One Plain, One Fancy

Last month I wrote a piece for Lion Brand Yarns that mentioned an almost century-old pattern that I've had my eye on. This is it:



Look at that collar. Gorgeous, and perfectly practical for a pencil-neck like me who is prone to agonies of stiffness if I get even a whisper of draught down my back. I saw it, I want it, I'm going to make it.

Mind you, I'm going to change it. It's too long, for starters. As written,* it would hang to halfway down my thigh. Not pretty. I'm adding shaping in the torso, too–a taper from chest to waist.

It'll be gentle taper, because a sweater like this is meant to be a smidge loose. You put it on at home, in your study, when you've finally taken off your jacket and loosened your tie.  It's not for the office. It's for quiet solitude. However, should somebody drop in on my solitude, I'd rather not have it hang on me like I'm wearing daddy's old bathrobe.

So, the Product Knitter within wanted to knit the sweater in order to wear the sweater. The Process Knitter within–which is dominant–wanted to try out the pockets.

Here's a shot of one pocket.



As you can see, not much else happening for acres and acres of stockinette but that pocket. Marvelously smooth opening, no?

You make it by knitting to the point at which you want your pocket opening to lie. Then–without breaking the working yarn–you work only on the stitches that will form the interior of the pocket, knitting and purling back and forth on them until you have a strip that's twice the intended depth of the pocket.

Then you line up the live stitches of this strip with the live stitches you left sitting on your needle and–again, without breaking the working yarn–resume knitting across all your stitches. The strip, now folded in half, forms the interior of the pocket. It's very neat, and just requires seams up the sides when the piece is finished.

Here it is in hasty scribble form.



And here's what the actual pocket (finished except for side seams) looks like from the wrong side.



I like it. The opening is, of course, seamless. The method is straightforward. You must plan for your pockets in advance, of course–so the devil-may-care atttiude I enjoy when putting in afterthought pockets is replaced by the smug satisfaction of knowing that part of the work is done, and I can just motor on toward the front-and-back shaping.

The yarn is proving to be a perfect choice–LB Collection Organic Wool. It's soft (without being so namby-pamby that it'll start to pill before the sweater is complete), it's springy, it's cuddly as a puppy wrapped in polar fleece, and the rustic texture is a welcome accent for a piece that's otherwise so plain.

Really, really curious about the collar, since to be blunt I haven't the faintest idea of how it's going to work after reading the pattern fifty times. Sometimes you just have to buckle on the parachute and jump.

How I Got This Way

Speaking of Lion Brand, the most recent essay I wrote for them–"Inheritance"–talks about creativity running in families–though often your creative family tree will include folks who aren't necessarily blood relations. I enjoyed writing (and drawing) this one...and my mother left a comment. That was a good day.

Turning Weaving Into Knitting

Quick update on the bag that card weaver John Mullarkey and I are collaborating on, using HiKoo CoBaSi. John sent along four band designs to choose from. He'll use the band as the basis for the strap.



I settled on the second from the top. What he wove, I'm going to try to interpret (not necessarily copy) in knitting for the body of the bag. Joy of joys, it's swatch time! I'm thinking mosaic might be the way to go, for the highly scientific reason that I've never tried it and it looks interesting. But first, we chart.

More to come.

*If you want it, the pattern is in the facsimile edition of the 1916 Lion Yarn Book that is available here. Facsimile means it's an unaltered copy of the original–so you'd be working from the period pattern, just as I am.

Entanglements, Various

I was in the workroom, trying to fit this year's books into last year's bookshelves, when Harry rolled in and asked whether he could have a yarn cave.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I want a yarn cave," he said. "I was just watching that house hunting show with Dolores and the man didn't like the first seventeen houses because there was no space for a man cave where he could watch television without his wife. I want a yarn cave so I can watch television without Dolores."

"Dolores," I shouted, "stop hogging the television! I am not going to have this argument again."

"I couldn't agree with you more," she shouted back.

