Official guidelines

From the Transportation Security Administration website:

Transporting Knitting Needles & Needlepoint

Knitting needles are permitted in your carry-on baggage or checked baggage. However, there is a possibility that the needles can be perceived as a possible weapon by the TSA screener. TSA Screeners have the authority to determine if an item could be used as a weapon and may not allow said item to pass through security. TSA recommends the following when bring knitting needles on an airplane:

• Circular knitting needles are recommended to be less than 31 inches in total length
• We recommend that the needles be made of bamboo or plastic (Not Metal)
• Scissors must have blunt points
• In case the screener does not allow your knitting tools through security it is recommended that you carry a self addressed envelope so that you can mail your tools back to yourself as opposed to surrendering them at the security check point.
• As a precautionary measure it is recommended that you carry a crochet hook with yarn to save the work you have already done in case your knitting tools are surrendered at the checkpoint.

Most of the items needed to pursue a Needlepoint project are permitted in your carry-on baggage or checked baggage with the exception of circular thread cutters or any cutter with a blade contained inside. These items cannot be taken through a Security Checkpoint. They must go in your checked baggage.

Just in case you were wondering.

No no Noro

I am going to say it.

Noro is overrated.

(pause for dramatic effect)

In the fall of 2004 I went to visit my friend Nora, who had been diagnosed with leukemia a few months prior. Nora is a friend from college who was born and raised in Alaska. She would use qiviut to knit fascinating items with fascinating patterns. When I went to visit, Puffintoad and I felt like gifting her. We thought about what it would be like to have cancer and things we would want if we were in her shoes. I bought her a scarf, knowing she would have lost her hair and I didn’t want her head to feel cold. Puffintoad decided to buy some knitting materials so Nora would have something to do while on bedrest.

We walked into an Anchorage yarn shop to find said materials. I’d never ever been in a yarn shop before, and I think what I saw there on that day has lingered with me, subconsciously pressuring me to learn how to knit. It was the multicolored yarns. The color combinations were fascinating. I remember that black label with the stylized word “Noro” on it. It’s an image in my mind, that label around the yarn with the coolest color schemes. And it stuck because we were there for Nor-a.

Fast forward to this past winter. My second knitting project was the Booga Bag. Noro Kureyon? Say, I recognize that label. Excellent.

Demystifying moment number one: on looking at the color swatches, I didn’t strongly care for any of the schemes. The skeins looked cool, but the swatches were kinda weird. And each colorway looked different on the various different websites.

I ended up picking colorway #90.

Demystifying moment number two: CamoDidi points out to me that “kureyon” is “crayon” with a bad japanese accent.

I ordered the yarn. It was kinda pricey and I ordered too much of it. What did I know? I started knitting with it.

Demystifying moment number three: while knitting the bottom of the Booga, I discovered that a) some of the uglier colors are not displayed on website color swatches. b) there are some exceedingly ugly colors mixed into these colorways.

Disappointing moment number four: I found bits of grass and other organic material in the yarn. When getting up close to pick these out, I found that the yarn smells like barn.

Frustrating moment number five: The yarn is spun heterogeneously. Big fat superbulky parts of yarn knitted adjacent to little bitty skinny fine as a human hair “I’m not sure this will even hold weight” parts of yarn makes holes in the knitting.

Annoying moment number six: Finding a knot in the yarn where two pieces of shorter yarn were joined to meet weight for the skein with no regard to colorway. I knew this would happen as Wendy of wendyknits.net had mentioned it, so at least I was prepared, but it was still annoying.

Disappointing moment number seven: I had waited and waited ‘til laundry day to finally felt my completed bag. Four loads later, the bag was still big and floppy even though I could tell some felting had occurred. A few weeks and three more cycles later, it is only slightly shrunken and a touch more stiff. I don’t know how many more times I’m going to put it through before I call it quits.

My experience knitting the Madeline bag for my mom in colorway #95 (by my mom’s request) was just as full of similar moments.

