By: pamgrushkin
Uncategorized

New England Springtime Fashions

Cornelia and I traded colloquialisms before we got down to the business of knitting. It was 49 degrees, cold, and rainy this morning.  I  mean really, really cold. I knew it was a cold night last night because my dog wanted to sleep under the covers.  Cornelia told me the origin of the expression “three dog night”. It’s an Australian expression. On really cold nights, three dogs were called into the bed to keep the owner from freezing to death.

I wanted to share the origin of hushpuppies, which I had just learned the night before but she knew it already. Hushpuppies (for those of you not “in the know”) are deep fried balls of cornmeal batter. This expression goes back to the 1800’s in the Southern United States. To quiet barking dogs, people would throw the cornmeal balls to them and say “hush puppies”. I love learning the origins of expressions.

Given our freakishly cold day, Cornelia had the opportunity to wear her Confidence Pullover.  She never thought she would be wearing her sweater until the fall.  Knitting this sweater was a great experience for her. She loved the sweater from the moment she saw the sample.  The details fell into place – loved the color, the yarn, the sleeve length.  The pattern was easy to understand.  Finally, having it professionally finished made it all come together.

She is enjoying working her customfit sweater.  When she reached a particular row count all the stars were in alignment.  The number of rows she completed = the number of inches completed = number of rows worked since last decrease.

Allison was wearing two finished knits, her Hitchhiker and Susie’s Reading Mitts. Hitchhiker was knit with one skein of Madelinetosh Pashmina (Sport: 75% Merino, 15% Silk, 10% Cashmere, 360 yards). Susie’s reading mitts were knit with Rowan Lima (Worsted: 84% Alpaca, 8% Merino, 8% Nylon, 160 yards).

She was well into her Burberry cowl knit with Tahki Zona (Aran: 35% Cotton, 28% Wool, 26% Acrylic, 11% Nylon, 119 yards). She started it over Memorial Day weekend, it was a good car project.

Allison is back on track with Customfit sweater knit with Skacel Kid Paillettes (Lace: 42% Mohair, 40% Polyester, 18% Silk, 136 yards) . She was originally knitting both fronts at the same time.  That wasn’t working for her. It was hard enough to follow one side, let alone two. I agree with her, as much as it is convenient to work them at the same time, I find I skip decreases.

She wanted another mindless project, she discovered the Yowza Weigh It Shawl 4 on Ravelry knit in Yowza Whattaskein reckless colorway (Worsted: 100% Merino, 560 yards).

I was working on an Entrelac pillow in Noro Kureyon (Aran: 100% wool, 110 yards), for the store. I think the long color repeat will really look beautiful.  I was merrily knitting along when I came to a knot. The knot broke up the color repeat.  

I wound off the skein until I found the same part of the color repeat. Since Kureyon is 100% wool, I was able to work a felted join/spit splice which minimized the number of ends to weave in.


Karine was ready to bind off the sleeve cuffs on her Pride and Prejudice sweater.  She tried Jeny’s surprisingly stretchy bind off and didn’t like how it looked (she had used Jeny’s surprisingly stretchy cast on). We tried three more bind offs until finding one that worked.  The book we used as a resource was Cast On, Bind Off by Cap Sease.  

As for today’s weather, remember the New England, “If you don’t like the weather, stick around and it will change.