Seaming Made Simple

 Knitting Related, teaching  No Responses »
Apr 272013
 

On Saturday, May 25, I’ll be teaching a class at Penelope Craft in Amsterdam – Seaming Made Simple.  If you’d like to learn everything you need to know about successfully putting your sweaters together, beautifully, be sure to sign up!

It’s a 3 hour class which will be mostly hands on practice.  You’ll have to make some swatches ahead of time, so be sure to ask about homework!

You can sign up at Penelope Craft, Kerkstraat 117, Amsterdam or on their web site.

There are a lot of other great classes planned for this summer.  Here’s the first few months’ schedule.

I’m also teaching Sock Design Studio on June 8th.  In this class you’ll learn how to make socks fit YOU, how to design your own socks using your favorite stitch pattern, and how to design socks for others.  What things do you need to take into account when designing socks?  Do’s and don’ts.  Hints and tips.  It’s going to be amazing.  I’m VERY excited about it.

Hope to see you there!

Dyeing Day

 crafts  No Responses »
Apr 132013
 

On Wednesday G. came over and we did some dyeing.  I did yarn, G. did fabric.  I did indigo and she did cooking pots of madder and weld.  Above are the results of my first ever indigo dyeing.

Left to right: 2x 100% merino wool, sport weight, 2 dips; same yarn that was previous dyed with weld (nearly 3 years ago!) and over dyed with 1 dip in indigo; 2x Cascade undyed sock yarn, superwash; 2x 100% silk lace weight.  I was really curious how the different yarns would dye differently.  It’s true what everyone says, superwash yarn takes up dye, even natural dyes, much faster and deeper than non-superwash yarn.  The silk came out beautiful too!

I started out in the morning making a jar of indigo powder, an alkali and a reducing agent, which turned it from blue to a greeny-brown.

Then I filled a plastic tub with hot water and more of the same chemicals.  Then gently dipped the glass jar into the tub, without disturbing it, and poured the contents into the tub under the water.  All of that was to avoid getting any oxygen into the mixture.

It smelled foul and looked green.  Perfect!

Meanwhile G. was busy mordanting fabric and stirring up her pots of color on the stove.

Then I started dipping my yarns, sliding them in and out of the tub gently, watching the magic of the green yarn turning blue before my eyes as it hit the oxygen in the air.  Presto!  In no time I had this:

I then dug into my bag and pulled out a skein of yellow wool that I had dyed almost 3 years ago.  Funny, that day was also with G., dyeing in my back garden.  I decided to take that skein and throw it into the indigo and see what kind of green I would get.  Not bad actually.

Here’s my yarn after a second dip and with the newly green skein.  G. is in the background showing off her bright red madder fabric.

And here are some of G.’s results.

It was such a fun day!  I love this stuff.  I love the chemistry and the mystery and the magic of dyeing.  I can’t wait to do it again.

And that might come sooner rather than later.  My indigo vat is now blue, which means it still has indigo in it, but has become oxygenated.  I need to put some chemicals in it again and it should turn green again and be ready to dye some more.  I think I’d like to try some simple tie-dyeing on t-shirts.  Why not?  Isn’t that back in fashion?

Healing

 Amsterdam, food, Health, Knitting Related  1 Response »
Apr 072013
 

I had a very nice Saturday, day 10 after The Fall.  In the morning I made the above Flourless Chocolate and Pear Cake.  I followed the recipe exactly and it came out perfect.  You can’t really tell from the photo, but there are big chunks of pear in there.  And no flour!  I highly recommend this recipe.  The only thing I did differently was to add the chocolate fondant on top.  Had to.

After making the cake, DB and I went to Amsterdam.  I had to see how tired the trip would make me and how confident I would be to do it on my own this coming week in order to get back to work.  AND it was the grand opening of Penelope Craft‘s new location at Kerkstraat 117, Amsterdam.  There would be cupcakes! And yarn! And knitters!  I had to make the effort to go.

We went by bus, then train, then tram, then a two block walk to the shop.  I didn’t even think about taking photos at the shop, which goes to show how tired and spaced out I was.  I sat and knit with friends and pet some yarn and picked up a couple of skeins of super giant fat yarn to make demo materials for the class I’m going to be teaching there.  It was lovely to be out and with my peeps.

