A Bluestocking Knits

Thoughts on the Primavera Socks

Crumbs, it's been a while.  I keep thinking, "dear oh dear, I really should post -- I even have a few actually-finished knits!" and then, alas, nothing.  I thought that once both of the girls were in school all day, I would have loads of time, but it seems to be quite the opposite. 

But here are some Primavera Socks by Natalja of s(t)ockinette.  This pattern has apparently been around for a while, but was new to me when I saw it this past spring -- can't remember where now, unfortunately.

I like these socks very much.  It's a nice pattern, simple but just enough interest to keep it from being a dull knit, and the results are very pretty.  You can hardly ask for more from a pattern, really.  (I should have gone with my instincts, though, and made my usual generous toe.  The one as written is too slender for my extra-wide feet.)

I didn't care much for knitting with the ProNatura, as it was quite splitty, but now that it's done -- and worn several times -- I put that pleasantly behind me.

Love the acanthus-like bas-relief effect --

Changeable

I can't seem to sit still these days.  The weather is cold one day, springlike the next, alternately rainy and grim, humid, windy, or blazingly hot, and my spring knitting careens back and forth nearly as wildly.

Garter Heel Sock, from the Vogue sock book -- I didn't like the garter top much, so made it a 3x1 rib, lined up with the pattern on the leg because it amused me.  Am feeling somewhat indifferent about this sock, and I am not entirely sure why.

Primavera.  Was rather unsure of this when I started, but it's growing on me.  Do not be alarmed by its scrongy appearance.  It is quite stretchy, despite being basically a 7x4 rib, and I find myself more dismayed by the splittiness of the Trekking Pro Natura than I am by the pattern itself.

Ahem.  This was the Friday Harbor socks from Knitting on the Road, three times.  I really liked the wool, the cuff pattern, the way the wool looked in the cuff pattern -- but the first time it was so small that I couldn't get it over my instep, the second time with an added repeat still so tight that it stretched the stitches mercilessly, the third time with yet another repeat far too big.  My only consolation is what a pleasure it is to wind this stuff into a ball.

I've got my nose in a book more often these days, instead of knitting, it seems.  Have recently finished chain-reading another string of Joanna Trollope novels, wh. I enjoy very much.  It struck me recently, finding my copy of the Persephone edition of Wise Virgins where I had subconciously kicked it under the bed, that even though I don't always like all of the characters in Trollope's novels, I am interested in what happens to them.  I found myself wrenched out of WV more often than not, because Woolf was so cuttingly judgemental about the characters that he obviously didn't like, that I felt myself curiously defensive on their behalf.  Very dislocating, defending characters against their own author.  Am thinking now of rereading some D.E. Stevenson, or I might try something new, an Elizabeth Taylor ....

Spring Fling

I was in Redlands the other day, and stopped by The Yarn Deli, as I'd never been there before and heard good things about it.  Honestly, I only meant to get a skein or two of sock yarn, but they were so scrumptious that I came away with four.

It's a nice shop, small so it has a limited selection but of some very pretty stuff.

Pagewood Farm's Denali superwash merino/nylon in New Horizon.  I couldn't quite get an accurate photo of the color -- it's more purple than this, but with a hint of grey/black

Trekking Pro Natura wool and bamboo blend, in 1544, a pretty dusty-rose.

Chameleon Colorworks Bambino superwash merino/bamboo/nylon blend, in Viridian.

The lady in the shop offered to wind up the skeins for me, but I confessed that I like the feel of it in my hands.  She laughed and said that she never came between a knitter and her wool.

Malabrigo superwash merino in Abril.  I confess that this last is the one that is sitting in my lap as I write, this cold spring day, so that I can caress it and every so often brush it against my cheek and inhale deeply the lovely woolly scent....

Thoughts on the Spey Valley Socks

I finished these Spey Valley Socks from Nancy Bush's Knitting on the Road quite some time ago, and am afraid that I am only now getting around to posting them.  I quite enjoyed knitting them -- the exciting bits at the top, and then settling down with the wide, comfortable rib for the rest.

