And today's lesson about charitable knitting is...

So there are all these nice ladies in a U.K. knitting group who were "tired of knitting scarves," as one of them said, so they came up with this brilliant idea: Let's knit an entire play village and donate it to a children's hospital for the kids to play with!

What they came up with is beautiful. What small child wouldn't love to play with this?

Skillfully done, knitted in wools with cardboard and stuffing to support the dimensional pieces.

Except... the hospital can't accept it. They're dealing with some pretty sick kids, and all of the toys need to be sterilized before kids play with them to prevent germs from spreading.

There's been some howling about this over on Ravelry: all that beautiful work, how dare the hospital turn them down! But there's also been some rational response, and this is the main message:

Before starting a charitable knitting/crochet/weaving/sewing project, check with the recipient to see what their needs are.

If you're hankering to knit preemie caps, call up the NICU at your local hospital and find out what materials to use and if they need caps. Some hospitals want only acrylic, some autoclave their preemie gear and want NO acrylic because it melts in the autoclave. Also, preemie caps are a popular charitable project, so they may not need caps at the moment. Is it chemo caps you want to make? Check also for fiber requirements, and ask people with experience about suitable yarns to use. Blanket squares? Check that the charity wants squares and has people to assemble them, or if they'd rather have finished blankets. Hats for the homeless? Maybe they want hand-knit hats, maybe they'd rather have large packs of store-bought socks. Afghans for Afghans specifically states that they want only items made with animal fibers for warmth, and only items for their specific campaigns, yet they still get shipments of acrylic garments and used clothing that are completely unsuitable for their work.

Never, never assume that because you put all the work into a handmade project that the recipient will be overjoyed to receive it just because it's handmade by you. This goes for gifts, too. Make sure you know the recipient's tastes before casting on.

Here's an article on the toy farm project: Miniature woollen village knitted by WI members for sick children branded a health hazard.

Happy 2013

Three days into the new year, but here I am to say Happy New Year, and Happy New Knitting, everyone! It's a fresh, clean new year, right out of the package, still crisp around the edges. What shall we do with it? Something wonderful, perhaps?

I keep putting off updating the blogs because I got behind in FOs and other things to post, and thinking I'd have to get this updated before that -- well, never mind. Time to let it all go and start afresh.

Toward the idea of happy beginings, I started a new group on Ravelry. I've used the book The How of Happiness for a while for my own benefit. I've battled chronic depression for years, starting when I was a child and didn't know that my sadness was depression, or that being sad a lot was an unusual thing. The book has twelve research-supported "activities" for increasing happiness and well-being. Not in the "OMG I'm so happy ALL THE TIME!!!"kind of happiness. More what Thomas Jefferson meant when he wrote about "...life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," in the Declaration of Independence. A life well-lived. A satisfying life.

But working through the book alone wasn't getting me as far as I wanted. I was trying focus on one chapter a month, and I kept petering out around August. I thought if I did it with others, maybe I'd stay on track, and we could help boost each other up. So toward that end I started The How of Happiness Ravelry group. If you're interested in boosting life quality, or are being treated for depression and want to use the book in addition to your treatment, or just curious, come and check it out.

Taking a stand against the war on women's rights

Today, across the nation, people gathered at rallies to support a resistance to the political attacks on women and women's rights -- health care, equal pay, voting rights, and more -- organized by UniteWomen.org. Here at Oregon's capital city, folks gathered on the Capitol steps to make their voices heard. I got about two inches of sock knitted in the few hours I was there.

The crowd was small, in the hundreds, but enthusiastic:

I found a nice seat in the shade with my sign (thanks to Marty Davis for the picture posted on the local site's Facebook page). I had my knitting with me, too, not visible in this pic.

 Here's what I wrote on the back:

 There were signs with pointed messages, like these:

And this, which pretty much sums up the feelings of the folks gathered there:

And these:

The Raging Grannies from Portland came and sang hilarious protest songs. Anyone remember protest songs? What ever happened to protest songs?

Dancers from a mission that rescues young women from street life were there:

More raging grannies, these from Corvallis:

More signs:

And more:

State Troopers were on hand for riot control... well... not so much. We're pretty civilized around here.