When we got home I kind of collapsed on the couch, fell asleep for a while and was woken up to the delicious smells of DB’s spaghetti.  We then spent the evening watching episodes of Justified, season 4.

All in all, a great day.

All the Colors of the Rainbow

 Health  3 Responses »
Apr 042013
 

That’s what my physical therapist said to me yesterday afternoon – “you have all the colors of the rainbow”.  He was talking about my backside.  Purple, blue, almost black, yellow and a kind of sickly green, covering my left butt, heading up my back and down my left leg.  I’m so tempted to post a photo here, but honestly, putting a photo of my ass on the internet is going just too far.

Exactly one week ago, Thursday morning before going out to work, I fell from the top step to the bottom landing near the front door.  Remember these lovely newly painted stairs?  Those.  The ones that look long and steep.  As Sheldon Cooper said, “Ah gravity, thou art a heartless bitch”.

To add insult to injury (literally), I ended up getting TWO trips to the hospital in an ambulance and spending the night there for observation.  The first trip was after the fall (I managed to crawl to where my mobile phone was and call for help), strapped onto a gurney as if my back was broken and I really thought my hip or back WAS broken.  Turns out nothing was broken and DB and I came home in a taxi.  The second trip was later that night after I tried to stand up and passed out several times.  DB called the night doctor, who came and found I had very low blood pressure and a bruise and swelling bigger than she’d ever seen before (and she was no spring chicken either).  The ambulance guys tried to get me to walk to the ambulance but eventually had to throw me onto the gurney like a sack of potatoes (so says DB, I was OUT) because I just couldn’t stay conscious while upright.  Sheesh.

I was better the next morning and came home and have been busy healing since.  Yesterday was my first venture outside since falling so the Fysio didn’t even get to see the swelling at its worse.  It’s getting better.  Every day I can move a little more.  The coloring is busy moving down my leg and up my back.  A friend said it reminded her of when her grandmother fell out of a moving car.  Yes, I sent her a photo of my ass.  I do have some good friends, and very close family, that have been privy to my privates.  At least the black and blue parts.

You’d think in this condition I could console myself with knitting.  Wrong.  Until Monday I couldn’t find a position comfortable enough that allowed knitting.  I was mostly laying on my right side.  The last couple of days I’ve been able to sit long enough to do something entertaining.  I finished re-knitting the neckline of a sweater that I’m designing.  I’ve started “teaching socks” for a class I’m going to be teaching.  I’ve knit a few rows of a beautiful brioche shawl.  Luckily I had already finished, and given, the baby blanket I was working on.  I’ll get photos posted here in the next day or two of that project.

For now, I’m trying to keep moving, keep taking pain pills, keep getting over this stupid accident.  Last night I woke with a start from dreaming the fall again.  I hate that.  I hope it stops soon.  Also for now I’m going up and down the stairs in bare feet – no more slippery slippers on my feet.  And this weekend we are planning to get some anti-slip stuff to put on the stairs.  More photos to come!

 

Preparations

 Knitting Related  No Responses »
Mar 272013
 

I’ve been signed up to teach a couple of classes in May and June and preparations have already begun!  I won’t say much about the classes yet because they have not yet been announced and I think it’s only right if the shop owner announces them first.  I will only say that, as the photo above hints at, one class involves socks.  I’ve started on the demo socks already.

See those shiny new needles sitting on my laptop?  Those are my brand spanking new ChiaoGoo circular needles.  I have been using KnitPro wooden needles for sock knitting for the past several years but they are just too fragile.  They break easily.  I totally gave up using their 2mm size because they would break if I looked cross-eyed at them.  I had searched Ravelry for needle recommendations and decided to give these a try.

Since the above photo was taken, I’ve knit about half a sock with these 2.25mm needles.  So far I like them a lot.  What I like the most are the very pointy tips.  In fact, I LOVE the pointy tips.  They make knitting with small sock yarn so much easier!  Also, the metal has just the right amount of slip – not too much – just right.  The one thing I’m having to get used to is the cable.  The lovely red cable is actually plastic covered metal.  You can see the metal inside through the clear plastic coating.  They are stiffer than I’m used to.  The stiffness is not causing me any problems with knitting, it’s just something to get used to.  So far though, I really recommend them.

