Bride & Prejudice

Best Movie Ever.

Okay, maybe not ever, but in a month, easily.

From a review on the IMDB:

"I recommend this movie to use as a 3rd degree torture to Osama and Sadam, definitely this movie can make you insane, I suggest entire universe including UFOs that you all should watch your or anyone's else wedding video but Do Not Watch This Movie, because it will make you think that Why We Are Here? and Where Is The God?"

Last Cry for Help: RSS Feed

I tried to update my RSS 1.0 and 2.0 feeds to display full entries, HTML, and images, and now I think I messed it up. Does anyone know of templates that work with Moveable Type that will accomplish this? Or, at least, can anyone help me to fix my RSS feed? Last I checked Bloglines wasn't updating it properly. :(

This is the last helpless entry I will post today.

Whoops, looks like it actually was fixed. I'm so happy about that! Now everyone with an RSS feed, you should follow suit if you can and set up your feed to list complete entries with photos. It's so much easier to read! I got my template here>/a>.

Got Scraps of Lamb's Pride Worsted?

Here we have the French Market Bag, in progress with partial balls of Lamb's Pride Worsted:

It's on hold because said scraps have been just about exhausted - I'm all scrapped out. I don't particularly want to buy more LP for the little bit I have left on the bag (upper bag and handles). Would anyone be willing to arrange a trade for their leftovers of one or more colors of LP that could even remotely coordinate with the colors above?

Thanks, everyone! I didn't know LP was so popular! You guys are great. Anyway, looks like I'm covered. I'll post a finished photo soon (I hope).

Want to Order Phildar W. Me?

New Yorkers: Is anyone out there interested in placing an order to Breiweb with me? They carry every Phildar yarn and pattern book (though it seems the patterns are mostly in German Dutch), and offer reasonable shipping for larger orders. They also carry Rowan pattern books (in English) and Rowan yarns. Any takers? We could meet in the city when the package arrives...

Of Course He's in the Next Car, Honey.

So yesterday, C. and I found ourselves in Port Authority, catching the subway on our final leg of the journey home from South Jersey. We were both exhausted and slightly nauseated from our ride on the Peter Pan, not to mention the pathetic in-route entertainment, The Terminal, in which a bloated Tom Hanks talks with a ridiculous miscellaneous Eastern European accent the entire film. We waited an hour in just-above-freezing temperatures to catch the bus, which belched us out into Port Authority where more of New York City's sizable insane population was hanging out than normal. The late train we boarded wasn't much different. Oh well.

Also on the train were some (sane, generally) families, with kids hepped up on Peeps. We were sitting across from one of these families, who had a boy of about 8 and a girl, probably 6. As we pulled into High Street Station, the little girl became agitated, tore herself from her parents, and headed toward the door between the cars. "He's... IN ... THE ... NEXT CAR!!!!" she choked out. C. and I couldn't tell what was going on, and her parents gradually dragged her back to her seat, where she twitched, and craned her neck to see out the window.

When the doors opened at High Street, a giant sherbert-orange bunny boarded the train, nonchalantly walked the length of the car, and sat down at the opposite end. There he sat, examining his pay stubs or something. The two kids across from us, well, you had to be there, but they looked like teenagers at a Beatles concert in the 60s, jumping up and down, hands to face, kind of shrieking and mumbling at the same time, held back only by a parental hand on jackets. You could see in their faces that, actually, they may not have really believed in the Easter Bunny until this very moment, when they saw him, exhausted after a long day of his annual work, get on the subway and head home to Far Rockaway, or somewhere else condusive to bunny life.

A train full of crazy people, two hysterical (in a good way) children, the Bunny, and us: Easter in Brooklyn.

Aran Felted Hot Water Bottle

Pattern: Aran Hot Water Bottle from Interweave Knits, Summer '02
Yarn: Jo Sharp DK Wool, Heath, 214 yds (exactly 2 balls)
Needles: 16" Circulars (US 5), DPNs (US 6), cable needle
Recipient: Undecided

Notes: No modesty here, this thing rocks. It's my first real cabling project and it's hard not to be impressed with learning this skeel. It's the perfect size for a first project, I think.

