Author Archives: pdxknitterati

urban fiber arts

Posted on October 8, 2010 | 7 comments

There’s a new yarn shop in Portland’s Pearl District, Urban Fiber Arts. Cindy Abernethy, the shop’s owner, carries yarn, spinning fibers, patterns, and accessories from regional dyers, spinners, and other fiber artists, many of whom are local to the Pacific Northwest. Cindy is one of the PDXKnit-bloggers, and she is realizing a life-long dream of having her own shop.

I missed the grand opening last week, but I finally had a chance to visit on Wednesday. I saw fiber from Abstract Fiber and Dicentra, and yarn from StitchJones. The shop will also carry hand-dyed yarn from Knitted Wit and Pico Accuardi. Urban Fiber Art’s focus is “quality yarns and fibers from the Northwest and beyond.” It’s almost like going to OFFF without having to wait. And they now carry most of my PDXKnitterati patterns, too. Thank you, Cindy!

Here’s some fun handspun from Trtlgrl Crafts.

While I was visiting, I bought this drop spindle learn to spin kit from Krafti-Kit.

I love the carved scrollwork on the spindle’s whorl. Pretty! And the alpaca fiber is really soft, like a cloud. It spins pretty easily, too.

In other news, I’m scheduled to teach a class on the Pippi Hat at Twisted the next couple of Thursday evenings. If you’d like an introduction to color work, this hat is a great way to learn. Contact Twisted to register.

Knit on!

7 Comments

Posted in Knit, pattern design, spinning

Tagged LYS, Urban Fiber Arts

Playing with plying

Posted on October 6, 2010 | 4 comments

I finally finished spinning my pink (colorway Rose City) Shimmer merino/silk that I got from KnittedWit last summer at Sock Summit.

I spun most of it last year, and then set the spindle aside. Last week I got a bee in my bonnet to finish the spinning, and then I knew I had to ply it because it was so thin. I keep accidentally making laceweight. I had two center pull balls off my Turkish spindle, so I used my Kundert top whorl spindle to ply them together. The 2 ply is the bigger skein on the left.

The singles had been sitting around a long time, so they weren’t very energized any more. This 2 ply is fairly loosely plied, but it didn’t seem to want to be more twisted than this. I like how the color changes cross each other, at least in the skein. This barber poled/marled look is sweet. The yarn is still pretty thin, though.

The two center pull balls weren’t close to each other in length; there was a lot left in the second ball after the first was gone. I decided to try Navajo chain plying with the remaining single. It’s basically making long crochet chain with the single, and putting twist in it to hold it together. Jenna showed me how last weekend at OFFF, so why not?

I love it! The three strands in the chain plying make this a more rounded, fatter yarn. And because chain plying is so linear, the color changes keep to themselves; there’s no barber poling. I’m sure there’s a lot more finesse to this technique; I’m still playing with it and learning how it works. I think I could make the chain loops a lot bigger as I do this, but haven’t figured it out yet. But I will.

4 Comments

Posted in spinning

Tagged navajo plying, spinning

Pacific Shawl, published

Posted on October 1, 2010 | 12 comments

I keep forgetting to post this, but the pattern is officially up!

Pacific Shawl, details here.

I saw Anna’s last night at book group. The lighting wasn’t ideal, but the shawl is gorgeous!

She used Blue Moon Fiber Arts Woobu, and it is a bit heavier, lovely and drapey. Anna’s shawl is the large size, and the yarn is heavier, too. It’s very cozy, but elegant.

You can kind of see the beads on the left, here. They’re much sparklier in person.

Thanks for knitting, Anna!

12 Comments

Posted in beading, Knit, pattern design

Tagged Knit, pacific shawl

OFFF, day 2

Posted on September 28, 2010 | 9 comments

After a perfectly gorgeous Saturday at OFFF, Sunday dawned, rainy and cool. But this is Oregon, rain doesn’t stop us. And by afternoon, it was no longer raining, anyway. I went back out to Canby under gray skies. I met up with Cathy to give her a tutorial on adding beads to her knitting. She’s knitting my Pacific Shawl pattern. I discovered that she’s a lefty! But beading works fine left handed, too.

I stopped by the Gardiner Yarnworks booth to say hi to Chrissy, and found her fondling this cashmere/silk fiber blend.