I also recently got a set of HiyaHiya SHARPS interchangeable needles.  I got the SMALL 5″ set, which gives you needles from size 2US through 8US.  Honestly I rarely knit with sizes bigger than this so it seemed like a perfect set.  Again, I got these as a replacement for my KnitPro set that kept falling apart.  And also with these metal needles, so far I love them!  The tips are nice and sharp, the metal has a very nice feel to it and different from the ChiaGoo needles, the HiyaHiya’s have a thinner more flexible cable.

The HiyaHiya set was a Christmas present from DB, but I didn’t actually get them until the end of January!  They were stuck in customs all that time.  What a pain.  He ordered them from a shop in the U.S. because he didn’t find them in stock anywhere locally.  Are you listening local shops??

So, I’m going back to my teaching sock knitting.  And I’ll post more about the class once it is announced.  It’s going to be so fun!

Look What Came in the Mail Today!

 Knitting Related  1 Response »
Mar 132013
 

In order of appearance:  Madelinetosh 80/10/10 worsted weight in color Edison Bulb; Madelinetosh 80/10/10 worsted weight in color Sand Dune; Madelinetosh 80/10/10 fingering weight in color Spectrum.  The 80/10/10 is 80% merino superwash wool, 10% cashmere, 10% nylon.

It is really hard to capture the true color of this fabulous yarn.  It should be easier once it is knit up into something that is worn outside in daylight.  It was snowing this morning so no outdoor photos for me today!

The first of these to be used will be the Sand Dune and the Edison Bulb.  I’m designing a vest and will knit one in each of these colors plus another color, Terrarium – MT Vintage yarn.  I can’t wait to get started!

On the rest of the knitting front – I’ve finished the baby gift I’ve been knitting for a while but won’t post photos here until the parents have it in their hands.  Don’t want to spoil the surprise!

I’m also working away on my second worsted weight sweater in the 6-sweater series I’m designing.  I’m over half way done so should be finished and ready to look for test knitters just after Easter (first week of April time frame).  I think Andy will be finished with his manly version at the same time.

It’s been so cold here lately that everyone is 1) complaining and 2) still wearing lots of heavy hand knits.  I’m looking forward to warmer weather and cotton sweaters and lace shawls!

Winter in the Dunes

 Haarlem, nature  No Responses »
Mar 052013
 

Yes, it is still winter here.  I don’t even see buds on the trees in the dunes yet and since there aren’t any bulbs occurring naturally here, there are no little flowers popping up either.  There are, however, lots of interesting tree shapes.

These photos were taken Sunday while DB was running and I was walking in Zuid-Kennermerland National Park, just a short 10 minute drive from our house.  If you continue west through the dunes you end up at the beach, either Bloemendaal or Parnassia.

I saw several trees with bark rubbed or cut off.  How did this happen?  I think either humans or the Highlands Cattle that roam around here did this.  I can’t imagine why a human would have wanted to do this but I can imagine that a bovine with an itchy head and horns would do this.  Or maybe the deer with new antlers.

After about 40 minutes of wandering around, DB came running up.  These photos make it look like we had the whole dunes to ourselves. Not quite.  There were actually a lot of runners on Sunday.  It’s a popular place to walk and run, even on a grey, cold winter day.

A Quiet Weekend Ahead

 Health  1 Response »
Mar 022013
 

There are no photos in this blog post since they would just gross you out.

Yesterday, March 1st, a day that should be a happy turning towards Spring and new growth, was a day I spent in a dentist chair having old growth removed.  Who knew that you could have a badly infected tooth and not feel a thing?  Who knew that you could have jaw bone loss and not be any the wiser?

I went to the dentist 3 weeks ago for a routine checkup  and he found that one tooth that had an old root canal had become infected and needed to be pulled out.  He could tell this from an x-ray.  I felt nothing wrong at all.  He referred me to an “implantaloog”, Dutch for a dentist who specializes in implants.