"It's not fair," said Harry. "I want to watch the new Learning Channel documentary about Yarn Pixies and she keeps putting on Emanuelle Goes to Maryland Sheep and Wool and telling me I have to leave the room."

"You two are really going to have to work this out yourselves."

"I want a yarn cave!" said Harry.

"We don't have space for a yarn cave. This is a big city. It's crowded. We live in an apartment. And it's a pretty nice apartment, as apartments go. Lots of yarn would be happy to have as much room to roll around as you have."

"Yarn cave! Yarn cave!"

"You know who has lots of room?" I said. "Mrs. Teitelbaum. Maybe you would like to go next door and see if she would let you move in with her and Tinkles."

"Maybe I will," said Harry, stomping off. "Then when I am gone, boy will you be sorry."

Hah. He'll be back. Won't he?

I can't blame Harry for feeling overcrowded. Even though I have a work room, the whole apartment has been a carnival of frenzied fiber activity for the past couple of months. It's good to be busy, but busy + yarn = tangles. By Christmas, after four months of near-constant travel, this place looked like the inside of an old sewing basket that had been shaken by a gorilla.  I conceded that it was time to address the mess when I tripped over a stray strand of merino in the kitchen and it knocked over a lamp in the bedroom.

Happily, a lot of works-in-progress are finished and can be tidied away. There's this, for example.



My first sweater design (in Cascade 220 Sport) for publication–the Men's Color Band Pullover from Vogue Knitting Winter 2012/13, which goes on sale the day after this writing.

I had a ball with it. We (the three guy designers in the story) were challenged to come up with a sweater we'd wear ourselves on a casual day at the office.

I only wish I looked like the model, but the sweater truly is something I'd wear.

It has very little ease, because I (and most men) look terrible in baggy sweaters. It tapers from the chest to the waist, because unshaped sweaters make me (and most men) look like they're wearing feed sacks. And though it has a basis in the traditional male palette of brown/earth/gray, I added purple and lavender houndstooth because life is too damned short wear nothing but brown/earth/gray.

There's this, a hat in so-called Bavarian Twisted Stitch. (Twisted, yes. Bavarian, not necessarily.)



It's a model for one of my new classes, débuting at Vogue Knitting Live! New York in just a little while. (That class is sold out, but a few of my other sessions have seats. Do come and play.)

There's also this.



Why, that's not knitting! That's not knitting at all! 

Nope, it's card weaving. Because I needed one more thing to do with string.

I've felt the urge to weave spring up once or twice, but always ran into roadblocks. A lack of space, for one. Also, the insistence of all my weaving friends and acquaintances that I would have to start with a plain dish towel.

I don't want to weave a plain dish towel. I want to make fabric with patterns. My weaving friends insisted that you cannot start out by weaving patterns, you have to start with a plain dish towel. Apparently this commandment is chiseled onto a stone tablet on a mountain near Taos.

I asked about all those unfortunate children who are forced into weaving patterned carpets. The horrors of their situation aside, if a five-year-old can weave patterns, why can't I?

Because you have to start with a plain dish towel, they said. It is written. Or chiseled, or something.

Then I met this guy when we were both teaching at the same event. He was working with tiny looms. So small they would easily fit on a coffee table. His beginning students were weaving bands covered in patterns.

So I said can you teach me, and John said yeah; and now I have a tiny loom and am making my own patterned bootlaces, which I think is hot.

We've become good buddies (he'll also be at Squam, teaching card weaving) and for the ducks of it we've decided to collaborate on a piece of design: a bag, with a knitted body and a woven strap.

Here's the yarn we're using: Cobasi by Hikoo.



Cobasi is a blend of COtton, BAmboo, and SIlk–get it?) distributed by Skacel. It is, in a word, groovy. The impetus was a desire to offer a really good wool-free sock yarn, and what they've come up with works equally well for knitting and card weaving.

Our challenge is to turn out a project that combines weaving and knitting in a beautiful, practical fashion. We're going to chronicle the development of the bag–for better or worse– right here in this space. More to come.