The Regia 4-fädig is sturdy and unsensational, but a good match, I think, for these no-nonsense socks. I've worn then quite a number of times already.

Catching Up

Good heavens, I'd almost forgotten how to log in to TypePad!

So what have I been doing, you ask, these long months?  Very little knitting, I'm afraid -- two pairs of socks finished, one of which was actually started in January.  Now I am plugging away at half-finished projects, a row at a time, apparently -- Vintage Velvet (wh. for some reason leaves me quite indifferent lately), a Muriwai Bathmat, a Harry Potter scarf in the Ravenclaw colors, not counting the projects that I found under the sofa cushions and stuffed back with a shudder.  I am, however, chain-reading fiction, racing through Joanna Trollope (loved The Men and the Girls), Anita Brookner (until I froze from the chilliness), Kristin Lavransdatter in the Tiina Nunnally translation (miles better than the old one, remind me to expound on this some time), and so many others that suited my fervid fancy at the time that my mind begins to boggle.  I suppose I don't need to explain that I now have two children in school all day.

The Father-in-Law socks, finished at last, during the Summer Olympics.  I was so excited by Michael Phelps' races that despite working exactly the same number of rows on the second sock, it came out noticeably smaller than the first. 

This is Jitterbug in "Blue Parrot" -- a quite apt name, I think.  Vivid isn't in it.  The socks are presently residing in Laura's sock drawer until cooler weather.  And still unmodelled.

We went camping at Lake Tahoe at the end of August with a passle of cousins.  They had just taken the kids down to the beach when we had our first visitor.  This was the baby bear -- mama came back in the middle of the night to rattle the Dumpster.  I actually did not know that a Dumpster could be so very loud.

Am also deep into choir rehearsals, what with our first concert of the season at the end of October.  We are doing, among other things, Benjamin Britten's "Hymn to St. Cecilia" with the small choir, and Monteverdi's "Beatus Vir" and Charles Ives' "Psalm 90" with the big group.  The Britten is lovely and strange, set to a poem by W.H. Auden, and the Monteverdi is just as wonderful as the first time I sang it years ago, and doubtless as wonderful as it was in 1630.  The Ives is seriously weird -- if you don't believe me, look at this --

Why the sopranos got off so easily, I don't know.  Man, that's a lot of notes.  And no help from the orchestra, either.

Tone clusters, Blue Parrots -- I'm seeing an unexpected connection, here, all of a sudden ....

Aktion 0195

Finished, thanks to a couple of extra rehearsals of the Bach "St. John Passion".  The wool is one of the limited runs of Lang Jawoll Aktion -- this one is last August's, apparently, color 132.0195.

I worked them rather longer than usual, and still had quite a lot of wool left over.  They softened up nicely in the wash, too.

I love the little spool of reinforcing thread that came tucked inside the ball.  I didn't use it, though, not sure why, maybe I just forgot.

I had to start the second sock three times, to get the colors to match with the first one -- but by golly, it worked!

Pathétique

Well, this is my sorry output since Christmas.  Not very impressive, is it! but at least it does sound better in French.  So this is part of the leg of the first father-in-law sock, and even less of one for myself when I found some Jawoll Aktion at the local craft store -- who frequently surprise me, because, to be honest, most of what they have is eyelash yarn.

Sigh.

Fruit Coulis

Some knee socks for Julia, Jitterbug in "Fruit Coulis", with a K3, P1, K1, P1 rib, offset by three at the cuff, as in the Yarrow Ribbed Socks from Knitting Vintage Socks, but with a standard slip stitch heel and wedge toe.

The color is even more vivid in real life, I assure you.

