Vanity

I just have one quick little thing to show you today:

That's right, it's now a Skewbaru.

Stitches go in, stitches come out

So you would think, in four and a half hours as a passenger on the road to Madison, that I ought to be able to get a lot of knitting done, right?

Well, yes and no.

I started the second sock of a pair as soon as we left town, because second socks (usually) require no decisions. But I forgot to bring my design notes, so I had to figure stuff out by looking at Sock One. The first time I cast on, after 6-8 rounds I realized I'd started with the wrong number of stitches. On the second try, I got a little farther before noticing my gauge didn't look right. Sure enough, it was looser than Sock One. So I double-checked my needles and I had brought the wrong size needles: 2.5mm instead of 2.25mm.

Luckily, I only had to fidget about 45 minutes before we got to Champaign, IL, where we got off the highway for gas, restrooms, and an emergency yarn store stop. I was sorry I couldn't spare more time to browse at Needleworks, but I did get a pair of 2.25mm circulars. Unfortunately, the only metal ones they had in stock in that size were Susan Bates Quicksilvers. I don't mind them for larger-gauge projects (in fact I rather like the finish), but for socks, they were a misery. They have nice sharp points (excellent for lace and twisted stitches), but look closely at the cable join; that little smooshed place is wider than the rest of the needle, so tightly-knit sock stitches do not want to slide over it. After a while I got frustrated and took a nap.

By the time we switched drivers in Rockford, IL, all I had finished was this tiny little toe-start, about an inch tall. I got another inch or so knitted after snapping this photo on the comfy couch in Lakeside Fibers. Mercifully, I was able to replace the offending needles with Chiaogoo Red Lace needles at The Sow's Ear, and finished the toe at Late Night Knitting. These are my new favorite sock needles. I'm a long-time fan of Addi Lace Turbos, too, but I have acidic skin and wear the "slick" off the finish pretty quickly. I'm hoping the stainless steel Chiaogoos will tolerate me better.

Unfortunately I slept late the next morning and didn't manage to get the instep pattern established before my afternoon coffee-and-knitting date at EVP Coffee, with my friend Jamie McCanless, Madison resident, cool dude, and tech editor to the stars. Jamie's too interesting company for me to set up the instep without my notes while we talked, so I knit a lot of stitches, but only in a "they're all wrong, but it's okay, I'm a process knitter" sort of way. (Guess I should have taken a photo of those completely random traveling twisted stitches before I ripped them out, huh?)

And two weeks later, I'm ready to turn the heel. Um, yay?

Driving and drawing

I've done a lot more traveling this year than I typically do. I'm not going to recite my entire 2012 itinerary at you, but I did just get back from four days in Madison, Wisconsin, which is my favorite Midwestern city. It's pretty, pedestrian-friendly, and environmentally conscious (at least, compared to where I live), and there's a great abundance of good food and drink. You can't walk a hundred yards in downtown Madison without the opportunity to buy beer, cheese, or beer-battered cheese.

The reason for this trip was that my spouse was giving two talks at MathFest 2012 and I went along. As a recovering mathematician, I often get to see old friends at math conferences. For example, we had lunch with D. Jacob "Jake" Wildstrom, crocheter, combinatorist, and coauthor of Making Mathematics with Needlework. Jake was kind enough to share an order with me of the finest cheese curds in Wisconsin, to save me from eating them all myself.

One particularly great thing about Madison is that they have figured out that coffee and yarn should be together. I spent an hour knitting on a very comfortable couch in the Lakeside Street Coffeehouse, which shares a building with Lakeside Fibers. I would have stayed longer, but a heavy lunch was making me drowsy (remember those cheese curds?). I also went to Late Night Knitting at The Sow's Ear in nearby Verona, WI, which may be the Knit Night to end all Knit Nights. I talked to a lot of great, interesting people at both shops and, of course, did a little souvenir shopping.

One of my spouse's talks was about graph theory and blackwork embroidery, and I helped out by drawing some of the diagrams for his slides. Here are the slides for the whole talk; the illustrations with a fabric background are mine.

Now that I'm home, I've got some knitting technical illustrations to draw ASAP. I'll show you a sample of my illustration style and answer a frequent question about Skew at the same time. The original wording for the lifted increases is confusing. So here's a hopefully-clearer restatement, with a picture.