They Weren't Kidding

Ladies and gentlemen, the yarn section of the grocery store–this one's attached to a mall in Reykjavik. The yarn is just past the dairy case.



Mostly Lopi, but also a very large selection of Dale of Norway. Also sock yarns, mystery acrylics, pattern books, needles, notions, and buttons.



The above is plötulopi (unspun yarn, in wheels), wrapped in plastic to preserve the yarny freshness.

I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes.

Making Things

We have been making things.

Abigail and her mother have been making cookies. Those cookies.



I have already had it up to my proto-Gandalfian eyebrows with holiday baking so I kept out of the kitchen. Instead, I sat down with Abigail on Christmas Eve and (courtesy of a sweet little notion from Girl on the Rocks) did my best to further instill the home truth that Making Things with Yarn = Fun.



(You get to choose your own yarn. We chose Cascade 220 Sport.)

On Christmas morning, I presented Abigail with another yarn-based thing I had just finished making.





I've named the purse* Floradora. This is the beta, child-sized version. A grown-up version, larger and considerably refined, will hit the shops in January to herald the launch of a new class, "Cavalcade of Colorwork," débuting at the Madrona Fiber Arts Winter Retreat in February.

Now that I have made this blog post, I am going to make a trip to the cookie jar. (I said I was fed up with holiday baking, not holiday eating.)

*I forgot to mention it's in Cascade 220. I guess we're having a Cascade Christmas.

A Keeper

A few years ago I started cataloguing my personal library over on a site called LibraryThing. At this point I'm a little less than half finished, with 887 books on the list.

I used to think I had a lot of books, mostly because upon stepping into my apartment visitors invariably confront the phalanx of overstuffed shelves and exclaim, "Whoa! You have a lot of books!"

LibraryThing has reassured me that no, I do not have a lot of books. There are more than a few collectors on that site whose collections number in the tens of thousands. I don't think most of the school libraries I encountered growing up were that well stocked.

Lucky bastards.

If I attempted to fill this place with tens of thousands of books the floor would collapse. Also, I would have to sell all the furniture and sleep on a catafalque made from the complete works of Anthony Trollope. It's frustrating, this lack of square footage. On the other hand it keeps me from ending up on a very special episode of Hoarders.

Truth is, it's tough for a book to merit a permanent slot on my limited shelves. I cull twice a year, and a dozen or so titles head to the charity shop. I'm still running out of room, but without discipline it would have happened years ago.

It's especially unusual for knitting and needlework titles to stick around longer than six months. So many arrive by mail these days (my life, it is hard) that the population, if allowed to grow unchecked, would soon invade the adjacent cases devoted to authors from the British Empire (on the left) and biography/autobiography/memoirs/letters/journals (on the right).

For a knitting book to earn permanent residency it must bring more to the table than a good collection of patterns. My favorites have taught me to be a better knitter, not just how to add a particular sweater to my wardrobe. I'm a child of Elizabeth Zimmermann and I can design my own sweaters, thankyouverymuch.

So it's rare that a book grabs me as quickly as Gwen Bortner's new Entree to Entrelac.



I've heretofore avoided entrelac by pretending it did not exist. Once, when it tried to say hello during a knitting retreat show-and-tell, I was forced to put my fingers in my ears and shout "La la la la I can't hear you I can't hear you." (Nobody likes to sit next to me during show-and-tell.)

Why this aversion? I wish you wouldn't have asked, because it kills me to admit this.

Long ago, a knitter at a neighborhood meet-up who was working on an entrelac scarf told me what was involved in producing it, and called it a pain in the ass. She demonstrated the making of one square, and I was so put off I swore I'd never touch it. Cowardly!

But when I learned that Gwen–who is nobody's fool–was sufficiently enchanted to run on about it for a couple hundred pages, I got curious. After several weeks of cohabiting, I've decided the book gets to stay. It's empowering, and that makes it a keeper.