So tell me again. Why are people nuts for Noro?

bitter kitty

another reason why one oughtn't knit clothing for animals:

they hate it.

picture taken from the "you knit what??" blog, which took it from somewhere else on the internet.

yay

alas, my photography skills cannot fully capture the personality of this pengiun. in any case, it turned out okay. it's a fun, relatively simple pattern that knits up quickly. i'd recommend this pattern as a weekend project.

here's a link to the pattern.

appendages

and thus it is confirmed that i do not really enjoy making appendages.

I am a beginner

Aren't I?

I started knitting about a year ago, and took a 2-month hiatus for certain pressing reasons. That means I've been knitting for about 10 months. That qualifies me as a beginner, doesn't it?

I can knit, and I can purl. I can tell the difference between the two. I can cast on (a couple of different ways), and I can bind off. I can increase and decrease in multiple ways. I know what to do if my needles fall out of my work without panicking (although it annoys me greatly), and after replacing my needles, I can tell when a stitch is twisted. I can knit in the round on circulars and on double-pointed needles, in jogless stripes no less. I think short row shaping is much easier than it sounds. I can recognize mistakes, and prefer to fix them by running a ladder and then using a crochet hook. I can add the simplest of modifications (a ribbing edge here, an intarsia stripe there) to certain patterns. As for finishing, I weave in all my ends, and am comfortable with kitchener stitching and mattress stitching. I can felt and do some easy blocking.

So maybe I oughtn't call myself a beginner anymore.

But. I have never done a project for which I've needed to knit a gauge swatch. The idea of knitting from a graphic pattern (like that for the Mariah cardigan on my sidebar) is daunting to me. The thought of making a garment that requires calculations involving gauge, fit, and ease fills me with dismay. I don't even aspire to try making complex fair isle patterns; it just doesn't appeal to me. I never wanted to be an expert knitter to begin with. I just wanted a scarf.

I suppose this lands me squarely in the intermediate category of knitting expertise. But you know what? I want to be a beginner. That's how I am with most things. I like having that label to blame for any ignorance, mistakes, and inexperience that I and my projects display.

So I'll keep calling myself a beginner until I don't feel like one anymore. Or until I end up teaching someone to knit. Or until I make something that someone mistakes for storebought. How does that sound?

yes,

yes, i did eat lunch before i started this today.
yes, i am stopping here to get my chores done.

it's official

i'd rather knit than eat.

make one however you darn well please

by now you can tell what i'm working on.

last night after i posted the two pictures, i hit a roadblock. "M1" looks like such an innocent instruction, doesn't it?

i was downstairs and i didn't want to come upstairs to check on the knittinghelp website to see whether i remembered correctly how to "make one." i just did something that i thought seemed right. oh, wait, i'm supposed to knit into the back loop of something. frog. re-knit. okay. they were close to the edge so it didn't matter. it looked fine.

then came a whole row full of increases. i did my thing and went on about twelve rows. then i thought, oh, i don't remember it looking like this. maybe i ought to check the website after all. i looked, thought i'd done it wrong, then frogged back and did it the way the website said to ("lift the horizontal strand between the two stitches and...").

it left holes in the work. big holes! i thought this way was supposed to be the most invisible! so i ripped back, re-knit without knitting through the back loop, and the resulting holes were even bigger. "screw it." i ripped back again and did it my original way. turns out i had accidentally "figured out" KLL and KRL on my own. forget M1.

did i do something wrong, such that my "invisible make ones" came out very visible indeed? anyone have any tips?

do i even care? no i do not. penguin's tummy will be round and smooth with no holes, by golly.

but i guess it would be nice to know for future reference.

still day 01

hmm...

overcoming fear

the fear of frogging, that is.

i started working on this bag quite a while ago. i've gotten really far. as a matter of fact, it's just about done. usually something being in the state of "almost done" spurs me on to finish it in a hurry, but this one's been sitting in the bottom of my knitstuff basket for weeks and weeks. as a matter of fact, i was considering it a failed project.

i started it for my mum. she saw this picture of the original booga bag, and said she liked the colors a lot, despite the fact that i had called them garish and obnoxious. "are you sure?" i asked. "sure! it's nice and bright," she said. and there you have it.