LLinc: use the left needle to pick up the aqua strand in the direction of the arrow; knit in the back of this strand.
RLinc: use the right needle to pick up the purple strand in the direction of the arrow; transfer it to the left needle and knit it (in the front).

If you're having trouble remembering whether to knit in the front or the back, the key idea is that they are intended to be untwisted. (Of course, if you want them to be twisted, by all means. It's your knitting.)

By the way, MathFest is scheduled to be in Portland in 2014. I'm desperately hoping it will coincide again with Sock Summit, like it did in 2009.

Revisions and invasions

After my guests left town, I buckled down and finally finished the sample sock pair for the new self-published edition of Willow Tea Room. They're knit in Simply Socks Yarn Company SSY Solids in Lavender. As a result of switching to a thinner yarn, the pattern has been re-gauged, re-sized, and (of course!) re-edited; the new edition has three sock circumferences to choose from, and instructions for altering the foot length.

By the way, this is an absolutely terrific yarn. It's got three plies (and you know how I love a round yarn!), comes in an extensive color selection, and is put up in 50 g hanks so you can buy only what you need. And in spite of the name, they're not entirely solid-colored; there's just the tiniest bit of variation to add interest.

You only get this lame laid-flat photo for the moment because I need to find a model. For whatever reason, most of my local friends either have really small or really large feet. The socks fit me, actually, but there is not enough Photoshoppery in the world to make my legs presentable right now, what with the blackberry scratches, the insect bites, and the accompanying ankle swelling.

See, we live on a seven-acre plot, six acres of which is wooded. And I've declared war on some invasive species that have moved into it. Just for example, we have large canopies of Japanese honeysuckle vines on top of thirty-plus years of thorny old blackberry canes. For the last few months, I've been hacking down Bad Plants and piling them up to burn. Earlier this year, I had a glorious time setting fire to a giant stickery pile of brush in my driveway.

However, there's been a temporary ban on open burning here for weeks due to extremely dry conditions. (In case you didn't know, the lower midwestern United States is having a serious drought.) So now there are numerous piles like this one, waiting for rain.

By the way, I'm a disturbingly good firebug; this gray spot is all that's left of a pile twice the size of the one above, and I didn't use any accelerants except the match.

Oddly enough, the Honeysuckle Wars have turned out to be related to knitting. The large-motion, non-repetitive upper body exercise has been really good for preventing the return of my knitting-related shoulder pain. (Disclaimer: this is my personal experience only and should not be taken as medical advice. Consult a doctor before reading this blog.) And the fresh air, the improvement of the view out the windows from my workspace, and the satisfaction of doing something good for the ecology have all been great for my mental health.

Today, though, I'm taking the day off from playing Junior Forester to get ready for a short vacation, which will include meeting up with some Awesome Knitting People. I'll be taking along the stockinette sock project for social knitting. It's coming along much better this time around, although I may yet rip back and try a sockitecture experiment. (The yarn is Schoppel Wolle Wunderkleckse; isn't it pretty?)

And no, of course it isn't the only project I'm packing. Don't be silly. Time to wind some yarn.

Wining + winding = whining

This is going to have to be brief because my in-laws have been in town until this morning, and I'm leaving for a trip this afternoon (for which I haven't finished the laundry yet). Let me be clear that a visit from my in-laws is a good thing (and I'm not just saying that because my father-in-law has been known to read my blog on occasion!).

My mother-in-law, in fact, is a knitter. She's not a rabid one, but she works on interesting projects and likes to learn new things, and she has wonderful taste. She's been fascinated by my knitting socks on two circs, and this time I handed her one in progress to knit on for herself, which she did with great success. Turns out we even have similar gauges!

Meanwhile, a large pile of Wollmeise grab bags arrived while they were here. She'd never seen Wollmeise before, and was really impressed with the saturated colors. I got two skeins of Birkenrinde, which she particularly admired, so I sent her home with one as a gift.

I took having company as a justified opportunity to knit a stockinette sock. I was going to show it to you because the yarn was knitting up in a particularly interesting way, but it'll have to wait. I had to rip it back from the beginning of the heel flap to the end of the toe last night, because I failed to count before beginning the straight section of the foot. Likewise, we went to hang some new curtains in the process of fluffing our house before company arrived, and I discovered I had only ordered half as many as I should have. (I do know what order the natural numbers come in, I swear!)