Entrelac itself is a very specific technique. It does what it does and it looks like what it looks like, and that's that. To her credit, Gwen pushes it about as far as it will go, using it to fashion not only the usual suspects like scarves and other mainly flat pieces, but also surprisingly fetching fitted garments.

Patterns aside, however, the book explains the underlying principles of entrelac so clearly and exhaustively that after working through the practice exercises an intermediate knitter could begin to design his own projects, or adapt the attendant patterns to suit. I waded in, as directed, with needles and scrap yarn in hand. In 15 minutes I produced my first complete square.



Yeah, fine. I'm not going to enter it in the county fair, but it led me all the way 'round the garden path without veering off into the pachysandra.

Gwen also pushes the technique of knitting left to right (also known as knitting back backwards) as essential to making entrelac a joy, since it obviates the need to constantly turn the work. You knit the stitches from the left needle to the right needle, as usual–and then you knit them back from the right needle to the left needle.

I'd seen it done. I'd envied those who could do it. But I'd never done it. Using Gwen's tutorial, I learned to fluently knit, purl, k2tog and p2tog backwards in five minutes flat. Obviously, here is a work written by a born teacher.

Now, a bit of irony. Learning to knit back backwards has put entrelac within my reach, but it's also the reason I won't be knitting any entrelac right way.

Thanks to Gwen, I can finally tackle a project I've wanted to make since the moment I saw it: the Roman glass vest from Kaffe Fasset's Glorious Color. There are two photographs, but no pattern–only Kaffe's succinct description in the text of how he did it. It's knitted flat, and involves working both intarsia and jacquard in the same row throughout.

I've wanted to make it as a showcase for some of the beautiful, beautiful yarn I've been given by spinners and dyers when I travel (did I mention that my life is hard?),



but didn't want to face working the wrong side rows. Now that knitting back backwards will allow me to keep the right side facing me at all times, it's time to go swatch.

Philadelphia: Back to Loop

Before I forget, I've added a trip to my calendar that's coming up pretty soon–to beautiful Loop in Philadelphia, November 13 and 14. I had so much fun there the last time that I can't wait to come back.

I'll be teaching three classes (lace and photography) as part of a lovely weekend that will also include a class and trunk show by my bosom companion Carol Sulcoski of Black Bunny Fibers and Knitting Socks with Handpainted Yarn. Full details are here.

And My Thanks...

The outpouring of supportive comments to It Gets Better was mind-boggling. I've managed to put high school behind me–although as you can tell, the memories are still vivid when I summon them. But should some kid in need stumble upon that entry, I have no doubt that she or he will find far more encouragement in your responses than in my testimonial!

And thanks, also, for making my maiden voyage into self-publishing a sweet one–Sahar is doing quite respectably, and there's already a beautiful FO in Rowan Felted Tweed on Ravelry. Who's next?

Color Me Impressed

It’s been a wonderful tour. I’m waiting for my flight home (via Los Angeles) from cozy, foggy Eureka and so have a little time to tell you about an unexpected and delightful adventure last week in Washington during the Men’s Fall Knitting Retreat.



WonderMike, host of the popular Fiber Beat podcast, is the driving force behind the gathering; and one of his many strengths is finding unique outings for us. Last year, we visited the Moonshadow Alpaca Ranch in Auburn. This year, he arranged for us to try our hands at indigo dyeing at Earthues in the Ballard section of town.

Now, I have a confession to make. I went to Earthues with only the mildest curiosity about what I might see. I love to knit, obviously. I enjoy spinning, when I can get to it. But though dyeing seemed interesting in theory–I certainly have enjoyed my visits to Lorna’s Laces and admire my friend Carol’s work at Black Bunny Fibers–I had very little desire to get my own fingers into the pot.

We were advised to bring along fiber to dip, so at the last minute I casually tossed a few odd hanks of blah stash wool into the suitcase. Word was that the neighborhood around Earthues is full of interesting shops, and I figured I could prowl through them if the dye studio turned out to be a snorefest.

Once through the door, it took all of fifteen seconds for me to lose my mind and begin fantasizing about planting a guerilla dye garden in the park near my apartment.



