I have been working on a blanket - yes, another one!  Actually, I’ve been working on two blankets but the second one will have to wait till later.

This is based on Kristina’s beautiful pattern - Vortex Shawl.  It’s knit circularly from the center out and I worried about getting the cast-on right.  As it happened, I didn’t have any trouble with it and was off and sailing in no time!

The beginnings went quickly, as always with a design like this.  I have, however, gotten to the point where I can only do a couple of rounds at a time.  That’s not a problem :)  When I’m not focusing on getting one thing done on a timeline (like the scarf), I can do a couple of rounds every day - sometimes even four rounds if my arm holds out :)

I have no idea where this love of making blankets comes from but around late May/early June the blanket bug started biting me so I started looking around.  I had also had the hankering to make something redredred.  When I found the pattern for the Vortex Shawl, I knew I had found my blanket and out I went to yarn shop!  I’m using Patons Wool and, as usual, finding it very pleasant to work with.  I’m on the fifth ball now and haven’t encountered a single knot yet.

I don’t know yet how big this thing will grow.  I started out with the idea of making it 70” in diameter which would be suitable for a double-bed, say.  But I’ve recently become aware of the advantages of a lap blanket - something just big enough to cover the lap and legs and it’s about that size now.  There’s also the matter of a border or an edging.  I would like to do one (the Godmother’s edging from Walker’s second treasury keeps s[peaking up) but I can’t decide whether to do it in the same red as the body of the blanket, or in a contrasting color.  Cream?  Black?  Purple?

It’s a good thing I don’t have to decide today as I tend to be notoriously slow about these kinds of decisions :)

I saw a film this afternoon that I’d like to recommend.  It’s called The Golden Boys and stars David Carradine, Rip Torn, Bruce Dern and Mariel Hemingway.  It is a gentle and charming romantic comedy set in Chatham, MA of 1905.  The movie was filmed entirely on Cape Cod and great attention was paid to period authenticity.  The musical score is also quite wonderful.  A word of warning though - this is not Die Hard.  There are no heart stopping car chases, no breath-catching perils or traumas and almost nothing in the way of sex or rough language.  This is an older style film.  If you’re over 45, you’ll probably enjoy it :) 

I loved it!

Apparently I’m not quite as ready to hang up the blog as I had thought.  I doubt that I’ll be posting very often, and it’s likely that many posts will have little to do with knitting.  Some will of course, but knitting is a slow process these days and I don’t get much done nor do I get anything done quickly.

Still, something in me seems to want to continue this digital diary, so I’ll just go with it for now :)

Most of you probably know that I have been dealing with a terminal cancer situation.  Funny thing - most of the physical problems I have stem from side effects of the chemotherapy drugs I’ve been given rather than directly from the cancer.  And there have been a lot of drugs.  As we move down the list they become less effective and have more serious consequences.

During this time, my treatment has been managed by a very good oncologist.  He has been sharp and has organized things ably and quickly when necessary.  He has listened to me - up to and including taking my observations about my condition and research into its treatment into consideration.  He is, in addition to being a good oncologist, a good man.

Yesterday I was informed that my doctor has taken a position in another hospital and will be leaving at the end of September.  I have the option of transferring my treatment to the other hospital or being assigned to another doctor at the one where I’ve been getting my treatment for the last nine years.

Initially I was pretty upset.  It is hard for me to be comfortable with doctors and I felt some resentment that now I would have to deal with a new one.  I could, of course, transfer to the other hospital but it hasn’t had the best of reputations in the past and is not in an area I’m comfortable traveling to.  In addition, I’m familiar and comfortable with the hospital and staff I’ve been seeing all along.  Do I want to pull all that up, as though I were transplanting tomatoes, and go elsewhere - where the doctor would be familiar but everything else would be up in the air?

Finally I realized that this cannot have been an easy decision for my oncologist.  Whatever his reasons are, perhaps it is time for him to move on.  I have had his care for the better part of a decade and am deeply grateful for it.  Maybe it’s a good things that others will get to experience his kindness and expertise.  And maybe there are things I can learn from a new oncologist.  So I think I have decided to stay where I am.  I could change my mind, though I don’t think it likely, and will wish my old oncologist the very best as I try to meet my new oncologist with an open mind and heart.