Also, here's the result of winding yarn after your dinner party of five consumes two bottles of wine. I didn't have the heart (or the lighting) to take a photo of the loops wrapped around the gears before I admitted defeat and got out the scissors.

On a (mostly) positive note, early last week, I did finish the shawl I was crocheting at the car dealership. And yes, there's a pattern in progress, although the stitch diagrams are giving me fits.

So about that ballwinder

I caved. I got tired of having to impose on my LYS to wind giant balls (like the Wollmeise Lace-Garn I mentioned in my last post, which comes in 1740 yd / 300 g hanks). And I'm a real big fan of using The Right Tool for the Job. So I ordered the Nancy's Knit Knacks heavy duty ball winder.

It took me a while to figure out where to put it (no, I didn't clamp it to the back seat armrest in my Subaru). It has much nicer clamps than my old Royal, so I wasn't worried about marring the surface of a good table; but most of the tables in the house have either a very shallow lip extending over a vertical panel, or a routed edge. And of course there has to be somewhere nearby to mount a swift. The kitchen island countertop worked great, but my family assured me that I couldn't leave it set up there.

I finally settled on a little bookshelf in my living room. Here's the whole yarn-winding setup, ready to go. The swift has to be taken down between uses because it's clamped to the table where we usually eat. That's my laptop in the background; this is also the table where I usually do any extended computer usage this time of year, since it has great light and a nice view.

The ballwinder is every bit as good a tool as I had hoped. Better, in fact, since it's much more versatile in terms of, mounting position than I realized. It came fully assembled except for the handle and even included the necessary nut driver in case I ever have to open the case to adjust or lubricate the inner works. It's well-designed for its function and well-crafted with a nice finish, so I'm happy to have it sitting out in my living room. The photo above is pretty much the last non-word on its usefulness.

Unfortunately, my swift doesn't work nearly as well. The screw that holds the clamp below the umbrella to the vertical post is wooden, including the screw threads, and some of the threads broke off. So it doesn't hold very well, and the umbrella has a nasty tendency to collapse mid-winding if I encounter a resistant spot. And of course, once a skein falls off the first time, it tends to have a lot of resistant spots.

Today I got fed up and consulted my household engineer. A woodworking clamp under the umbrella is pretty clunky, and orange, but very effective. And next time I go to the hardware store, I'll see if I can find a smaller, round clamp (perhaps in the plumbing department?) that will do the job.

By the way, speaking of using the right tool for the job: if you need to give your long-haired cat a lion cut, don't use your husband's beard trimmer. Just sayin.'

If I could just replace that cupholder with a ballwinder...

I had this idea in my head: "Mondays! I shall blog on Mondays, nothing ever happens on Monday." So of course yesterday I got to drop everything and drive to the far side of Indianapolis (about two hours away). But I came home with this:

I've been shopping since February to replace the old beater my husband totaled by driving it over a curb and down a hill into a tree ("But at least not into the creek, honey!"). He was actually still driving it, but the air conditioning went out on it last week, so the project became just a leetle more urgent.

Since I didn't drive on the way over, and the dealership insisted on making me wait while they washed my new used car (in spite of it being already cleaner than any car I'd driven in at least ten years), I also came home with this:

I got several rather long rows added to this shawl, which I'm crocheting from The Verdant Gryphon's Mithril. It's one of my very favorite laceweight yarns for crochet. In fact, here are some closeup shots of three I love. It's hot outside, so you get indoor shots, but they're in natural light, albeit from the skylight over my stovetop, with a cutting board for a backdrop.

Here's the Mithril; it's the only one of the three that hasn't been blocked, since I'm still working on the project, so cut it some slack.

This is Wollmeise Lace-Garn. It's a little heavier than Mithril. It's challenging to get your hands on this stuff, but it's worth the trouble. I've gotten most of mine from other Ravelers' destashes, actually, although once in a great while The Loopy Ewe gets some (it usually sells out within about twenty minutes), or sometimes I'm still awake at 2 a.m. here for the German website updates.

The lightest of the three is Lana Grossa Merino Lace. Lana Grossa isn't all that common in U.S. yarn stores, but not impossible to find either. I bought mine at a LYS in Indianapolis. And right now, with the exchange rate, it's possible to order it from Europe for about the same cost, even including shipping, as buying it at home. (That reminds me, I wanted to order some green...)