This slogan is carved into the front of the Capitol building, right behind where the rally was taking place. I wonder how many of the legislators who make laws in this building abide by this?

It doesn't end there, of course. I'm appalled that we're re-fighting the battles for voting rights and equal rights for women. I'm appalled that anyone thinks there's no need for feminism, "because women can vote and have jobs," as one online critic of feminism whined. I'm appalled that no one from the media, even the local newspaper located just a few blocks away, was visibly present in spite of press releases that went out.

I'm heartened by all the women of all ages who showed up, particularly young women, when five years ago or so I was hearing young women in college, on the brink of a career, saying, "Oh, I'm not a feminist," in a tone that suggested it was a dirty word, that "feminist" means angry, ugly, bra-burning, man-hating creatures instead of rational beings who believe that women should have equal pay for those careers that these young women were going into and equal opportunities, such as going to college in the first place. I'm heartened that the apathy I saw during the Iraq war is changing to, "We've got to do something about this."

We just need to say it louder.

A public service announcement: Kiva.org

Hey, do y'all know about Kiva.org? They're the microloan site that helps back small loans to small businesses in developing nations. Anyone can be a Kiva lender with just $25. As a lender you earn no interest and take all the risk, so it keeps costs very low and affordable for people trying to make a dignified living in some pretty trying circumstances.

Right now Kiva is giving away free $25 trial accounts. The founder of LinkedIn donated $1 to fund the accounts, and they're going fast. If you'd like to try being a Kiva lender, click the link and it will take you to the sign-up page.

In the five or six years I've had my Kiva account I've made 56 loans so far and had only two borrowers default. Both were women in Kenya who had to flee their homes during violent uprisings. I've been focusing on single moms and widows, since lone women tend to be most vulnerable in developing nations. But there are a wide range of borrowers to choose from.

Knitting blogs, post-SOPA/PIPA

Hey, did you see this gorgeous new sweater on Knitty.com? Here's a linked image:

Oh, and did you see that wonderful cable design in the new afghan from DROPS? Here's a detail:

The cats were particularly adorable today, so adorable I captioned the photo and posted it on the I Can Has Cheeseburger site. Cute, huh?

And I finally finished that Alice Starmore aran sweater that took forEVER! Here's my own photo of my own rendition of Starmore's gorgeous design:

There you have it, blogging post-SOPA/PIPA. The idea was good -- stop internet piracy -- but the actual documents only hand control of the internet over to corporate interests. Readers in the U.S., please write to your senators and representatives to oppose these two bills. The internet is still the one form of media not entirely under corporate control -- yet.

Do you want "fair and balanced?" Okay. Here's a short video from YouTube titled "Why you SHOULD support SOPA/PIPA." Give it a click. I think you'll like it.

The Ghost of Christmas Crafting Past

We have a pretty fair collection of Christmas ornaments. Not anything like the collection my parents had, since my Dad liked to hit the drug stores after Christmas and see what ornaments were on sale. If we'd used all the ornaments collected over the years, we would have had to put up three or four trees. Well... we did live on a Christmas tree farm so that wouldn't have been entirely out of the question. But we didn't.

Still, my collection would cover large tree as thickly as any gift shop display. Since we put up small tress these days — less for the cats to knock over, though they haven't done so yet — I only get out some of the ornaments and leave others. Some I've bought. I adore old-fashioned shiny glass ornaments in all kinds of shapes and figures. Some I've made. So, in a crafty theme, here are a few of my handmade ornaments and the stories behind them.

Starting with:

I wanted some gold shine on the tree one year, maybe ten or fifteen years ago, and saw some pretty gold lamé ornaments. Thinking I could make some myself, I found some gold fabric. The only kind I could find was quilted, so I used it to make quilted stars and crescent moons.

This snowman:

And this tree:

began life only a few years ago as plain glass ornaments from the craft store for decorating. I used window sticker paints to paint them up all pretty.