Of course, there are two big mistakes. First, my tension was way too tight in the beginning (bottom) of the project, and loosened along the way, especially in the neck where the combo of larger needles and looser gauge makes the aran pattern much larger. Second, I left the pattern at home while I was on the subway knitting the neck, and decided, what the hell, I've been working on this for a month - why not wing it? Well, the cable is way messed up up there - where in the body each cable overlays the other, in the neck they cross in all sorts of places.

Two 12-minute stints in the washing machine was enough to felt it down to the right size. I couldn't believe how long the neck was (8"!) before felting, but it is roughly the right size now.

On water bottles: I bought one on drugstore.com which was the wrong shape and size for this pattern. It would certainly work for some pattern, but not for this one. However, after scouring the internets, a craft company called Barrett House saved el dia. Their medium rectangle bottle measures 6" x 12", exactly the size called for. The bottles were so affordable ($4 each compared to like $15 on drugstore.com) that I bought a few in different sizes for future projects.

A note on the note: The photo above stinks, PU. The color and clarity are not right, but I'm telling you the sun has not really been out here for days and days*. I've had it up to here with trying to take these photos under the clouds. This is supposedly why I don't live in Portland, or England, or somewhere with weather JUST LIKE THIS. Anyway, new pictures and more views as soon as the sun deigns to shine on New York City.

* C. helpfully points out that it was beautiful here the week I was gone in Chicago, so my bit about rainy and cold is not quite accurate. Thanks. Thanks a lot. I'm off to continue wallowing.

Additional Views:

The back of the bottle is ribbed -

Related Entries:
First Aran Cables
Yarn Purchases & Plans

French Increases & Decreases

Okay, I give up. Someone please explain to thick old me what the perplexing way of noting increases and decreases in French patterns means. Each is stated as a multiplication equation or something, like so:

1x1
6x1
1x3

Help! What does it all mean?

ps - on an unrelated note, I finished and felted my Aran Hot Water Bottle Cover and I am pleased as punch with the result. Just looking at it makes me feel so damned cool - it's felted AND aran! We're in S. Jersey visiting C.'s family right now, but I'll post photos and details as soon as we return.

KnitPicks Summer Yarn Update

After reading in Knitters Review that KnitPicks would at some point be coming out with a summer fiber collection, including cottons, etc., I thought I'd e-mail them to find out more deets. Here's the response:

Dear Jessica,

The May 2005 catalog will feature our Summer line which will have cotton,
cotton blends and other summer fibers. It will also feature eyelash and
other scarf style yarns. We are very excited about our new line and hope
that you will be too.

Happy Knitting!

Knit Picks - Customer Service
1-800-574-1323

So that's the scoop, peeps. Keep your eyes peeled in May for new, affordable fabulosity from KnitPicks!

Oh, and there was one more unrelated thing I wanted to tell you. I just tried Tea Spot, the new tea cafe across from NYU Law School on MacDougal between W3rd and W4th, and I love it! They offer a great selection of high-quality teas, a nice atmosphere, free wireless, and lots of space. They've even got a patio out back for summer. Thing is, they're really, really quiet, and I'm hoping they stay in business, so check it out if you're in the nabe, and spend some $$.

Climbing the Motherhood Ladder: A Mad Rant About "Perfect Madness"

Yesterday Judith Warner, author of Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety was interviewed on NPR’s Fresh Air. I’d read “The Mommy Trap,” the Times’ review of her book, a few weeks back, and was profoundly bored by Warner’s thesis. Maybe because I live in Park Slope, its hotbed in NYC. But there she was again, this time on the radio. In the interview, and in the review, Warner came off whiney and narrow-minded rather than solution-oriented. This time, I was irritated.