I have been listening to a new album of mine, "Le Jour du Poisson" by Thomas Fersen.  He has a song each on two of the French Putomayo albums, "French Playground" and "Paris", both of which albums we listen to quite a lot -- this is how I heard of him.  I find his music fascinating -- melodic and quirky, intelligently crafted, with each song having a character completely its own and yet still recognizably "Fersen".  One song has a klezmer-y feel, another salsa, one a rather thrilling tango, one a lovely lilting piano and orchestra accompaniment that makes it almost a lullaby, another has a rather formal brass band intro and then sweeps in with an unexpectedly charming lounge-singer feel.  Fersen's voice is rough and smoky -- very Gauloise.  I suspect that Fersen's music might bear comparisons to Tim Finn's, also quirky, melodic, and highly intelligent.  Alas, that I do not speak French! for I am somewhat dismayed that I understand very little of Fersen's lyrics -- one of the things I appreciate deeply about Tim Finn is that his lyrics are so interesting (and they rhyme, always for me a sign that the writer has given a lot of thought to what he wants to say) -- but this is certainly my own limitation, and not Fersen's!

Now is the Caroling Season

I'm in the middle of a long week-end of concerts -- well, two, to be honest, but we usually do only one! and so it feels rather intense.  This year we are singing, in addition to some of the wonderful carols from the first volume of "Carols for Choirs", the "Gloria" by Francis Poulenc.  I wasn't so sure about this piece when we sang it some years ago, but it's growing on me.  I'm a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to church music -- sometimes, the more ancient it is, the better!  Well, that's a sweeping generalization, but modern stuff usually leaves me rather cold.  But after six or eight weeks of rehearsals, the Poulenc has gotten fun to sing -- difficult, though, not like, say "Messiah", which is not only possibly my favorite piece ever to sing, out of a very extensive field, but wonderfully sensible.  The Poulenc has some very strange leaps and progressions that puzzle when you are picking them out on the piano, but come together in a surprisingly cinematic way.  In fact, I find myself humming snatches of it and "scoring" movies in my head -- one theme in the "Agnus Dei" sounds rather like a 1930s horror movie, frightening and poignant at the same time, the "Domine Deus Unigenite" is quite rollicking, even "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers", and the last movement, with its dreamy "tu solus altissimus," seems to belong in a bittersweet 1960s French romance, all rainy umbrellas and Parisian melancholy.

We also have unusually early calls this year -- had almost an hour this afternoon between the end of rehearsal and the beginning of the concert -- and so I've gotten quite far on the second Spey Valley sock, almost down to the heel already ....

Thoughts on the Fuzzyfeet

What have I been doing all this month, you ask?  Knitting?  Ha!  I have been driving small children hither and yon -- tonight I am up late waiting to go and collect my mouse/little angel/Gingerette from Dress Rehearsal #1.

Well, I have managed to winkle out of my free minute-and-a-half this month a pair of the famous Fuzzyfeet by Theresa Stenersen of Bagatell, though.  These were going to be a Christmas present, but I've sort of, well, redirected them a bit.  Here are the before and after photos, with the first half of a pair of Spey Valley socks for scale.

Zoinks!  I washed them on my front-loader's warm-cold setting but did not "stop when the desired size" as I wanted them to be easy-care, and I personally am not about the hand-washing of the socks, and don't want to mess around with running out to the machine every two minutes, so I doubted that auntie would be either.  They shrank much more than expected, unfortunately.  I don't mind much, though -- it was an experiment, after all.  The felted fabric is rather fascinating -- wonderful, how all of the wobbly bits just sort of disappear, too!

I did have to break into the second skein to finish the last two inches, so Fuzzyfeet knitters, take heed.

Alas, they are now far too small for auntie, and so they have been glommed onto by Laura, who is quite taken with them.  She was, however, quite mortified when I asked her to step out onto the front porch this morning to model them in the only available light, and she shrieked mightily.  "Mom! I'm still in my pyjamas!"  So the photo is a bit rushed.

Still, the Fuzzies are warm and much as the name implies, and Julia is already casting not-so-subtle hints about a pair for her as well.

Oh, there's my warning bell -- off I go --