This little critter peeing out of a stocking:

is made of polymer clay. I have a pattern for this in felt, but thought I could make something smaller and shinier from polymer clay. I rolled the red and the white very thin to make the stocking, and inserted a wire loop between the white border and the red for a hanging loop. Miss Mousie is dimensionally modeled in brown clay with pink in her ears and bright beady black eyes, accented with white. Some tubes of sparkle glue made the adornments, and the whole thing was coated with acrylic floor wax and baked for a hard, shiny finish.

Going back in time to my cross-stitching days over twenty years ago:

What's it say? It says "Merry Christmas" in Czechoslovakian. I made it for my grandmother, whose parents immigrated from Bohemia when Bohemia was still a country of its own, back when Queen Victoria was sitting unamused on the throne of England. Grandma didn't speak a lot of Czechoslovakian, but her parents spoke it at home when she was young.

This one:

is done in counted bead work on cross-stitch fabric using vintage glass beads I got from my other grandma. I crocheted the border with vintage rayon thread, sewed it to a white satin back, and stuffed it. The ornament won a blue ribbon at the State Fair.

And these:

are real eggshells. I cut the fronts out with embroidery scissors, washed them well, and peeled out the membrane. I painted the outsides with multiple layers of fingernail polish for color and strength -- pearly white for the one on the left, metallic cherry red for the one on the right. The lace is crocheted from gold thread on a tiny vintage crochet hook. I crocheted the poinsettia on the left from sewing thread on the same tiny hook. The one on the right has a tiny bell, with little leaves of holly cut from green ribbon. Even though I used ordinary nail polish from the drug store, no fancy-schmancy brand, it's held up for well over twenty years. Made hash of my nails (I must be sensitive to acetone or something), but makes eggshells last forever.

HuffPo Blogger Says Knitting and Gardening are For Girly Weaklings!

Sensational enough? You'd think that the blogosphere would have caught on to the fact that you don't diss women with pointy sticks and sharp tools without having to duck and run for cover, but this blogger on HuffPo apparently hasn't got that message yet. Now, normally I stay away from the "comments" section on news sites and such, but this time have a look as knitters around the world eviscerate the author after the Yarn Harlot (one of those specifically held up as an example of "::scoff!:: Girly! Weak! Un-feminist!" tweeted about the article, followed soon by gardeners as the women of Garden Rant picked up on the brou-ha-ha.

Memo to Peggy, author of this atrocity: The women you picked on are NOT women you want to anger.

The author's main point seems to be that feminism has lost its edge. Women aren't "tough." They're blogging about gardening, cupcakes, knitting, and cats, all weak and girly subjects. What they should be into are manly things like shooting guns and hotwiring cars and practicing survival skills being executives and stuff.

Hel-LO, knitter with a Ph.D. here. Knitter who is a college biology professor. Knitter who could survive a helluva lot better with my spinning, knitting, gardening, canning, wild plant foraging, and food drying skills than this cupcake will if the best she can do is hotwire cars and break into bomb shelters. You ever see the remains of Cold-war era supplies that still linger in some bomb shelters? Ew.

What cheeses me off most about this article is this: Author, did you really mean to say that traditional women's pursuits are baaad, and the only worthwhile things a woman can do are traditional men's pursuits? So to be a feminist, one must try to be like a stereotypical man? What a narrow, limiting, outdated idea of feminism that is! While there are many flavors of feminism, my take on the whole subject is that feminism, in addition to advocating for social justice and basic human rights, is about rejecting the command of "Conform!" Telling women that they must give up one set of activities and take up another is just another command to "Conform!" Not feminist. Not pro-women. Entirely misogynist if it says, "What women like is bad."

So, joining bloggers across the blogosphere, allow me to roll up my sleeves, don the lab coat, sharpen my scalpel, and dissect this mess.

What happened to our hard-won bad-assery? All those years of being suffragettes, bra-burners, free love artists, corporate queen bees, supermoms and women-who-wanted-and-got-it all? ...Maybe "having it all" was a silly fantasy that ultimately made women feel exhausted and inferior. Maybe we just wanted to sit on our asses and knit and eat cupcakes in our Hello Kitty jammies.