(Digression:  I find it so amusing that the Dutch take foreign words and Dutch-ify them.  ”Implantaloog” is just hilarious to me.  A Dutch friend informs me that “implant” is a perfectly good Dutch word, but I don’t believe him.  I can’t find it in a Dutch dictionary.  I do find “implantaat”, which is the Dutch translation from the English “implant”.  So, I guess “implantaloog” comes from the Dutch “implantaat”.  Sometimes English and Dutch are so close that it’s hard to know which came first, the chicken or the egg. /end Digression)

Yesterday I went to this Implantaloog, whose name happens to be Quaak (seriously), and he pulled my tooth.  I really have to give you the gory details.  Turn away now if you are squeamish.  Despite the fact that this root was badly infected and was full of puss and smelled bad, the damn tooth was really hard to get out.  He cut it into 4 pieces and tried to get them out carefully so as not to damage the bone further.  I swear he stood on my jaw with a crowbar in his hands prying these pieces out.  Eventually he managed it and only once did a piece of something land back on my tongue requiring a diving expedition to grab it before I swallowed it.

Then he cleaned it out and decided to immediately do a bone graft.  I didn’t even think to ask where this bone came from.  I’ve read online that the bone is either from the patient themselves (I didn’t donate anything), or from a cadaver, or from an animal, or artificial.  Next week when I go back to get my stitches out I will definitely ask him what it was.  Not that it matters, I’m just curious.

So, yes, tooth out, hole cleaned, bone substrate inserted, stitched up closed, a wad of gauze placed on it and hold it tight til the bleeding stops.  Then to get home I took a tram, the metro, the train and finally a bus.  Yesterday afternoon I felt exhausted and beat up.

Luckily I have nothing planned for this weekend.  It’s cold and grey outside, which perfectly matches how I feel.  DB is taking care of shopping and cleaning and I only have to sit around healing and, yes you guessed it, knitting.  My jaw is throbbing but this doesn’t keep me from using my hands and my mind.

I’m going to work on a design proposal for Vogue Knitting.  All I can say is that it involves some lovely shetland yarns, 3-ply.  Maybe in another 9 months I’ll have something to show for it!

Oscar Weekend Recap

 Amsterdam, entertainment, Traditions  2 Responses »
Feb 262013
 

This last weekend was our 5th annual Parool Oscar Weekend.  You know, where you go to the Pathe de Munt movie theater at Muntplein in Amsterdam and sit for 2 full days watching back to back Oscar nominated movies.  I love it.

If you haven’t noticed, on the right side of this blog page I am now posting my Twitter feed.  During this weekend event I sent out tweets summarizing my movie review and giving each movie a score out of 10.  I’ll just expand on that a little bit here.  Warning, it’s full of spoiler alerts.  But then, you should already know how Lincoln and Argo end.

Saturday we started at 10:30am with Lincoln.  This is the movie that starred Daniel Day-Lewis, who won his 3rd Oscar as Best Actor.  I really enjoyed this movie.  It helps if you are raised in the U.S. and know a bit of the history and can relate to the story and the times.  It also helps if you are a native English speaker.  The language in the movie is not simple or easy but it is beautiful and thoughtful and lovely to listen to.  As a language lover, I really appreciated the care they used in recreating the sound of the times.  It is also so interesting to contrast politics of that era with politics of today.  In both cases it’s a dirty business.  But in both cases there is one party that is ignorant and wishes the country to remain ignorant.  What’s interesting is that those parties have switched titles over these 160-odd years.  I highly recommend the film and gave it a 9/10.

Next, with a 30 minute break in between we saw Beasts of the Southern Wild.  I really didn’t know what to expect of this movie.  The main character is a 6 or 7 year old girl who lives with her father and a few scrappy characters in a swampy island that has been abandoned by the government and society.  They are all a bit wacko.  When a big storm comes most of them leave but not the most crazy ones and this girl must stay with her father.  They end up at the end in a shelter, but then escape, and go back to the swamp where he father dies of some disease.  Some parts of the movie were touching.  Some parts were just more of the same.  It wasn’t my kind of movie really.  It went no where and didn’t seem to have a place it should go.  I gave it a 6/10.