So what's so great about these yarns? The thing they all have in common is that they all have three or more plies, which makes them "round." With fingering weight yarns, there are a lot of round choices, but lace yarns are frequently two-ply. Sometimes the structure of two-ply yarn obscures the structure of the crochet stitch. This can be a good thing with very simple stitch patterns, but if I'm going to the trouble of designing complex new edgings (which I am), I jolly well want every detail to show up.

Resurrection

I know I haven't blogged in a long time, but as you can now see at the top of the page, I do tweet regularly, and have been for over a year. Apparently I have an attention span of about 140 characters. So if you don't yet follow me on Twitter, please do!

Meanwhile, I've spent the last year or so concentratedly acquiring useful skills for self-publishing. I've been fortunate to work with some of the very best publishers in the business, but what can I say, I'm a control freak. And I've discovered I really enjoy typography, graphic design, and layout.

I've attended two of Cat Bordhi's Visionary Authors retreats now, and yup, I've got a book project in the works. But since I plan to do my own book design and layout, I've been learning Adobe InDesign by developing a new single-pattern template. (You can see some of the design elements in my refreshed blog template, as well.) So here's what you can expect in the short term:

I'll be releasing a second edition of Oblique using the new template. Hopefully, if testing goes well, it will include a new, larger size. For those of you who've already bought this pattern through Ravelry, you'll get the update free. Having recently made a couple more pairs of these myself, I can happily report that the new template is also quite usable on an iPhone, for your paper-free mobile knitting.

I've got a new crocheted shawl pattern ready to publish except for the photography. Here's a teaser photo of Cremona (a.k.a. "Epic Flounce").

I injured my shoulder from repetitive strain pretty badly late last fall, and couldn't knit for several months, but I could crochet. So you can expect quite a few more crocheted shawl patterns in the coming months. And after an ergonomic consultation with Carson Demers and weeks of physical therapy, I'm happy to report I also have two new sock patterns prototyped.

Oh, and by the way, I discovered I haven't been receiving your comment notifications in a long time. My ISP got bought out by another ISP, and they changed my email address, and the comment notifications have been going to the former, now defunct address. So I promise I haven't been ignoring you.

But right now, there is something very important I must go look at on the internet.

Any minute now

Are you anxiously awaiting the Winter 2011 Twist Collective? I know I am. The pattern list is already entered into Ravelry, so I'm not giving away any secrets by saying that I'll have another sock pattern in this issue. I'm incredibly excited about it and can't wait to share.

Meanwhile, I'm knitting a pair of socks for myself from Loure, my pattern from Fall Twist Collective. The prototype pair was too small for me, and I recently had the pleasure of giving it to a wonderful designing friend. I'll eventually get back the sample pair I knit for Twist, but it, too, is a little small for my wide feet.

There's a Loure knitalong just getting started on the Ravelry Twist Collective forum. If you've been thinking about knitting Loure but would like a little company and occasional advice, please come join me!

Sizing woes

There's a well-known editor who has publicly proclaimed that all sock patterns "ought to" be offered in a range of sizes, as if anyone (like me) who has ever published a sock pattern in only one size should be publicly flogged with a handful of Addi Turbos. And I'm absolutely in favor of offering as many sizes as is possible. But when I say "possible," I mean provided that re-sizing does not compromise the integrity of the design. Sometimes the math simply doesn't allow a complex sock pattern to be re-sized without significantly changing the sock's appearance. If we insist that a sock pattern shouldn't be published without three or more size options, then we run the risk of (a) banishing many very beautiful, complex sock patterns, and (b) promoting dishonesty in sock sizing.

Let me explain what I mean by "dishonesty in sock sizing." Once, in my pre-professional-designing days, I bought a sock pattern by a very well-known designer. The pattern was written for three sizes (64, 72, and 80 stitches around the leg), and I started knitting the medium size. When I got to the transition from ribbing from the leg, the knits and purls of the 2x2 ribbed cuff did not flow smoothly into the knits and purls of the more-complicated leg design, like the pattern photo showed.