so i set out to work the felted madeline bag with this yarn. it would make up for the true failure of making one out of yarn that doesn't felt. i put the vomitous brown color on the bottom, where it wouldn't be seen (and it wouldn't show dirt), and worked my way up. little did i know that would put the pukey-brown in the perfect position to re-appear on the flap, where it would cover up all the "nice and bright" colors. see how that works? then i ran out of yarn several inches shy of having a complete handle.

say, why didn't i notice that ugly brown on the booga bag? oh, because its circumference is so much bigger the brown just appears in passing. dangit. it's very prominent on this pattern.

well today i wanted to free up those needles for a new project (perhaps something in pink for one of my pinkaholic friends), and suddenly it occurred to me. i can solve both of my problems (ran out of yarn, vomit-colored flap dominating the color scheme) if i buy a new skein and knit a new flap and the rest of the handle— after frogging the old flap.

for those of you who don't knit (which is all of you but puffintoad), frogging means ripping out stitches by grabbing the end of your yarn and just pulling. you can watch your work melt away before your very eyes. it can be rather disheartening. oh, and it's called that because frogs say, "rip it. rip it." silly, i know, but i didn't make it up.

i've noticed mistakes in my irish hiking scarf and had to frog inches and inches back to correct them. after that, frogging this little bitty flap seems like no big deal at all. i don't know what i was afraid of. evidently, i've overcome my fear of frogging.

hey, it's a step.

bunny no. 3

i'm definitely ready to try new patterns, but this one is so popular and so simple.

this white rabbit was done by request and bartered in a mutual gift exchange (not involving money). i decided to branch out and accessorize this one. i wasn't sure at first about the ribbon, but now i think it adds a nice touch of, well, a touch of "me." since it had to be black ribbon (of course), i was compelled to add a little pink to the ears for balance. making the ears drove me nuts, and now i have a few experimental rabbit ears lying around, but the final ones do look okay.

here's a link to the pattern.

What knitting does for your reputation

Please allow me to clarify.

I am not a badass. It's just that sometimes people at work or church ask me questions as though I were one. Questions about my motorcycle (I do not own one) or my tattoos (I have none) or how many men I've killed and the like. Maybe it's my haircut.

I think all y'all know that inside, I'm a kitten. Actually, a bunny. A fuzzy bunny. With tiger stripes. A CamoBunny. Hiding is more my thing. Quiet hiding is advantageous. Example: in paintball, I was always elected to the position of sniper; because I'm small and quiet and able to stay still (and I own my own camo) I was good at hiding. Being a sniper in paintball does not require good aim; paintball guns are always off anyway.

In any case, I'm not exactly sure what knitting has done for my reputation. Someone once called me "domestic" (haaaaaaahahahahaha!) because one day to a volunteer workshift I had brought cookies I'd made from scratch and was knitting to pass the time. Most people just look kind of confused and stay quiet, or ask me if I'm pregnant. Maybe the ones who stay quiet are silently judging me for getting pregnant. (I'm not pregnant.)

Really, I think what it does is make me just a little more difficult to pigeonhole. How I do enjoy defying expectations.

Okay. Enough of that. Here's the pic that got me started on the topic in the first place.

BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

According to Yarnboy, from whom I ganked this image, the Crowe didn't even know how to knit. He was just posing for the picture to maybe appear sensitive. A POSER KNITTER? (snort of derision!) He really does look like quite a dope. I have never been a fan of Russell Crowe. This does not help him. But Yarnboy says the Crowe has now learned to knit as a form of anger management (chuckle). I don't know, maybe giving pointy sticks to a man with obvious anger problems isn't the brightest of ideas.

That's about as far as I'll go this time. Oh but I will add that George Washington Carver also knit. Now, he I will give it up for. Genius inventors who buck the system deserve props. Here's Yarnboy's blog (click on this other pic I ganked from him), from which I got this information. No he is not gay. He has a little historical thingie that has a few tidbits about men knitting that I thought was interesting.

Oops, gotta go!