Finally Saturday we saw Argo, yet another historical fact/fiction movie about getting Iran hostages out of Iran.  This movie was so suspenseful, even though you know how it’s going to end, that it had my stomach in knots.  The acting was good and I have to say that Ben Affleck really outdid himself as actor and director both.  And he doesn’t look half bad in a beard.  It did remind me of All the President’s Men in look and feel, which is not a bad thing.  I can see how it won best picture as everything was so real you lost sight of which parts were historical film reels and which was recent movie making.  I gave it 8/10.  It’s as well made as Lincoln, but there was something beautiful about Lincoln that got it the extra point for me.

And that’s all we saw Saturday.  We had a concert to go to in Paradiso that night so cut it short at 6pm and only 3 movies seen.  But we were back at it Sunday morning at 10:30 again!

We started Sunday morning with The Master.  After reading the synopsis I was looking forward to seeing this movie.  The first 30 minutes had me sucked in and I was really intrigued.  And then it just droned on and on and on making the same points over and over and over again.  Finally we end up in England for no apparent reason.  The movie should have been 20 minutes shorter, or found something else unique to say.  Having said all that, Joaquin Phoenix was exceptional in the lead role.  Now this is acting folks, every bit as good as Daniel Day-Lewis.  Too bad the movie was such a let down.  I gave it a 6/10.

Next up: Prometheus.  Seriously?  Yes, seriously.  And seriously bad.  This is the pre-quel to Alien and poor Ridley Scott just can’t let it go.  This movie was nominated for visual effects and that, folks, is ALL it had going for it.  Laughable science, deadly predictable script.  The very best part was the very last scene, which ties this movie to Alien.  That’s it.  About 20 seconds.  5/10.

Movie 3 on Sunday was Django Unchained.  Some people don’t appreciate Quentin Tarantino’s movies or his point of view or his humor, but I’m a fan.  Maybe you have to be a fan to be excited about seeing this movie.  I think it’s his best in years.  It was clever, funny, punchy, bloody, and never ever dull.  Jamie Foxx is perfect in the lead and Christofer Waltz won best supporting actor as the German bounty hunter.  If you like dark humor you have to go see this movie.  8/10.  Oh, one thing, here’s a tip Quentin: don’t act in your own movies.  It ain’t your forte son.

Finally, the last film for Sunday was Silver Linings Playbook.  It’s your typical dysfunctional feel good movie.  Screwed up boy meets screwed up girl, lots of screwed up stuff happens and finally they get together.  That’s the plot.  That’s it.  What makes it so entertaining are the actors and the stuff that is just crazy enough to be real and just real enough to be crazy.  You can see these people living next door to you.  You feel for them.  You root for them.  You want them to be happy.  When such a simple plot can do that to you then it’s a highly successful movie.  8/10.  Go see it.  Everyone should laugh and smile at the movies now and then.

And that’s it!  Last year we saw NINE movies, this year only 7.  Next year I’m aiming for 9 again.  I can’t wait.

More Mandy’s Heart Sweaters

 Knitting Related  No Responses »
Feb 222013
 

This past Monday night at de Jaren, C. and C. brought/wore their Mandy’s Heart sweaters.  The red one was made for C.’s daughter.  Aren’t they lovely?

The light in de Jaren is just AWFUL for photos (and for knitting too).  I did my best with photoshop to improve the light and color.  They both seem very happy with their new sweaters, and you can’t ask for more than that!

I’m busy working on the next sweater design, which will be perfect for a beginning sweater knitter.  Andy is also knitting a sample sweater for me.  I’m about half finished with mine so I hope to get test knitters started in another month.  There’s also another new project that is 2/3 finished which I NEED to finish in the next 3 weeks.  That’s a lot of knitting to get done soon!

But at the same time I’m itching to start something small and new.  I really want to make another pair of Mandy’s Heart socks in a bright shocking pink and it’s taking all my willpower to hold back and finish these other 2 projects first.  I used to be such a monogamous knitter too!  Looks what’s happened to me!

Oh, one other bit of knitting news – I’ve started using my new HiyaHiya sharps, interchangeables, 5″, and I LOVE them!  I swear I’m knitting faster with them.  They feel great in my hands, nice and light and the finish on the metal has just the perfect amount of slip.  I think I’ll post a more extensive review of them in a few weeks when I’ve had a chance to work with them some more.

Happy Knitting everyone!

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