 Wait, wait, wait... putting suffragettes in the same barrel with free love artists and bra-burners? Honey, get your history straight. Suffragettes were brave, bold women to be sure. I admire them and honor their memory by voting every chance I get. Bra-burners, however, are nearly a myth. I remember the late 60s/early 70s, and believe me, there weren't people running around burning bras, which has nothing to do with social justice or freedom of choice. It was one sensational news photo of one incident that got iconized. Free love? Societies for free love started in the swingin' Victorian era, and while it was entwined with feminism, it did not define all that feminism is. As for "having it all," having all what? This assumes our only choices are "corporate queen bees, supermoms and women-who-wanted-and-got-it-all" and "sit on our asses, knit, and eat cupcakes." Succeed in everything, or give up. No, no, NO. This is NOT all there is to the choices that the feminist movement has given us.

And now that so many women have seemingly retreated from our reign of awesomeness to immerse themselves in the feminine past-times of yesteryear, it does indeed appear that we've lost sight of what it means to be a badass, strong, tough woman. 

HahahahahahahHAHAHAHAHhahaha! Oh, dear, oh, dear. While the author does throw out this sop:

Not that our pioneering foremothers were not bad-ass... have you seen Meek's Cutoff?

she goes on assuming throughout the rest of the essay that gardening and knitting are frivolous girly pursuits, not the utterly necessary survival skills of yesteryear. It was all those badass women who spun, knitted, wove, sewed, gardened, preserved, kept chickens, milked the cows, and all that other girly stuff that kept the family alive, warm and fed.

From there she gets into the meat -- or meat-like texturized soy protein substance -- of her argument:

Maybe being called "tough" makes some women uncomfortable (sorta like being called a "bitch," right?). Well, too bad! There are tough times ahead, and we need to be tough bitches to face them. Growing vegetables is useful; but so is learning how to shoot a gun, hot-wire a car, and manipulate our way into a bomb shelter.

In the post-apocalyptic world, if ever we face one, you know who's gonna survive the best? Not the "tough" people hotwiring cars in some urban alley. That's only going to last until the gas runs out. The best survivors will be the Amish who can -- you guessed it -- spin, knit, sew, raise chickens, grow crops, milk cows... you get the idea. As for tough -- listen, cupcake, succeeding as an Amish farmer, or any kind of farmer, is not a job for sissies. I'm guessing the author hasn't spent much time in the country.

Remember our tough gal role models? They were strong, sexy, and took no crap. They wore leather and sang rock and roll. Chrissie Hynde, Joan Jett, Grace Jones, Courtney Love. They kicked ass in the movies: Sigourney Weaver in Alien, Sally Field in Norma Rae, Meryl Streep in Silkwood, Julia Roberts in Erin Brockovich. (See, what's cool is, those last two films were based on real women.) They battled monsters on TV: Xena: Warrior Princess and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Those are your "tough gal" role models? Good Lord. Are you six? Rock stars and actresses playing (mostly) fictional characters? Here are a few of mine: Eleanor Roosevelt, Jacqueline Cochran, Amelia Earhart, Jane Austen, Abigail Scott Duniway, Maria Mitchell, Rosalind Franklin, Jane Goodall, Barbara McClintock, Rachel Carson, Ada Lovelace... I could go on, but you get the idea. These are women who did things in an era when women weren't supposed to do things. They followed their interests even when their interests were things that women weren't suppose to even be capable of. They kept on going even when life slapped them in the face. Some fought for women's rights, some spoke out for social justice, some made world-changing scientific discoveries. Hotwiring a car? Cute parlor trick. Winning the Nobel Prize? That's bad-ass. (ETA: I heard an interview with Joan Jett once. As she was doing housecleaning with the radio on, on her hands and knees scrubbing the toilet, one of her songs came on the radio and the announcer said, "And that was Joan Jett. ::leer:: Wonder what she's doing now?" And Ms. Jett thought, "Sonny, if you only knew...")

And really, glamor has limited practical value; do you want to be left behind when the revolution comes, back to the wall, crippled by your stilettos? Hell, no; you want to be on the run with a sackful of penicillin, Kruggerands and organic chocolate bars.