So, dear readers, I’m going to subject you to a rant. Get ready. Some of you will disagree, some may be offended. I do welcome your thoughts on this topic, so comment freely. Sorry in advance if you just come here for the craft content – more of that tomorrow. But for now:

As a preliminary matter: I am consistently stunned by the ability of the Times to extend its own navel-gazing generalizations about its demographic (read: rich) to society as a whole, or to nod superficially to that circumstance and proceed to dedicate several pages to such stories anyway. The women Warner writes about have the leeway to be neurotic about raising their kids. Most people in this country don’t, and too many Americans are concerned more about putting a roof over their kids’ head than buying them the newest pair of cleats. See also "The Opt-Out Revolution" and "Mommy (And Me)," (a snide article about the alleged self-centeredness of blogging parents that I think is actually a great companion piece to Warner's book).

Anyway: I’m not saying that the phenomenon Warner’s writing about doesn’t exist: surely it does. But I think the problem goes deeper than this country’s deplorable childcare policies. I think it stems largely from the hubris of a complacent generation of women (mine), ambivalent about feminism, who grew up never considering that they would have to make sacrifices, and who don’t know how to fight for effectively for ourselves when such unanticipated sacrifices become unacceptable.

But even more significantly, to my mind, the problem is that as upper-class women have entered the most competitive careers in the country, and as we have learned how to succeed in those fields, we have integrated the competitive approaches that dominate those fields into our lives. In short, we have become “male” in our approach to motherhood. From what I can see, the pressures Warner writes about share much with the pressures men stereotypically feel about their roles as breadwinners: guilt, inadequacy (especially that), jealousy, overwork, hyperbolization of problems, tunnel-vision, and stress. Apply this to motherhood, an inherently imperfect pursuit, and you have a recipe for disaster for both mothers and kids, the ultimate object of all these feelings. And to add to everything, here is Judith Warner with another book telling mothers: you’re doing it all wrong. Where is our backbone? If you think there’s too much guilt, too much pressure involved in the way we’re told to raise our kids, try to choose another way. I know this is easier said than done, but if you have enough energy to whine this loud, you have enough energy to change, and enough energy to resist social pressures. No one way of parenting is good for ever kid, or for every parent. After all, if all the other soccer moms drove off a bridge, would you do it too? Now, how about that $500 stroller? And of course, one of Warner’s main points is that women ought to be kinder to each other, which is true. But, like any relationship, there are two sides to unkindness: the (perceived) unkindness, and the (hyper)sensitivity to it on the part of its object. Part of the fault can be attributed to an unsupportive society still bent on forcing women into a series of Hobson’s choices about their careers, but part of it is a return to victimization: women must show solidarity, yes, and also take some responsibility to stand up for themselves if any of this is to change.

Stupid Big-Handed Broad Street Mittens

I'm about 1/3 finished with one Broad Street mitten, and like every mitten pattern, it is too damned big. AND there are big mistakes in the pattern. Ugh.

Nothing more to say, this is purely a whining post. Thank you very much.

Dyeing Update

Weeeeell, as my last official fun act of Spring Break (which by my count ends at 4PM today, the start of the week's first class), I took the Red/Blue yarn and overdyed it with Blue Moon Berry on the stove top. It would have come out great, I think, the red muted to a perfect blue-red, had I not been so overzealous. I peeked in after the first packet and it still seemed a little bright, and I thought the water looked pretty clear, so before it was done I added just shy of one more entire packet of blue moon berry to the dye bath. It appears to have come out more burgundy / grapey / wine colored than red. The blue became even more vibrant, which I love, and all the white spots were filled in with light blue. Just a little too much blue to go around. Where the yarn was tied, though, and less of the blue absorbed, it ended up being just about the color I was going for. Live and learn:

Anyhoo, this dyeing is addictive! As soon as I finished this batch, I was cooking up other combos in my wee mind. I'm thinking of ordering just a crapload of the Andean Silk to dye to my heart's content, or maybe even the Color-Your-Own Sock Yarn from Knitpicks.

Wedding Shrug

Wow, check this out:

Wedding Shrug (scroll down a bit)

Isn't it beautiful? What an honor to make something so lovely to be worn in a wedding!