It turns out that it’s not hers. It belongs to Sivia Harding. I was wearing my Stitchjones Constellation beaded yarn around my neck as a necklace, so Sivia decided that her fiber could be a tiara.

Carson was pleased to have a new fleece. It was sheared on the spot while he waited. How cool is that?

I love how crimpy it is. I forgot to ask what kind of sheep, sorry. I did ask if he knew the sheep’s name, but it only had a number.

I also ran into my friend Claudia. She had just bought some wool, and said I’d be shocked by the color. Not! It was green, and it matched her green handknit socks. I showed her my new blue wool, and my blue handknit socks. We are such creatures of habit.

I’m so glad I decided to go back out. It was way more fun than cleaning the house!

9 Comments

Posted in Knit

Tagged OFFF

Friends and Fiber

Posted on September 25, 2010 | 15 comments

A perfect combination! It was a glorious sunny day at OFFF today, perfect for a fiber festival. I never did sit down to knit, but I became reacquainted with my Turkish drop spindle. I had forgotten how much I like it. Several people reminded me!

I saw lots of old friends, and some that I hadn’t met in person before. I’d like to especially welcome PeacefulKnitter to Oregon; she just moved here. What a lovely way to get to know the local fiber scene.

PeacefulBaby and Sweetie were here with her, too. PeacefulBaby seemed quite taken with Lorajean’s Baby O.

I got to see Rachel‘s finished Pacific shawl. She used Malabrigo Sock yarn in Abril.

Our shawls hung out together. Thanks for test knitting for me, Rachel! The pattern is available on Ravelry, and I have some paper copies at the Knitted Wit booth at OFFF.

And I broke my “I don’t stash” rule for this:

Constellation beaded worsted, 50/50 merino and silk, with beads from StitchJones.

I believe this is the first yarn I’ve ever bought that didn’t have a plan for it. And I probably won’t knit with it for a long time. I just want to look at it, pet it, and admire it. Thank you, Sharon!

A few more scenes from today:

15 Comments

Posted in Knit, pattern design, spinning

Off to OFFF

Posted on September 24, 2010 | 10 comments

The big fiber event this weekend is the Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival at the Clackamas County Fairgrounds in Canby. I helped Lorajean (KnittedWit) set up her booth today.

She’s sharing her booth with Pico Accuardi Dyeworks, so there is a lot of fabulous fiber in one small space! I’ll have patterns for sale there, too, including a few copies of my new Pacific Shawl pattern. It hasn’t even gone up for sale online yet, but I was doing a big print session for OFFF, and it told me that it wanted to go, too.

There’ll be some Lantern Moon product in the booth, including Sox Stix (their 6 inch ebony needles are my favorite dpns). Lantern Moon doesn’t have an official presence of its own at OFFF, but I sweet talked them in to having some of their super-cute fans there. It’s going to be 80 degrees and sunny, so it’s the right place at the right time. The fans are at the Knitted Wit/Pico Accuardi booth, and are a gift with a purchase of $10 or more.

We got the booth set up in record time. We had good help! (LJ’s youngest)

Also this weekend, Lantern Moon is extending their warehouse sale. There are still a lot of cute things left, including lots of silk needle cases, lanterns, wall fans (still have to put mine up and take a picture), ceramic pots. doormats. I even saw things this morning that I didn’t see last weekend, like this laptop case.

Cute! (It’s actually black, but I took the picture with my phone in my back yard, so it’s not quite WYSIWYG.)

Now I just need to pick a project or two to bring with me, so I can hang out with the PDXKnitBloggers, and dust off my poor neglected spindles so I can hang out with the Spinnerati. And find my Ravelry button. And…

Have a great weekend!

10 Comments

Posted in Knit, pattern design, spinning

Tagged OFFF

A crazy idea

Posted on September 21, 2010 | 2 comments

Dina has a crazy idea. She’d like to give a handcrafted item to each of the 1617 homeless students in the Beaverton, Oregon school district. The items can be knit, crocheted, sewn, or other. The children are ages 5 through 18, so items of all sizes are needed.

Do you feel a little crazy, too? Do you want to donate? Even better, do you want to get together with other crafters to work on this project? There are opportunities for get-togethers listed on Dina’s blog. See Dina’s blog for details on getting together or donating.