As I tried to figure out what was going on,I discovered that the sample sock photographed was the small size. And I realized that in order to size up the pattern from 64 stitches while preserving the symmetry, the designer had to add 4 stitches of ribbing on each side of the centered motif on the front of the leg, and likewise 4 stitches of ribbing on each side of the centered motif on the back of the leg. That's 16 stitches added in total. And in fact, that is how the pattern was written for the large size. But the designer included the in-between size even though it was impossible for the ribbing and leg to line up (IMO a very important feature of the design). The medium size simply wasn't as attractive as the other two sizes.

The moral of this story is that I just don't feel it's right to pretend a pattern is graded for sizes that look significantly different from the sock shown in the photo.

Something Nouveau

Have you seen The Sanguine Gryphon's Spring 2011 Art Nouveau pattern collection yet? I have a new sock design in it. Willow Tea Room is a toe-up lace anklet named for a Charles Rennie Mackintosh-designed building in Glasgow, Scotland. The rosebud motifs appear on the leaded glass windows and doors, and the lace grid is reminiscent of the chair backs.

The pattern model features TSG's Skinny Bugga! in spring/summer 2011 colorway Golden Orb Weaver.

After I sent off the sample pair, though, I made a second pair to keep for myself. This time I used a winter 2010 colorway, Miss Spider, because the inspiration building is decorated in similar shades. Here's a quick snapshot of my pair. (The camera angle was a little awkward; my feet aren't really that short.)

Like Betony, WTR has asymmetric toes and arch shaping. And both Betony and WTR have a heel that is identical in appearance and proportions to a top-down flap-and-gusset round heel. However, Betony shapes the sole flap with short rows; WTR shapes the sole flap with decreases and then stitches are picked up along the sides. A bit of garter stitch at the sides of the heel back adds interest and coordinates with the garter-and-twisted-stitch lace background on the instep.

The sizing for this sock is a little unusual. There are two foot circumferences given, but three foot lengths, as well as directions for adding more foot length. If you have any trouble following the pattern (for this or any other reason!), please do email me at the address on the pattern.

If you have really small feet and like a snug fit, you can still knit WTR. Now, I think it's a terrible idea for a pattern to direct changing the finished size of a sock by changing gauge with the same yarn (that's a whole other post). But it's perfectly fine to change size by changing gauge if you also change yarn weight. If you use TSG's Little Traveler instead of Skinny Bugga!, you can get a very nice sock fabric at around 9 st/in and follow the instructions for the size M circumference. The Little Traveler version of the Golden Orb Weaver colorway is called The Five Continents.

Not today

I know I've mentioned before that I intend to publish a multi-size version of the Skew sock pattern. And at least a couple of times, I've predicted in private emails or Ravelry messages that it would be available by Thanksgiving.

The bad news, obviously, is that today is Thanksgiving. And it's not ready.

While I'll openly admit I'm a procrastinator, there were three specific reasons that interfered with the release of multi-sized Skew. The first is that I personally test-knitted the adult Small size and ran into some difficulties with the fit. As a matter of personal pride, I will NOT sacrifice quality to rush this project.

The second reason is that we have been having a radical remodel done on our house: we added a second story. As a night person and light sleeper, I've found it virtually impossible to get enough rest before being woken up by the noise of hammers and air compressors and chop saws. And the stress of arguing over design decisions has been even worse. I've tried leaving the house to work at a coffee shop, but usually I found that I needed some yarn or needles I'd left at home. One time I realized that I was too tired to drive home safely. So I quickly gave that up and have been working on less mentally-demanding projects instead. Mercifully, the contractors are only a couple of weeks away from completion.

The final straw is that I've been babying a terminally ill cat this fall. We were able to suppress Callisto's symptoms at home for a while with medication, but the meds eventually ceased to be effective and we euthanized (a tremendously painful, personal family decision) and buried her yesterday. She was not our only cat, but Callisto is the one who cuddled with me while I worked, often sneaking onto my lap under the knitting-in-progress, and I miss her terribly.

Now, on the bright side, an unusual opportunity has come up to assist me in exploring the Skew sockitecture. I'm not ready to make it public yet, but it may help me provide an even wider range of Skew sock options than I had previously considered.

So if you have ever made a wish for any variant of Skew, hang in there. I haven't forgotten you.

