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I've done it, I've earned my knitting stripes, I've knit a clapotis. I've also frogged it - never mind.
Flatliner
Pattern: Clapotis by Kate Gilbert, available from knitty.com. It is a fantastic pattern - a unique concept and extremely well devised, all the way down to the stitches that create a consistent selvedge across all sections. I like this sort of attention to detail.
Size: Ah, rather huge, too huge in fact. I knit 8 rpts of section 2 and 28 rpts of section 3. The width was good (in theory) but it turned out rather too long.
Needles: 4mm Addi Turbo.
Yarn: Handmaiden Fine Yarns Casbah, a merino/cashmere/nylon sock yarn, colourway Vintage.
Start to finish: I started this on 31 December 2009 and knit furiously until 5 February 2010. It's taken me until today to accept that it hasn't been a success. I should have known when I couldn't be bothered to weave in the ends ...
Comments: Knitting is harder than you might think. Well, not the actual knitting but the creation of an item that works. I realise now that designers must put in a lot of thought to the mix of pattern, structure, texture and fibre. That was the problem with my clapotis: it just didn't work. For one thing, my choice of yarn was not compatible with the stole that I wanted to create. The Casbah is gorgeous yarn, squishy and drapey but this drape combined with the bias inherent in the pattern just created a too long scarf that was too bulky to boot. And then there was the variegated yarn effect - I didn't like it, it pooled. I loved the yarn when it was all in a hank but not when knit up. I'm curious to see what it looks like when done in garter stitch which I have had luck with before when using a variegated yarn.
Verdict: You knit, you learn. Why did I keep knitting this, even long after I had misgivings? Because I had a brand new baby, because I was spending hours on the couch breastfeeding, because despite the tumultuous change in my life and obligations I wanted to hold on to something of my own. I was knitting, feverishly, to save a sliver of my old life.
I'm still a bit stuck on 2009. I realised that I had one more finished object, you see - the apron that I made for Di's son, C. You can see him putting it to good use here.
Excitingly, this was made predominantly from stash. The fabric that I used also features in my vintage fabrics quilt. And I have actually used it in two further sewing projects already this year (details to come). Pretty good mileage for one shower curtain. The pattern came from Better Homes and Gardens 167 Things to Make for Children.
So, including my recent appendix, this brings my 2009 tally to:
projects: 36
knitting: 18, sewing: 17, other: 1
recycled/refashioned/upcycled: 26
made from stash: 8
2009 was also significant in terms of what I made, particularly what I knit - garments! adult garments! three adult garments! I don't think that I expressly stated that this was an aim for the year, probably for fear off jinxing myself. But I did it - Sunrise Circle, Wallingford and the Pimlico Snug. I am going to dare say it for 2010 - I would like to knit an adult garment for someone else, namely Tim.
And I also completed my first ever piece of knitted lace - the swallowtail shawl - which is pretty much the reason why I started knitting.
On other matters of repeating - Clapotis is going well. I agonised quite a bit about how large to make it, about how large I could make it, about how to maximise how large I could make it given the amount of yarn that I had. I only did one increase more in section 2 than the pattern directs but am up to 15-odd of the section 3 repeats. I think that I could do as many as 30! The pooling is still happening but never mind. I'm having fun dropping the stitches and helping them to ladder down - it's so contrary to normal knitting practice. Each one is deliciously transgressive. So, I've done about 15 repeats now ... oops, repeating myself.
So, variegated yarns - like them or not? In the hank I often think that they look wonderful and (along perhaps with many a knitter) have been lured into a purchase as a result. Once wound up into a skein some of that mystique tends to disappear as the colours get all tangled up, and you discover some colours that, ah, you didn't quite realise were in there. Is it something about the magic of the dye job that in the hank you only see the colours that you like, and can selectively ignore the ones that make them pop out (which you may not necessarily appreciate as much)? And once it's knit up into a fabric ... well then things can start to not look so good.
The only other time I have really knit with a variegated yarn was the Elizabeth Zimmerman tomten jacket in 2008 from Noro Kureyon, which was a great success. That was knit in garter stitch and I recall deciding at the time that garter stitch was indeed the best choice for such yarns. And here I am now knitting Clapotis which is a whole lot of stocking stitch. I am undecided as to whether it looks like a dog's breakfast, and if it does, whether I can live with that. The dropped stitch effect certainly serves to break up the swathes of colour and it is fun to watch the various hues layering upon each other, row by row. Except when they don't.
Don't layer that is - yes, I'm talking about pooling.
It strikes me that in a reasonably evenly space-dyed yarn that it is inevitable that there will be some combination of stitch count and length of colour repeat that will result in pooling. I have seen quite dramatic photos of seriously pooling socks (no, no idea now where) that were reknit with just an extra stitch or two that resulted in quite a different pattern effect. Anyway, my Clapotis is indeed pooling although interestingly this didn't happen until quite a bit into the current 119 stitch-wide stretch. And I'm about to change skeins. And in the Clapotis pattern I really don't think that it matters as the bias pull means that the columns all sit askew anyway.