A Good Day to Dye - Using Kool-Aid to Dye Yarn With Jess and Jenny

Yarn: Knitpicks Andean Silk, Cream (55% Super Fine Alpaca, 23% Silk, 22% Merino Wool)
Amount Dyed: 2 skeins (192 yds / 100g / 3.5 oz)
Dye: Black Cherry (5 packages), Blue Moon Berry (3 packages)

Yarn: Knitpicks Wool of the Andes, Natural (100% Peruvian Wool)
Amount Dyed: 2 skeins (440 yds / 200g / 7 oz)
Dye: Mango (3 packages), Orange (1 package), Ice Cool Arctic Green Apple (1 package).

Notes: Presenting... A photo essay on the subject of dyeing yarn with kool-aid:

We bought what can only be referred to as a crapload of kool-aid. Unfortunately, we were missing some of the kolors Jenny wanted to use, so we still ran short on oranges / peaches.

We diluted the kool-aid with a few tablespoons of water and a dropperful of vinegar (even though we knew kool-aid is probably acidic enough on its own, we're into good measure). Then we used plastic droppers to paint the yarn in the bathtub, as Jenny is demonstrating above.

We then carefully removed the yarn from the tub into a container to transport to the stove for steaming.

This is my yarn. It truly looks like a bizarre and bloody piece of meat. To get vibrant color with kool-aid, most tutorials say you need to use lots of dye and little dilution, so I ended up using 8 packets for 3.5 oz, about twice the number recommended for single-color dyeing on knitty's tutorial.

Here's a paparazzi shot of my yarn in the steambath. Hot! We steamed each batch for about 45-60 minutes.

Meanwhile, we had some iced tea, talked on the phone, and went out for a slice from Pino's.

When the yarn finished steaming, we washed both skeins in warm water with Woolite in the bathtub, rinsed well, and hung to dry. Then we watched Manhattan and sat around on the couch for the rest of the day. Oh, and we knitted some bunnies.

The results are, as you can see, above. I love the springiness of Jenny's batch. I propose "Papaya" as a name for Jenny's colourway, and "Scarlet Bluebell" for mine. Alternatively, we could call mine "Bruises and Wounds."

A word about the yarns: both took dye extremely well. The Peruvian Wool is made to be dyed, and despite our using a rather skimpy amount of kool-aid for so much yarn (though Jenny wanted some natural sections left), dyed pretty vibrantly, more so than the photo shows.

My Andean Silk batch was made as an experiment to decide whether this yarn, if hand-dyed, would be suitable for Clapotis. My conclusion is that it definitely would be. Although it's not the beautiful single-ply of the original Lorna's Laces Lion & Lamb, the finished product turned out much less fuzzy than I expected (and less fuzzy than the original skein), and has a smoothness and drape that would lend itself to the pattern. Sadly, KnitPicks seems to be cleaned out of the Cream Andean Silk, so I can't run there to order more right away, but I assume they'll get more in eventually.

Here's a swatch of the Andean Silk:

That photo's a little truer to color, see below...

Question for you: Since my camera seems to give everything in natural light on cloudy days a blue tint, the red/blue yarn is not quite as bright in the photo as it is in person. I'd like to mute/darken it a bit. Do you think it would be possible / advisable to overdye the yarn in a weak blue to deepen the colors in this way? Would I just use the same stovetop method as is recommended in all the tutorials?

Related Entries:
Resources for Hand-Dyeing Yarn

Young Buns Havin' Some Fun: Knitted Bunnies

Pattern: Knitted Bunny, free from Heartstrings Fibers
Yarn (large bunny): Bulky New Wool from Union Square Market + a bit of cashmere for tail
Yarn (small bunny): School Products Cashmere, worsted weight
Needles: US 13 straight needles (large), US 5 straight needles (small)
Recipients: Denny's mom, Chris' mom.

Notes: This was Jenny Narcoleptikov's first finished knitting project! I think her bunny (the large bunny) looks fabulous, even if he did at points in his making look like a turtle, and subsequently an armadillo. He looks like a bunny now, the color of beets, the national vegetable of Jenny's home country. As for me, this was my first time making pompons. Fun! Fast! Poofy! Poofy!

Here's Jenny's boyfriend Denny watching her knit the ears of her bunny. That's, um, boredom.

