like to do the Bunny part myself. A rabbit is probably the only fiber producing animal I’ll ever be able to have.

I am so excited about NEXT weekend … I’ll be picking up my dream machine – Silver Reed 860 at Knitting Today’s Ribber Intensive with MAO. From which I’ll be doing the next MK World Live session btw. No promises of attendees or what will happen but I’ll be there. So much to share, so little time.

I was sweating a little bit about my yarn choices. I really love the periwinkle colored wool its not a superwash though. However it doesn’t felt easily so I figure it will withstand many wearings. And the subsequent cleanings. I hope, that is. I knitted this swatch up using the prescribed tension 8. I could go looser but now having washed it… I like this fabric so I will adjust the pattern ever so slightly.

By the way… knowing that many designers are very protective of their designs, I asked Mary Anne how she felt about folks modifying her patterns to suit their needs. She responded “my stuff is all about doing whatever you want – I wish to inspire people to knit – not to duplicate what I do, but to use my techniques to learn and do what they want!!” Well, I AM INSPIRED! I didn’t really need to ask about how she felt because right within the pattern she says.. “Add more cables or make it plain!”. Thats a strong reccomendation for me.

I need a raglan sweater… so I may knit this as a Raglan, but then I will lose some of the Cables and Tuck Rib. I am just thinking about this btw… I am not glued to it yet. Or knitted into it so to speak. I knitted my swatches today here they are:

Then there is this swatch… 45% Acrylic 45% Nylon and 25% wool nope its not going to shrink up on me. But I just don’t love the fabric.

I did a little bit of a study of the pattern with Knitware and I know I have plenty of yarn for the project and I can see what I need to modify thats IF I do the Raglan.

Oh and my pre wash swatch measured very closely to the 30st 36 rows over 4in/10cms. I was at 29.09 SP4″ and 38RP4″ with the wool and 30.46 SP4″ and 41RP4I in the blend. The blend changed rather dramatically with blocking. The wool is about the same. Thats eyeballing I haven’t actually measured them again yet. They are drying now.

I have a most favorite non-fiber site that I love to view… Icanhazcheezburger hysterical pictures and captions and its mostly kittys. I’ve been keeping my eyes peeled for fiber related ones so I wouldn’t feel bad about sharing my addiction.

more cat pictures