So, I am currently knitting laps on my Clapotis, just back and forth with not a lot of variation on each row. I'm doing the sixth repeat in section three and expect to have enough yarn to complete maybe twenty. I am also doing laps around the house - change table to couch to kitchen to laundry and back to the change table. There's a quick detour to the bathroom a few times a day and we are getting out a bit too.
Doing laps is relentless though - I had forgotten how relentless it is to look after a new baby. You get through a day only to wake up again (after a few short bursts of sleep) to another in which you do pretty much exactly the same thing. And newborns are demanding and fragile and as much as I want my baby boy to be just that I also find myself longing for when he's a bit older. Really, I think that I'm just longing for a break from the laps but I know that things don't work that way. So in the meantime I am just learning to love the laps, surrendering myself to them and perfecting the art of knitting while breastfeeding (better than knitting while swimming).
You may have read a book called The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho. It's a long time since I did but the general gist that I remember was taking a journey to discover that what you most wanted was right here at home. Such was my trip to Portland.
So here I am at Sock Summit, staffing my friend Kylie's stall while she took a well-deserved break on the Saturday. I wish that I had the alchemical ability to turn my toenails to bright red - that was one thing that I forgot to take with me, some nail polish. The idea was that, finally with time to myself, I would catch up on those kind of grooming things. I did manage to get my hair cut but no nail polish was applied.
I caught the train down and it was a great, relaxing ride. It also ran on time, both going there and coming back, which I've been told is quite unusual. I was able to sit and knit, uninterrupted for several hours. I really enjoy train travel and this is the first long train ride that I have taken, by myself, since ... hmm, moving from Melbourne to Sydney in 2001? Anyway, I got back onto my faux prussian stole and actually ran out of yarn! I have heaps more here at home but hadn't thought to take any spare with me. I don't think that I realised that I was so far through it already.
At Sock Summit itself I wasn't booked in for any workshops, I just went to experience the atmosphere, visit the marketplace, catch up with friends. Kylie brought all of this wonderful hand-dyed sock yarn over from Australia under the lable ms. gusset. I worked in retail all though high school and my uni years and I had forgotten how much fun it is, for the first 15 minutes. Then my cheeks started to hurt from all the smiling but I did get to talk to lots of attendees and even sold some yarn.
And bought some yarn too. I have been hankering after the Handmaiden 'vintage' colourway for months now but had only seen it available in the Camelspin which is about $40 per skein at my nearest yarn store. So I was delighted to come across their Casbah on sale for $24 a skein, and machine washable to boot - hoorah!
Otherwise, I found the marketplace completely overwhelming - hundreds of vendors all with, well, basically the same thing - sock yarn - and as much as I like knitting with finer yarn it's not really where my head is now. And there were just so many vendors that really, it all started to blend into one big mass of colour. Perhaps a more experienced sock knitting connoisseur would have coped better with it all! As for my Handmaiden, I'm considering the Cleopatra Wrap (Ravelry link) from Sensual Knits. But then again, I still haven't made a Clapotis yet ...
I've always called it an aubergine, not eggplant. I love the word aubergine, it's delicious to say.
So, remember that really fine white wool that I bought a few weeks ago at Value Village? Well, the very excellent Val from Actual Size Creations held a dyeing party at her house on Tuesday and (with a great amount of help from her) I produced this:
Now it's aubergine.
A lace-weight clapotis? Yes, I realise that I am waaay behind the times here. Clapotis was the viral knitting when I first joined the Melbourne stitch'n'bitch group some three years ago or more. The pattern itself is some four years old already and on Ravelry alone there are 8,524 finished versions.
I've been thinking about it for a long time. At first I felt compelled to do it in Lorna's Laces Lion and Lamb but it was so hard to choose a colourway and the price was prohibitive anyway. The clapotis craze has grown larger than Lion and Lamb now though - I have seen it in lots of different sizes and yarns, including a lovely sock-yarn version. I think that it would lend itself well to displaying the very subtle semi-solid variagation in this yarn. Well, I can always swatch up and see.
Thank you so much Val for having us and for all of your assistance.
I've done it, I've earned my knitting stripes, I've knit a clapotis. I've also frogged it - never mind.
Comments: Knitting is harder than you might think. Well, not the actual knitting but the creation of an item that works. I realise now that designers must put in a lot of thought to the mix of pattern, structure, texture and fibre. That was the problem with my clapotis: it just didn't work. For one thing, my choice of yarn was not compatible with the stole that I wanted to create. The Casbah is gorgeous yarn, squishy and drapey but this drape combined with the bias inherent in the pattern just created a too long scarf that was too bulky to boot. And then there was the variegated yarn effect - I didn't like it, it pooled. I loved the yarn when it was all in a hank but not when knit up. I'm curious to see what it looks like when done in garter stitch which I have had luck with before when using a variegated yarn.
Verdict: You knit, you learn. Why did I keep knitting this, even long after I had misgivings? Because I had a brand new baby, because I was spending hours on the couch breastfeeding, because despite the tumultuous change in my life and obligations I wanted to hold on to something of my own. I was knitting, feverishly, to save a sliver of my old life.