Tie-Dyed and Helpless

Last night I hunkered down in bed with one of the patterns I'm hoping to make, this simple sweater (#15, "Trui met 'tie & die' effect") from the '04 ete catalogue:

I was making a lot of progress in understanding the pattern, but what I could not figure out was the technique used in achieving that fading tie-dye effect (which is difficult to detect in the photo, but trust me, it's there). I spent like 45 minutes reading and re-reading, and re-reading, trying to figure out where the heck in the pattern it told you to use more than one ball of yarn. Also puzzling were the suggested amounts - 4 balls of one color, 1 ball of the other. Finally, I just fell asleep confused and sleepily cursing France. This morning, however, I checked out the yarn called for, which is this:

Um, yeah. Self-patterning yarn. Heh heh. Sorry, France.

Phildar Windfall

Whelp, that list right down there? It just got about TWICE as long. The Phildar magazines Sarah sent as a trade for the Nakiska headband have so many awesome patterns inside, well, you can see in the photo how many I've tabbed! Thanks so much, Sarah. J'adore trades.

Here are just a few of the patterns that have elbowed their way to the front of the queue...

• Pull Raglan à Mitaines - I am completely entranced by this pattern. You can see it on the cover of Irlandais, but that photo doesn't do it justice. Here's a full shot:
  

  Everything about this sweater is amazing: the cabling, the neck, but especially the sleeves. The sweater comes complete with a hole for your thumbs: half-mittens! Frankly, I may in the end leave them off, but for hiking and stuff, they're ingenious.

• Almost every pattern in Tendences Hiver 04/05 - too bad winter is ending! In particular, the wide-necked white sweater, the chunky turtleneck, and the v-neck cardigan.
  

Thanks again, Sarah, for helping to keep me busy ;-)!

ALSO: A question for my smarty-pantses readers: Does anyone know of a good resource for working with French knitting patterns? I found a few, which may be sufficient, but parts of the ones I'm looking at still seem confusing. Here's what I've got so far:

Illustrations of French Stitches
Knitting Terms Translated
Needle Equivalents

The Big To-Do

Since Spring Break is tailspinning to a close, I best get to some of the enormous stack of reading gathering dust on my desk. This week has absolutely flown, and April will be my busiest month, and I have a feeling May will arrive all in a flash. Stupid time, always running away from everyone. I've always envied Meg Ryan's character in Prelude to a Kiss, who hadn't slept for like twenty years.

In any case, since I have so little time to knit, I thought now would be a good time to share a partial, unordered list of patterns I'd like to tackle in the next however-long. Wishful thinking:

1930 - vintage-inspired undie set
hush-hush - vintage inspired nightgown
clapotis - shawl / scarf
french market bag
honeymoon - tank top
newsies cap
jiffy tube
sassy stripes - strapless top
Caramel Cap Sleeve Top - Interweave Knits, Spring '04
Polka Purl Dots - sleeveless top - Interweave Knits, Spring '04
Ballet Pullover - Interweave Knits, Summer '04
Hobo - tank top - Rowan Magazine #37
Chamomile - sweater - Rowan Summer Tweed Collection
Gwennabe Zim Hat
Butterfly - camisole version - Rowan #37
MagKnits Hug w/ Oh My Stars Modifications
Rogue
Hike from Rowan #37
Knitted Panniers from Vogue Knitting Winter 2004/2005
Pleated Top from Vogue Knitting Winter 2004/2005

Altitudes Turtleneck - From Phildar Tendances Winter 04/05
Scoopy Roll-Neck Steppe Sweater - From Phildar Tendances Winter 04/05
Round-Neck Sweater - From Phildar Tendances Winter 04/05
V-Back Onde Sweater - From Phildar Ete 2004
Holey Sleeveless Top - From Phildar Ete 2004
V-neck Tank - From Phildar Ete 2004
Cabled Sleeveless Top - From Phildar Mode Irlandais 2004
Awesomest Sweater Ever - From Phildar Mode Irlandais 2004
Irish Hiking Legwarmers from Wine and Needles

I also did a bit of browsing for dress and skirt patterns and found some good ones by Simplicity / New Look as well as a couple likely candidates from Vogue. I'll keep you posted.