Calling Earthues a dye studio is like calling Disneyland a kiddie pool. The company was founded by Michele Wipplinger, a visionary dyer with almost a quarter-century of experience, as a home base for her mission of promoting and supporting the worldwide use of natural dyes.

There is a retail space (as of this writing, open Monday–Friday from 1o am to 5 pm), gorgeous and beautifully stocked with naturally-dyed fiber products from around the world, including a selection of yarns and beautifully printed cottons in fat quarters. They also offer gift items, objéts d’arts, and even some notions–I lucked into a beautifully carved wooden needle case and crochet hook I’ll photograph when I get home.







Beautiful light and sources of inspiration are everywhere.









We spent most of our time in the educational area with Michele’s passionate, charismatic business partner, Kathy Hattori. While Michele travels a great deal to consult and teach, Kathy keeps things buzzing in Washington State–managing the shop, fulfilling commissions, teaching classes, and–during our visit–deftly guiding 30 guy knitters through the ABCs of natural dye in one short afternoon.



I learned a lot in a hurry, including that indigo (above) looks a lot like basil and marigolds (a flower I have always detested) produce a lovely yellow dye.



It was like finding out the smelly, annoying kid across the street is secretly a concert violinist.

After our introduction, we moved into the yard where four big pots of indigo awaited. Since this was, of course, a group of guys, we were interested (and perhaps slightly disappointed) to hear that our own indigo experience would not require the use of pee.

One by one, we dipped and watched as our yarns turned from white



to green



to blue.



At the end of the day I had two skeins of yarn and one shin that were dyed several exceedingly fetching shades of deeps blue.

My assumptions that the natural palette would be limited, muddy and fugitive turned out to be utterly incorrect. Turns out you can, in fact, make brilliant and lightfast colors without recourse to petrochemicals; nor does Earthues use heavy metal mordants of any kind.





I was so impressed I went back later in the week on a free afternoon to hang out with Kathy some more. When I told her about my budding interest in quilting she showed me a fascinating project undertaken a few years back by another dyer at the shop. She had subjected a rather insipid selection of quilting cottons to systematic overdyeing in a series of natural hues.



The word "magic" is as overused these days as Lindsay Lohan's prescription drug plan, but it's the only word that seems appropriate.

Since my dream of of planting an indigo patch is likely to remain a dream, I was particularly interested to learn that in the 1990s Michele pioneered extract forms of natural dyes; they allow you to play with the process even if you aren’t ready to grind your own cochineal bugs or grow your own woad. Earthues sells the extracts in little kits and pots, and I know with fatal certainty that I’m going to have to try them out. Happily, they already sell some products online and there are plans to expand the range of Web site offerings in the near future.

If you find yourself in the Seattle area, for goodness' sake head over the Ballard Bridge (the Number 17 bus will take you there from downtown) and knock on the door at Earthues. If you care about fiber in any form, you really ought not to miss it.

Do Not Do This

When you are sitting in a coffee shop working on an entry about the amazing stuff you saw at Stitches Midwest, and you look up what you know perfectly well to be a lace weight yarn in both Ravelry and Yarndex to double-check the fiber content, and you note that in both places this lace yarn is listed as fingering weight, do not accidentally exclaim in your outside voice, "Fingering my ass!"

Urban Legends of Knitting, No. 1

And I Don't Feel So Good Myself

Why Should Cats Have All the Fun?

A Stroke of Genius

After the Fall Men’s Knitting Retreat back in September, I staggered home under the weight of one of the most voluptuous goodie bags ever to be seen outside of an Academy Awards gifting suite. Somewhere in the middle, between a handsome book by Brandon Mably and a typically gorgeous skein hand-dyed by the inimitable Rabbitch was a small bundle wrapped in tissue paper.

Inside was a quantity of this:



It’s a blend of merino, silk...and possum. Yes, possum. I couldn’t quite believe it, either. In fact, I recoiled, as this



is not an image that makes me feel all kinds of cuddly.