A gear to wear

This is what happens when a knitting designer has a housemate who is a mechanical engineer:
Involute is a full-circular capelet named after the curve that forms the contact edge of gear teeth. Its lower edging consists of twenty-four teeth. The square neckline represents a gear’s square axle opening. Four “spokes” are separated by panels of Arrow Lace suggestive of rotational motion. Garter ridges and eyelets provide texture and laciness, but with an industrial feel. Even the color is reminiscent of antique brass.

This design was originally conceived in response to a call for submissions for the Sanguine Gryphon's fall steampunk pattern collection. They passed on my submission proposal, so I ordered some yarn, knit madly for several weeks, and submitted the completed Involute for the Deep Fall issue of Knitty (punch line: it was very graciously rejected by Knitty also), which meant a photo shoot in mid-July. I had a great site for the shoot-- I live just down the road from an engineering college. But I couldn't get the sample finished until the morning of the submission deadline, and it was nearly a hundred degrees that day. So here's Involute on my awesome model, as she tries not to melt. (That reminds me, I think I owe that girl some knitwear.) After a few shots with the cool rusty statuary, we hastened indoors for the rest of the photos.


I really did research the proper shape and spacing for gear teeth, so if you have two Involutes-- or in my case, one Involute and a submission swatch-- the teeth do mesh. The photo at left is the engineer's favorite.

Out of ideas for potential publishers and anxious to get Involute out into the world, I decided to self-publish, so Involute is now available for purchase through Ravelry.

Betony

Finally! Something new to share!

I was invited months ago to design a sock pattern for the August installment of Three Irish Girls' Sock Yarnista Club. Betony is now available for purchase directly from Three Irish Girls.



(I wanted to name this sock after an Irish wildflower. I apologize to my friend Steven A. who was really rooting for the name Butterwort, but I was too chicken to name a sock this pretty after a carnivorous plant. Another sock, another time, my friend!)

Betony is worked from the toe up and, although the toes aren't worked on the diagonal like Skew, they are shaped to be left- and right-footed. I'm in love with asymmetric sock toes. Not only are they more comfortable, but they also wear more evenly than symmetric toes because the strain on the big toe is eliminated.

Speaking of fit and wear, check out the arch shaping:

Unlike arch shaping on top-down socks, which places increases on the sole of the foot, toe-up arch shaping places decreases on the bottom of the foot. The double layer of stitches in a decrease is more durable than an increase. And of course they feel great snugged up into my arch.

I'm particularly happy with the heel. For a very long time, I've used a toe-up heel with the same structure and proportions as a standard top-down flap-and-gusset heel, but it involves knitting a shaped heel cup and then picking up stitches around it. Personally, I don't mind picking up stitches; but I know some people do. And most toe-up heels with short row heel cups are either way too shallow or have way too many gusset increases (but that's a rant for a whole separate post). So for a change, Betony's heel has the same proportions as my usual heel, but the cup is shaped with short rows instead of picking up stitches.

By the way, the heel flap is patterned at the sides, but I left the center of the flap plain since that area is prone to wear. However, you could certainly pattern the whole flap if you want to wear Betony with clogs.

And now for the bad news: there are a couple of errata. I've posted them to Betony's Ravelry pattern page, but I'll repeat them here.

In the Double Rivulet Rib chart, the three central columns should be (p1, k1, p1) instead of (k1, p1, k1).

In the Ribbing instructions, the Right and Left sock instructions are switched.

Strange juxtapositions

Yesterday I saw Cookie A attempt to explain the Axiom of Choice to room full of knitters. One of my life's Great Missed Photographic Opportunities was my failure to snap her picture drawing the Cantor set underneath a knitting diagram.
Demonstrating that I occasionally learn from failure, I offer you Franklin Habit wearing my Oblique fingerless gloves.

Getting carded

Okay, I think I've successfully ordered business cards to pick up later this afternoon. The hotel wireless was too slow to handle emailing a big attachment, so I had to sneakernet the file downstairs to the business center and use webmail. Let's hope it went through.

I really do need them here. Just this morning I talked to an indie dyer who would be interested in sending me some of her yarn for a Skew sockitecture-based design and an Ohio knitting guild program chair who invited me to give a workshop.