Yarn Swift! (and Electric Mixer Yarn Winding Tutorial)

Last week was so long that I decided to use my 50% off coupon at JoAnn (coupon code MARA550, through 4/28) to buy myself a little present. My new yarn swift arrived today, to Chris' befuddlement (weirdest umbrella he ever saw) and it took approx. 3 minutes for me to get started on trying it out.

A while back, I'd read this detailed tutorial on how to use an electric mixer to wind yarn. My own yarn-winding adventure is documented here, for your reading pleasure. Of course, you may be an intelligent person with $30, and decide to buy a yarn winder instead.

You'll need...
Yarn in a skein
Yarn swift
Electric mixer (a stand mixer if ya got it, and hand mixer for people like moi)
Toilet paper roll
Plate
One glove

I started with one skein of Knitpicks Shimmer, a laceweight yarn I was not looking forward to winding by hand:

(1) Load the skein onto the swift, like so. You may want to ask your cat to inspect, to ensure you've done high-quality work on this step:

(2) Now, insert one beater into the t.p. roll. It will be a tight squeeze, but it should fit:

Note that you'll probably want to get yours higher up toward the mixer - that will make it easier later by preventing the possibility that the yarn will stray from the t.p. roll and wind around the beater.

(3) Cut a 1/2" slit in the edge of the t.p. roll and slip the end of the yarn in there, so that it catches.

(4) Now you can set up to wind. Now may be a good time to explain what you'll do. You'll set up your mixer at about the same level as your swift. While holding the mixer with one hand and with the end of the beater resting on the plate below, you will use your free hand to guide the yarn onto the t.p. roll. This is a bit tricky, and your first skein will probably not be perfect.

So... put a glove on the hand you'll use to guide the yarn. I discovered the hard way that, especially with a speedy mixer like ours, you'll get yarn-burn on your hand if you don't take prophylactic measures. Then set up as described above: beater above plate, level with swift, and free hand guiding the yarn onto the tube. Then turn your mixer on to the lowest setting. It will seem too fast, but you'll get used to it:

I wound this 440 yard skein in about three or four minutes. Here is the result:

You can see there are a couple of extra ends poking out of the top, and this is because at some point my yarn wound around the beater. Being lazy and not knowing another way to fix it, I just cut the yarn and figured I'd deal with the break later. Moral: in this world of modern technology, things move so quickly, one must be especially alert to snags and mishaps. You must pay attention to where the yarn is directed at all times!

Anyhoo, if you try this, let me know how it goes for you, and please share any tips you've got.

Vintage Fabrics, Pt. 1

After a short hiatus, I'm back with the first installment of the waaay too much fabric from Village Thrift (you're lucky I'm not subjecting you to all the vintage pumps I hauled back here!) while home in Chicagoland. The second installment was used as padding in a box my mom's shipping to me, so I'll post that later.

On the left, there's a stack of mostly sheets, a few pillowcases (2nd from top), and one miscellaneous piece of fabric. These will most likely be tank tops, a dress or some skirts for my niece, Lorin. The top piece is thicker and made of canvas and is, I think, destined to become a bag or purse of some sort. On the right, there's what I think was a table runner - a beautifully embroidered piece. I have no idea what to do with it, but I certainly don't have any tables that need running. Any suggestions? I was thinking it could maybe be the center panel in a three-paneled bag?

Oh, also, here's an actual piece of fabric I picked up, featuring those big-headed kids so popular in the 70s:

If you know of good, basic skirt and dress patterns out there, please share them!

Ruth, or Grandma

Cool Bedsheet Dress

Check out this killer dress made of an old bedsheet:

Cool Tree Sheet Made Into Dress [via Craftster]

Hot!

Some of you might know I spent the weekend in Chicago and NW Indiana ("da Region," among the 'in' crowd) visiting friends and family. My g-ma is doing okay, considering all she's been through. When I saw her, my mom had been there earlier in the morning and had given her the cashmere socks. She was uncomfortable, but much more lucid than she's been in days, and when she saw me she said "look what I'm wearing on my feet!" and managed a smile. Sure enough, I peeled back the sheets and she wiggled her toes in the socks below. Anyway, it was nice, and reassuring to see her getting back to herself even though she's in a lot of pain still.