The yarn–which is called Supreme Possum Merino–comes from New Zealand and was a gift to the retreat from the guy who replaced Kiri Te Kanawa as my favorite Kiwi. (Sorry, Kiri.) James is the proprietor of the Joy of Yarn Sock Wool Boutique in Greytown, New Zealand, and no slouch when it comes to picking out great fibers.

Still–possum?

But as my dear grandmother once said to me regarding pickled beets, and as I once said to a Marine Corps lieutenant regarding nevermind, how can you know you don’t like it until you try it?

A short swatch later, I was typing a frantic e-mail to James asking about the immediate availability of more, more, more. This stuff, dear kiddies, is like a kiss on the forehead. Buttersoft, cloudlight, gently haloed. Not quite cashmere, not quite qiviut, but also not quite the same cost per ball as a spa vacation. You have got to try it. (And yes, James sells online.)

I got a second color, an ineffable mauve through which the natural shade of the possum still glimmers. And I decided that the original fuchsia and the mauve would, together, make a fantastic pair of striped socks.

Then I got to thinking, which never bodes well for me.

I started thinking about how boring I was about socks when I first started knitting. I wanted them in blue or brown, I wanted them without patterns, and I wanted them to match.

Gradually, the hoodoo of sock knitting jangled my brain, and I started to imagine what fun it would be to make colorful socks, so I made a pair in lime green. Then I thought a pair of colorful, mismatched socks would be just the ticket, so I knit a pair from a self-striping ball.

And the suckers matched perfectly.

I tried it again. Different self-striping yarn, different pattern, advised by an expert to start the second pair in a different part of the color repeat.

And again, the socks matched perfectly, except for the heels. Heels don’t count.

Here, with two yarns, I could at last control the color changes with an iron fist and force the socks to mismatch. In fact, why not make them mirror images of each other? And call them–Lewis Carroll dork that I am–Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum?

And in what book do the frères Tweedle appear? Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There.

And what is the central motif of Through the Looking Glass? A chess game.

And how many colors in a chess board? Two!

And how many colors of yarn had I to work with? Two!!

Eureka!!!

Chess board socks!!!! With the colors reversed!!!!!

!!!!!!

If you are not quite so confirmed a dingbat as I, you have already spotted the flaw in this vision. If you are, pray allow me to offer this demonstration.

I'm striping them. It's only been two months, and I'm almost three inches past the cuff on sock number one. Hooray for me.

Yammertime

I recently had the great pleasure of talking with Lara over at Crafty Living and the Math4Knitters Podcast, and the episode (number five) is now up if you’d care to have a listen. I promise she’s not nearly so frightening as you would expect someone to be who has put the word “Math” in the name of her Podcast.

In the Shop

Newly in stock: gift enclosure cards and signed prints. New designs are in the pipeline, too. Many thanks for all the positive feedback!

Knittin' to the Oldies

I've just had a curious snowdrift of messages asking whether I'm finished posting about that little stack of vintage patterns that came my way. Heavens, no. But after the parade of toilet dollies I thought we might all need a wee breather, and perhaps a drink.

Sailing to Fair Isle

The greater part of the American Midwest was stifled by a blanket of severe cold this past weekend, but I didn't feel it. I was at Threadbear Fiber Arts Studio, surrounded by knitters, wool, knitters holding wool, knitters covered in wool, and wool wrapped around knitters.

On Saturday, the Tomten Jacket class was packed once again. Such is the genius of Elizabeth Zimmermann, that a pattern she wrote in 1961 still draws a crowd. I loved watching the faces of the students as the little coat unfurled under their fingers. Knitting Elizabeth's best patterns is like reading a cleverly plotted thriller, and the Tomten is enough to make you drop your popcorn.

After our brief lunch break, I got a surprise–a giant birthday cake topped by a strikingly true likeness of Dolores.



It was delicious. Pity I had to sue them for copyright infringement.

Much better, let me tell you, to have Dolores on the cake than to have her pop out of the cake, which happened last year on Tom's birthday. Seven visits from Stanley Steemer and we are still trying to get the icing out of the carpet.