I do, however, want to give him something a little more personal than a hearty handshake before he leaves so I started an Open Cable Scarf this afternoon.

I was a little nervous about managing the cables because my hands and fingers are about half numb due to neuropathy.  I have become very clumsy :)  To my surprise and pleasure, things didn’t go badly at all and I was able to make good progress.  I’m using Paton’s Classic Merino (which has been discontinued, I understand) and it’s nice and soft.  If I can keep up the pace I managed today, I should be able to finish this in a week.  It doesn’t seem like much, but I hope he will enjoy it.

Jade is pouting in the hall because Myria has been busy and I have had either a keyboard or my knitting in my lap all day.

She’ll live :)

I’ve been blogging for about five and half years now.  To say it has been rewarding beyond my wildest expectations is a vast understatement.  I have made friends, learned many, many new things and received far more than I have given.  I thank you all, who have come on this journey with me, profoundly and from the bottom of my heart.

However, life and circumstances have become such that blogging isn’t going to be possible any more.  I’m on a new medication which has some fairly incapacitating (if not exactly dangerous) side effect which leave me without strength or much in the way of focus.  I am still knitting, but only very simple things that I can’t mess up too badly and usually, only a couple of rows/rounds at a time.  Also, dad’s condition keeps deteriorating and he needs more help all the time just to get things done - like paying bills and doing laundry.  So what energy I do have goes into that.

I’ve gotten many notes inquiring into my well-being over the last month.  I will try to respond to them, but I can’t make any promises.  Suffice it to say I’m as well as can be expected :)

Thank you all for your concern and for reading along with my little knitting adventures.  Further patterns and/or tutorials - if there are any - will be posted on Ravelry (user name Robbyn).  I know this isn’t available to all of you for one reason or another and I’m sorry about that but it’s the best I can do.

Onwards :)

I did something yesterday that I almost never do any more - I bought a knitting magazine :)  Interweave Knits Spring 2009.  I’d like to tell you it’s because it had several patterns I was interested in - and it’s reasonably true that there are at least three things in there I’d like to make.  That’s my basic magazine rule; there has to be at least two patterns (and preferably three) that make my pulse pound before I’ll buy a magazine.

But really, I bought it for the Fountain Pen Shawl.  Not only is it a beautiful and not-too-difficult piece of work, I happen to love fountain pens - always have.

I’ve had 4 hanks of Kntipicks Gloss just waiting for the right project to sing for them and I have been thinking about a lace weight shawl for a long time now.  I’ve even started a couple at different times but eventually I lost interest in them or they otherwise told me they weren’t interested :)  So the yarn was there and any number of appropriate needles - all I needed was some inspiration.  And I got it when I saw the photos at the above link.

I even dragged out my Harmony wood needles for this.  My only complaint ever about them was that they are dark and a little difficult to use with dark yarn.  I thought I’d give it a shot though, since I imagined combining this yarn (wool/silk) with my lovely, slick, Options needles would be a recipe for dancing, screaming, cursing disaster :)  And you know what?  If I turn the light on over my shoulder, it isn’t too bad after all!

I very much like the way this looks, though the scale is smaller than I had imagined.  On the other hand, I have plenty of yarn and can do a couple more pattern repeats if I’m not satisfied with the length when I get to what the pattern suggests.  It is simple enough not to be scary (I’m easily threatened by lace) but, I hope, not so simple that I get bored with it.

In fact there’s only one thing about it that I don’t like - nupps.  I know, I know - time honored technique and tradition and all that.  Trying to purl a bunch of yarn-overs together is not my idea of a good time.  So I’m using beads instead.  While they’re not terribly apparent in the photos, they actually look very spiffy!

Just an aside…  I’m liking the Gloss lace weight but I have the feeling that it’s a bit heavier than usual for lace weight.  Not that I have any objection to that - heavens no!  I’m really very grateful because my fumbly fingers would have a tough time with something really fine.  I’m sure cobweb would just make me cry :)

I think I’m going to have to order some of this in the undyed form to play with in the dye pot!

