Merribee Needlearts

Support your local yarn stores. Here's another in Houston, Texas.

Ravelry & Yarn Stash

I received an invite from Ravelry and set myself up as ReneeR. Great!

Now it's time to log my needles and stash. This should take a long time - so call me Sisyphus today. Logging and itemizing is not the tough part... it's getting across the room to touch the yarn and record it! My family seems to think my sewing/quilting/knitting room is not My Room, but the only drop zone in the house for homeless items destined for charity donation. I can't list the things, that have Nothing-To-Do-With-My-Hobby, sitting on the floor instead of the trunk of my husband's, my teenager's, my car, ready to go to a new home. That list would take more time than my stash's.

Yesterday, a group of us discussed our inventories:

1. Who had the largest stash.
   I nominate this woman.
   
   I wish she would adopt me!!!
   See more at Word's Biggest Stash.
2. How to hide yarn from your husband.
   One woman was caught hiding hers in a rental unit. (He probably found the bill and investigated.)
3. What hubby thought about so much yarn.
   (I'm safe as you can see by pics of my husband's hobbies.)




4. And...what constituted "too much."
   
(by UFO?)

And here's my honey playing his new toy, the dobro he made. Turn the volume on and listen to the Texas Moonbeam Waltz. YeHa!

On Hiatus

Taking an ArcGIS course. Knitting on hold.

Knit At Night Guild Member Needs Discontinued Yarn

I am posting this plea for one of my knitting guild's (KANG) members in Houston, Texas:

HELP!
Knitting the Oat Couture Celtic Cardigan and looks like I am running out of yarn. Have 2 1/2 skeins and the entire front of the sweater to do.

Need Rowan Calmer in their old purple color from a couple of years ago. CHECK THAT STASH. Color has been discontinued. Will buy or trade.

Color # is 478. Dye lot doesn't matter. I can blend with what I have.

Thanks, Sally Wickes
sockgoddess@aol.com

First Blooms On My Orchid Tree

Spring is like a perhaps hand
(which comes carefullyout of Nowhere)arranging
a window,into which people look(while
people stare
arranging and changing placing
carefully there a strange
thing and a known thing here)and

changing everything carefully

spring is like a perhaps
Hand in a window
(carefully to
and fro moving New and
Old things,while
people stare carefully
moving a perhaps fraction of flower here placing
an inch of air there)and

without breaking anything.
--E.E. Cummings

A Sampler of Increases & Decreases

Somewhere in your progress, you want to knit to the next level of techniques.

For a beginner, one of these is a lesson of increases & decreases. Sure, a 'make one' gets the job done... but it's just the basic beginner increase. After reviewing two good samplers on the net (Knitting Helpand NonaKnits),

I combined their shaping stitches with ones gleaned from my reference books: Mary Thomas's Knitting Handbook, Vogue Knitting, the Knitter's Handbook (Reader's Digest) and the Knitter's Handbook (Knitter's Magazine). I have bought tags to attach to the sampler to record the stitches until I can discern them by sight.

I've left the tail on the bind-off. The second picture bottom rows show the beginning cast-on and garter stitching.

Beginners, please note that abbreviations do not appear to be standardized.

• Multiple references may use different abbreviations for the same stitch.
• Multiple references may use the same abbreviation for different stitches.
• Some references give the increase or decrease a name without abbreviations.
• Others use their own terms as reference (June Hiatt for example).
• ALWAYS, check your source pattern to determine which method their abbreviation is referring to be used. For example, compare M1L in Mary Thomas’s Knitting Book to the Knitter’s Handbook. Same abbreviation, different stitches.

SHAPING	LEFT SIDE	RIGHT SIDE	NOTES
Bind-off leaving tail.
Decrease	yo dec rs	yo dec ls	KnittingHelp.com
Increase	MI	MI	Vogue’s median increase
Decrease	k2tog	k2tog tbl	Vogue
Increase	M1	M1	EZ’s method
Decrease	k2tog	ssk new improved	NonaKnits
Increase	yo	yo
Decrease	krpr	skp (s1k1psso)	KnittingHelp.com
Increase	M1R make 1 right	M1L make 1 left	make one
Decrease	k2tog	ssk improved	KnittingHelp.com NonaKnits
Increase	M1L lift stitch before	M1L lift stitch after	lifted increase
Decrease	k2tog	ssk
Increase	M1B	M1B	bar increase, k1f&b or kfb
Cast-on			long tail method

Knitting To-Do's

2007: Finish UFO’s, samplers/swatching, lace (scarf), socks, entrelec dishcloth, small EZ almanac project, fairisle (hat), Shadow knitting (scarf), raglan sweater, Abigail's dishcloth

2006: My Second Sweater, Cables, Diagonal knitting

2005: Teach Myself to Knit, Knit in the Round, Felting, My First Sweater

KANG Meeting During the Holidays

KANG Houston, December 2006

" A knitter's guild is a staggering, incredible thing. It is a room filled with men and women who have in common one obsession. They are possessed enough by the manipulation of two pointy needles and some yarn to give up whole free evenings, not just to knit, but to talk about it. The first time you find yourself having a conversation about moss stitch with a group of people who aren't desperately trying to escape you . . . it's like coming home." Quoted from At Knit's End, Meditation for Women Who Knit Too Much by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (The Yarn Harlot)

An Inspiration

This sweater has been a motivation to learn knitting for years. My good friend's mother, Mrs. Adams of London, knit it for my daughter, who regularly wore it to school. My friend's knitting however, has gone to the dogs!