I also had time for a run to Village Thrift with Joy Olivia, who also generously passed along her one vintage portrait for my collection. She's gorgeous! In fact, I was with Joy when she found it (at Thrift) and pushed her to buy it. She's still at my mom's, but I'll post a photo once she arrives in NYC.

At Thrift, I picked up a whole bunch of vintage textiles, including an especially large assortment of pillowcases, and one big piece of actual vintage fabric. These are also still in Indiana. But the point is, in the next month or two, look for some sewing projects, including at least one or two tanks or tube tops made from this haul. The dress above also really inspired me to tackle one like it, so perhaps the piece of fabric is destined for a similar frock.

Cashmere Convertible Mittens (aka Glittens) with Pattern Modifications

Notes: A lot of you have been asking me lately what happened with those glittens I made months ago, from a very modified version of the Patons pattern with which I made Clayton's honkin' huge convertible mittens. By the way, the Patons pattern came in one size: honkin' huge. So I set out to make a pair of glittens pour moi, scaled down for my nearly childlike paws. The result is what you see above, and I will try to reconstruct the modifications I made, and reflect on what I'd do differently.

What went right:

Smaller thumb / thumb gusset: I continued the thumb gusset increases until there were, I believe, 10 stitches between the 2 purled stitches rather than 14.

Shorter palms: I omitted a few rows from the palms once the thumb gusset was complete. I think I knitted 7 rows even above the thumb gusset rather than the 10 specified.

Stockinette fingers: Rather than ribbed fingers, I went with stockinette, which I thought looked better and made the fingers a bit tighter.

Shorter, more rounded flap: Rather than alternating decrease rows with even rows, once I began decreasing I decreased every row. This eliminated the flipper-like pointy shape of the original pattern and made the flap shorter overall.

What could have gone better:

Wrists way too loose: for some reason, probably because I was paranoid about the fingers being too small, I cast on the 48 stitches called for in the pattern. I think a combination of the pattern and the ultra-soft yarn means the ribbing on this pair is really loose, and as a result the wrists are annoyingly loose, which you can sort of see in this photo:

I think I could have gotten away with casting on 40 instead of 48, and having the fingers be 2 stitches more snug (though they aren't as loose as the wrists).

Thumb / thumb gusset still too big: I think I picked up two too many stitches from the palm when I started the thumb, which meant the thumb was only 2 stitches smaller than the original. My thumb is just not that chubby.

So the bottom line is that because of the looseness of the wrist and thumb, I find myself gravitating toward my old thinsulate-lined, non-homemade gloves more often than I do my glittens. I'm thinking of frogging these to correct the problems, but probably won't get around to it till next fall.

By the way, Clayton ADORES his glittens. I have been told multiple times by both him and his girlfriend that they are his most prized piece of indoors-outerwear. If you're making convertible mittens for a man, I still think the Patons pattern is just about as good as it gets for worsted-weight yarn. As for us delicate lasses, we'll just have to keep trying.

Additional views:

Here's a shot of the closed glitten:

Space-Dyed Cashmere Socks

Pattern: School Products Sock Pattern
Yarn: School Products Space-Dyed Boucle Cashmere Sock Yarn (90% cashmere / 10% nylon), 1 skein (only $13!)
Needles: Crystal Palace DPNs, US 2
Recipient: Mom (or Grandma*)

Notes: Oh, what a long, strange sock trip it's been. I started a pair of socks for my mom back in November. That effort resulted in these (there's a whole pair, not just one, I was just too lazy to put on both for the photo):

Pictured on my feet, not hers. They're mine now, ALL MINE, I mean, unfortunately, she could not wear them because they were too small for her so I grudgingly kept them. So in December, I started a second pair with a different colorway of the same yarn. The first sock (technically the third sock) was finished promptly, but I didn't begin the second (fourth) one for ages. Finally I finished sock #4 it was, remarkably, much smaller than sock #3. So it was frogged, and sock #5 was begun. Finally, sock #3 and sock #5 are together and relatively happy, although the ankle part of #5 is longer than #3's. You can see that pair above.