Pharmaceutical failure

Well, bother. I've got another hour before my alarm, but my sleeping pill wore off. I'm always too excited too sleep unaided at these events, and I only get six hours' help from a pill, so that leaves me about three hours short. I guess I need to add a bottle of anti-redness eye drops to my travel supplies, so I won't look like I followed up a hard day of knitting with a hard night of drinking.

Today's agenda: a morning class with Cookie A, and an afternoon trip down toward the Capitol building to see if the independent printer can crank me out a small batch of business cards.

In between, I'd say lunch at North Market is a strong possibility, including a salty caramel ice cream sandwich from Jeni's (yesterday I had the orchid vanilla sandwich, which includes a marvelous layer of tart black currant filling). North Market reminds me of Faneuil Hall in Boston: you can just eat your way down it from one end to the other. You can get Indian, Vietnamese, Mediterranean, sushi, crepes (savory or sweet), fine chocolates, pastry, or gourmet ice cream. And those are just the places that caught my eye!

I don't think I'll be needing to spend a lot more time in the Knitter's Market, though. I covered it pretty well during last night's preview session. Unfortunately, it's a lot smaller this year. Last year, the exhibitors were split between two rooms, one of which was distinctly less desirable than the other. It wouldn't surprise me if a number of the exhibitors who were stuck in "the Cave" decided not to come back this year (I know that's the case for one of my favorite indie dyers). I did make a beeline for the Briar Rose booth, though, to snag a couple of skeins of limited edition teal merino/silk laceweight.

I'm going to see if I can doze a bit before breakfast and Cookie.

Road trip

I'm in a hotel room sipping on a hot beverage vaguely resembling coffee, waiting for registration to open at Knitter's Connection. I've got design classes with Ginger Luters all day: modules in the morning and short rows in the afternoon.

Although being solely responsible for the hotel bill is going to be grim, I'm enjoying having a room to myself. Since I have both a husband and a housemate at home, I don't get a lot of truly "alone time." And since I have some income to offset, at least the expense will be tax deductible.

It's been a long time since I took a car trip by myself, too. While it's awfully nice to ride in the passenger side and knit, it's also pretty cool to have sole control of the radio dial. And I get to decide when it's time for a Starbucks stop. Or whether to take a semi-gratuitous detour through the Dayton metro area. (I say only semi-gratuitous because I was looking for an office supply store. I successfully acquired a graph paper notebook and possibly the most fabulous set of colored pencils in the world, but it was too late in the day to get business cards printed.) This would have been more brief if I had remembered to pack our Ohio map.

My late departure, as well as my failure to get business cards printed, was due to a frenzy of mad knitting and proposal preparation for yesterday's submission deadline. I'm terribly proud of this project; it's a triumph of short row geometry. I wish I could post photos! If it doesn't get accepted this round, I've already got a Plan B.

It's almost eight o'clock, so I guess it's time to pack up my colored pencils, my modular beret, and my mystery short rowed object, and head over to registration.

Almost famous

My first interview is now available! Many thanks to math4knitters for the invitation (given that my own Ravname is named4wool, how could I resist?). Now you have the opportunity to hear me rattle on about the history and construction of Skew. (I'm still not sure I have the nerve to listen to myself.)

Easing into it

I've finally got successful modifications to add a bit more room to the back of the Skew ankle (at the top of the heel). A lot of people have said (and this is my experience) that their Skews are comfortable once on, but hard to wiggle into. That's because the band at the back of the heel is biased with respect to the main sock fabric.

So here's what I did: On the 13th and 25th rounds after beginning the ankle gusset, I worked short rows 8 stitches long over the ankle band. (That's 4 stitches on either side of the second ankle marker for the left sock, but on either side of the first ankle marker for the right sock.) You can use any gap-closing method you like; I chose the Japanese method. This photo shows the heel of the left sock (toe is pointing upwards); can you find the short rows from the 13th round? I can, but they're pretty subtle in the handpainted yarn (Kitchen Sink Dyeworks Merino Fine, BTW).

Do be careful to make a conscious choice about increasing on the knit-side short rows. I only increased on the first pass (before the first turn, but not right after both turns) to keep the stitch counts correct. If you increase both before turning and after both turns, you will add one stitch to the back of the leg and one stitch to the heel per pair of short rows.

Oh, and I'll hide a little bit of exciting (to me, anyway) news at the end of this post: I've just received a test knitter's review of my next pattern! I expect to have it ready for publication no later than early April.