It snowed again today - heavy and wet.  I know it won’t last long because the temperatures aren’t going to even get down as far as freezing for the rest of the week.  But goddamn, I’m tired of this - whinewhinewhine…

Heh :)

Clearly, Goldie knows what to do on a day like this!

Me, I knit on the second tote in an admittedly lazy fashion - a few rounds here, a little TV, another couple of rounds, pet the cat, etc…

Cocoa spent the day chewing up her cardboard toys between naps.  I guess there’s something about a snowy day that makes for a sleepy feeling all around :)

The weather critters are promising us some sun for tomorrow.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed: I so want to see the sun.  And I’m absolutely desperate to get the windows open again!  When the apartment is shut up for winter, some tiny (but loud!) part of me always feels like it is suffocating.  I know spring is coming - there’s a whole fringe of green coming up on the side of my dad’s house, the temperatures are going up if slowly and reluctantly and hell, we’re into daylight savings time.  An artificial marker it may be, but a marker it is never the less.

So why is it the closer spring gets, the more impatient I am for it to arrive?

I made a discovery last week - kind of stumbled in by the back door :)

I knit English style.  When I make a stitch, I let go of the right needle to manually bring the yarn around the left needle.  I know about Continental style knitting where the yarn is tensioned in the left hand and sort of scooped through the stitch by the right needle (picking, as opposed to throwing).  I have tried it many times over the years because it’s supposed to be so much faster.  It may be because I’m just not dexterous enough or because I’m left-handed but I knit right-handed.  In any case, my fingers just don’t seem to be able to move the right way.

I didn’t waste any time worrying about it, just continued knitting and throwing as I always did.  Then, a couple of years ago, I learned about knitting backwards.  Really, this is a way of purling back from the front so that you don’t have to turn the work, nor shift your hands nor let go of the yarn.  It makes things easier in several cases.  For plain stockinette work, it’s a dream - things go quite a bit faster,  For things like bobbles and entrelac, it’s a dream come true.  I always did like bobbles but making them was a pain in the butt.  Now, it’s a pleasant little diversion from the regular row (or round) of knitting.  And I never even tried entrelac (barely knew what it was) before I learned about knitting backwards - and you all know how I feel about entrelac :)

My only regret about the knitting backwards thing was that while it covered purl stitches, nowhere was there any suggestion about how to do knit stitches.  I did, eventually, figure out a way that worked, but it’s awkward and still involves bringing the yarn from the back to the front of the work in order to make the stitch.  For some reason that I couldn’t quite pin down, this seems to be a much clumsier maneuver when working back from the front than when working forward from the front.

A few weeks ago, a knitter who designs and knits beautiful shawls and whom I knew to habitually employ the knitting backwards technique (see the Yahoo group Mmario Kknits) mentioned a way of making a knit stitch (while knitting backwards) that didn’t require bringing the yarn to the front of the work.  It was compared to the Norwegian purl technique (video tutorials here and here), a method of purling from the front that didn’t require moving the yarn to the front of the work.  I had investigated this technique a while back, but it’s aimed at Continental knitters.  There’s really no way for an English style thrower to accomplish it.  So I promptly forgot about it and moved on.

And yet, the idea of being able to knit as well as purl from the back of the fabric without having to shove the yarn back and forth kind of haunted me.  I went and looked at the Norwegian purl videos again.  And then I observed (closely this time!) where my hands and yarn were when I was knitting backwards - yarn tensioned in the right hand and being picked, not thrown.  And it dawned on me finally, when I knit backwards, I’m knitting Continental style!  Well, whaddya know!

So I went back to review the Norwegian purl videos.  I kept trying to figure out how I could adapt this to create a knit stitch when one was working backwards.  Periodically, when I was working on the blanket, I would try one thing or another as various ideas occurred to me and last week, I finally nailed it :)

I will try to put a tutorial together for those few who might be interested in this sort of thing.  I realize this is kind of esoteric, but it’s pretty cool all the same :)  English going forwards and Continental going backwards!

Seed stitch and ribbing will never be the same - and this is going change the way I knit forever!

“The best thing…is to learn something. That is the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds.

There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the thing for you.”

The Once and Future King
T. H. White