If you gotta get older, this is the way to do it.

On Sunday, I hung out at the shop and signed copies of the little book. It was very jolly.



Knitters just kept coming and coming in nice, steady stream so I wasn't pining alone in the corner.



Some I had met last year at the 1,000 Knitters shoot, some I knew from Ravelry or the comments, and many had no blinking idea who I am but figured it was either me or another afternoon at home watching the "Rock of Love" marathon on VH1 and decided to give me a shot.

For the first time ever I was asked to sign a boob, which puts me into the same club, I believe, as Willie Nelson, Kaffe Fassett and Stephanie Pearl-McPhee. Ma will be so proud.



I am indebted to Matt of Threadbear for taking and sharing these sweet souvenir photos.

Something About Alice

On Saturday night I was hanging around with the bears themselves, Matt and Rob, and our conversation about the current crop of pattern books took a detour onto books no longer available, including the bulk of those written by Alice Starmore.

Now, I've been knitting since 1992, but I spent most of those years completely out-of-touch with what was going on in the field. I didn't know any other knitters, and could barely find yarn, let alone pattern books. By the time I joined the dance, Alice had already pulled her work off the shelves.

As a result, I'd never seen any of the books myself. Not one. Everything I knew of them was secondhand. I would hear how wonderful In the Hebrides, Pacific Coast Highway, Tudor Roses and all the rest had been. I would read of exorbitant prices paid for old copies, of knitters begging local libraries to re-shelve them with the rare books so they wouldn't be stolen. I encountered a few garments knit from the patterns, though never using the original colors. They looked complex, yes. But there are lots of complex patterns out there.

So my opinion of Alice Starmore was that she was probably an excellent designer, and her books had probably been good ones, but the hysteria and the high prices were likely no more justified than the ridiculous sums that changed hands during the Great Pink Chibi Mania of 2004.

As for Fair Isle, I'd seen great heaping piles of that. Most of it either looked dowdy–the kind of ho-hum, shapeless stuff that almost killed knitting at the end of the 20th century–or was so busy it induced seizures. I remember one vest which sported such a gamut of vibrant colors between the hem and the neck shaping that it looked like an abridged version of an acid trip. "You can do anything you want," said the perpetrator, "and it's perfectly okay!"

I beg, madam, to differ.

So when Rob began to pull his copies of Alice Starmore off the shelf I was curious, but not overly excited. Then I sat down with The Art of Fair Isle Knitting and almost wet myself.

So this is what makes people gaga over Fair Isle. The tension, the incredible chill-giving tension, of vibrant colors rippling in counterpoint to vigorous patterning, the two constantly pushing and pulling like opposing voices in a Baroque orchestral suite without ever tipping the balance.

I kept on poring through the books, with their solid writing and their wildly creative variations on a theme, and I realized that for maybe the third time in my life I'd encountered an artist who was actually worthy of the hype. It's tough to design one good sweater, let alone a book full of them. It's damned near impossible to crank out a whole string of terrific books without going stale. And it's rare to find a scholar, a writer, and a designer all sharing the same body.

I hear tell that Alice may be ready to come back to the playground soon, and I certainly hope so, because if not the loss to the knitting world is immense.

And So...

Once upon a time, after dreaming over lace as presented by Nancy Bush, Galina Khmeleva, and Sharon Miller, I set out to knit a shawl of my own and came up with this.

Now, having seen what Fair Isle can be when it's well done, I'm in the mood to cook up a vest for myself. In this I was aided and abetted by Matt at Threadbear, who knows from color and helped me put together the shades of Rauma Finullgarn you see at right. (By "helped me," I mean I watched in amazement as he deftly assembled the palette from a huge basket of yarn. Then, at the end, I took out the ball of cream.)

I'm swatching right now to figure out my gauge, and then it's time to chart. I haven't been this jazzed about a new project in ages, and you know I'm easily excited. Will I knit a decent vest or will I crash and burn? Time will tell.