To top it off, somewhere in the middle of sock #5 I misplaced the pattern I was using, so the toe decrease is probably a little different.

Anyway, strangely I'm not down on sock knitting, in fact, I feel like something of an expert after all those socks. The yarn I used is lovely, though I feel like it may begin to pill sooner than later. Here's a close up:

* I may actually end up making yet another pair of these socks for my mom, because my grandma just had surgery and is recovering in the hospital, and if Mom thinks Gma would enjoy the socks, they are going to Gma. Sorry Mom, the 92-year-old beats you out!

THANK YOU, S.P.!!

Check it out!! I was just settling in to do some booooring reading this morning when the FedEx man came with a mysterious package from Minnesota (most cool people seem to be from Minnesota, in my experience) and look what was inside:

You done good, SP! I just about started to drool when I saw what was inside:

320 yards of Artfibers Origami, a "paper" ribbon yarn with a strand of bronze metallics (you know I love metallics!)

560 yards of Schaefer Yarns' Anne, THE SOFTEST, MOST BEAUTIFUL finger-weight handpainted superwash merino / mohair / nylon yarn! I adore this colorway, in fact, I was just scheming about how to dye some like this myself, and effort headed for certain failure. Probably this will go to either a couple of pairs of socks or a lightweight Clapotis.

A Pinocchio tape measure, straight off probably a one-year stint on my wishlist! I looooooove him!! I'm constantly struggling with my non-retractable tape measure, but I'd been waiting until some nice person got me this hilarious one. After all, Pinocchio is not the kind of thing one buys for oneself :). I adore him... honest!!!

All packaged in a cute-as-a-button vinyl purse, which I think my 5-year-old niece and I will be fighting over. She will win, she always does.

I'm lucky to have such a cool secret pal - thanks so much, SP!

Eat, Knit, and Be Happy in the Village

Becca, another knitter from school, tells me a new knitting cafe just opened near school. The Point is on Bedford, and it's reportedly much more spacious and a bit more laid back than Purl, though the yarn selection is smaller and the pricing is comparable. And they have coffee and pastries. Oh, and did I mention, they also have pastries? And they have pastries, too.

I'm thinking we may gather our NYU Law knitting group there. If you go there, please let me know what you think!

Gallows Humor Finally Gets TFA, and the Story of the Socks that Socked it to Me

Oh, I should have posted a while ago, but I figured it was still worthwhile. Check out this article from The Onion about Teach For America:

Teach For America Chews Up, Spits Out Another Ethnic Studies Major

Some of you might know I was a TFA teacher in Houston, then worked at their national office in NYC. I love 'em to death, and it's out of that love that the hilarity of this article sprouted.

In knitting knews, I am working on my mom's socks for the THIRD time. The first time I sent her a pair and they were too small, so now they're mine. They are wonderful - made from handpainted School Products cashmere with 10% nylon, but they just didn't fit her. I started the second pair in December, and finished the first one shortly, but didn't really start the second sock until a week or so ago. Then in the middle of sock #2, I lost the pattern I was using, so I did the toe decreases from memory.

When I finished sock #2, my gauge was substantially tighter than the one I made two months ago, so I had to frog the foot and redo it, which I count as my third attempt at this sock. For some reason, I never seem to be able to make a totally matching pair of anything, even though my gauge on larger projects seems relatively consistent. Argh - cursed socks! If they don't fit this time, I may have to take ownership of a second pair of cashmere socks... how unfortunate! Er, just kidding Mom, I'm dedicated to your sock needs.

Anyway, hence no knitting posts this week - I've just been busy doing then re-doing this bleepin' sock, and of course, doing the occasional school thing. With luck I'll have the finished product to show tomorrow, but my odds so far are way low.

Dyeing Yarn and Fiber With Food Paste

Just what I was looking for! Check out this fab tutorial, downloadable in Word or .pdf, for dyeing yarn and fiber with food paste dyes, like Wilton's cake dyes. There are also a few helpful photos on her website.