I have a Quincy hat in my stash that I’d be glad to donate. I don’t wear hats; I just wanted to make it because the construction was so intriguing. I think this would be a great way for it to find a home.

Let’s do it!

2 Comments

Posted in Knit

plum busy

Posted on September 20, 2010 | 11 comments

September brings plums, and plums mean jam; at least for me. Last year I made 20 jars of jam with the bounty from Vickie’s tree. But I gave away too much at Christmas, and by March I was out of jam. I’ve been (im)patiently waiting for this year’s harvest. Unfortunately, Vickie’s tree didn’t cooperate! I think our strangely rainy and cool extended spring and very short summer have wreaked havoc with the crop. I was reduced to actually buying plums from the supermarket.

These are the biggest Italian prune plums (Damsons) that I’ve ever seen. But they’re the same variety I always use. The inside is greenish yellow, as usual.

And the jam is reddish purple, as usual!

Since I had the water bath canner out, I made another batch of blueberry lime jam, too, using our blueberries from the freezer. This time it set up a lot better than my previous batch.

In other news, my rose is blooming.

And I’m teaching at Twisted this Wednesday evening and next, intro to circular knitting/basic hats. If you’re ready to break out of your straight needle beginnings and move to the next step, contact Twisted to register!

Knitting continues. I’m flying along on the BSJ. I love knitting garter stitch because it’s so good for multi-tasking; I usually watch a movie or read. It’s hard to get the book to stay open to the right page without using my hands, though. Luckily for me, DH gave me a Kindle for my birthday. (In addition to the rose planting!)

Do you multi-task while knitting, too?

11 Comments

Posted in Knit

Tagged plum jam, plums

EZ group project

Posted on September 16, 2010 | 10 comments

EZ, as in Elizabeth Zimmermann, rather than easy. Although the knitting *is* pretty easy on this. I think every knitter should read at least one book by Elizabeth Zimmermann. I have Knitting Without Tears and Knitter’s Almanac. Reading these books is like having a favorite aunt chat me through knitting projects.

My friend K recently asked me if I would knit a Baby Surprise Jacket if she spun the yarn for it. Elizabeth Zimmermann’s BSJ is a classic in the knitting world. I knew I’d have to knit one at some point in my knitting career. This one is for a mutual friend. What a cool idea! And another friend is on button duty, so this is truly a group project.

K sent me four balls of pretty handspun. The colorway is Crayon. It turns out that the fiber was from two dye lots, so there are two balls of predominantly blue yarn, and two of a pinker hue. I’ve decided to alternate knitting from the two dye lots; I’m swapping after every six rows (three garter ridges).

I cast on for this last weekend at Black Butte. I’m using the sample Lantern Moon interchangeable needles. I cast on with the rosewood tips, and after a couple rows I decided that I really wanted to try the ebony tips. It’s easy to change tips in the middle of a project. But there was only one ebony tip in the size I needed (the sample case had been raided), so here’s what I’m working with now.

I like them both, but I prefer the ebony. The rosewood tips feel a little pointier to me than the ebony tips; I prefer a more rounded tip. Now to settle in to knitting!

10 Comments

Posted in Knit

Tagged baby surprise jacket, BSJ, Elizabeth Zimmermann

September…

Posted on September 14, 2010 | 17 comments

September is my favorite month. Not only do I have my birthday, we also have our wedding anniversary. Here’s what we looked like 28 years ago this past Sunday.

I also love the beginning of the school year in September. The Teen is a high school senior, so it’s the last of the first days of school. We celebrated with a trip to Black Butte Ranch in Sisters, Oregon, with three other families. Next year the kids will be scattered to different colleges, so it was the first in what will be a series of last hurrahs.

The weather was perfect. Crystalline blue skies, high 75, low 35 (fahrenheit!). Perfect for biking (Mt. Jefferson to the right, Three-Fingered Jack to the left, Black Butte cut off to the extreme right)…

crafting…

or lazing in the backyard hammock.

This is Black Butte, a volcanic cinder cone.

And the two snow-capped mountains are two of the three Sisters. The third sister (Middle Sister) isn’t visible from here. The closest mountain is Belknap Crater.

But what would a knitting blog post be without knitting? We stopped at the Stitchin’ Post in Sisters. It’s mostly a quilting store, but there’s an exquisite little yarn section.