No, you don't. Glamor might not be much use, but neither will cosplaying your favorite TV show characters be of much use when "the revolution" -- whatever that might turn out to be -- comes. Sounds like the author been watching to much post-apocalyptic drama on TV.

In fact, all of the other "badass" women the author offers up as role models are characters in various television dramas. Here's a memo, author: those shows are fiction. Dressing up as a vampire and pretending to be capable of keeping " the peace with an iron hand and a heart of chrome"is all adorable I'm sure, but the tough women who are really holding things together right now are the everyday women who work inside or outside the home, juggle family needs with working lives, balance the household budget, write books, publish academic papers, take the kids to soccer practice, go camping with the Scouts, and, yes, knit, keep cats, and eat a few cupcakes now and then. That's real life, kiddo. Welcome to the real world, where the real heroines dwell.

By the way, who is this author, who snubs those who like knitting, cats, and... cupcakes? Hello, Peg Aloi! I see what you're doing there!

Hello, artists and illustrators, I have a bone to pick with you.

Suppose you're an artist. You've been commissioned by a greeting card company, or a fabric company, or a children's book company, to draw some illustrations that depict people (or animals or robots or whatever) in the act of knitting.

You're an artist, right? You know all about drawing from models, or even from good photographs.

So why, oh WHY, do you and your kind keep illustrating knitters in the same stereotypical way -- the very, very wrong way? Why are you going with the image of what everyone "knows" knitting looks like instead of -- hey, here's a wild and crazy idea -- actually looking at knitters?

Let me show you. Here's how you non-knitterly artists depict knitters (source of images: Microsoft Clipart site).

Like this:

 And this:

 And this:

 And this:

 And this:

 And this:

Do y'all see what I'm seeing here? I'm not just talking gray-haired old ladies in rocking chairs here. Here are young people and even sheep all doing the same damn thing. Do you see it?

Do you?

Here I'll point it out to you:

Yes, THAT. I see that all over the place, in cartoons, in children's books, in fabric used to make knitting bags, for freak's sake! Straight knitting needles held like pencils, with the knobs waggling in the air, making a V-shape, and the points poking down into the knitting doing -- what?

Now, there are lots of different ways people hold knitting needles, but believe me, artists and illustrators, when I say that the V-formation IS NOT ONE OF THEM! This does not work. You cannot knit this way.

How about this?

Not quite. The needles are better, but what's going on in the middle of the piece? She could have just bound off a neckline and has the live shoulder stitches on the two needles, but I suspect that the artist has no idea that the live stitches are supposed to be on the needles -- that somehow the points just poke at the fabric and something happens.

Why, artists and illustrators, WHY do you keep on drawing knitters this way?

For once, go down to the local independent yarn shop, or find a knitting group, and watch people actually knitting. They do this (yes, sometimes with kids and cats included):

 Or you can even show it like this:

Notice that the needle ends are down. The hands are on top of the needles, palm down. The live stitches are on the needles, and as they are worked, they are passed from one needle to the other.

Now, there are different ways of holding the needles. Sometimes English-style knitters hold the right-hand needle like a pencil, so it looks like this (source: Wikimedia commons):

But there's no knitting style where both needles are held like pencils. Most knitters look like this fellow, palms down, even though the yarn tensioned around one's neck isn't common (source: Wikimedia commons):

Okay, got it? Young people, old people, men, women, indoors, outdoors, it's all good, just don't give us the V-formation with needles flapping around uselessly. Art is all about observing, so observe, okay? Have a look at actual knitters. The whole knitting community will thank you.

Now... don't even get me started on stereotyped "scientists" in the clip art galleries!

A solemn anniversary: Triangle Shirtwaist Factory

Today marks the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. In just half an hour, the fire snuffed out the lives of nearly 150 young factory workers who were trapped in the upper stories of the building. Many of them flung themselves out of upper-story windows, forced to choose between burning to death or perishing in an eight-story fall. Outrage over the fire became the impetus behind a strengthened union movement and a push for the workplace safety regulations that we enjoy today. But as the first linked article notes:

In the aftermath of the Triangle fire, public opinion, shifting political allegiances, and an active labor movement resulted in state and federal laws regulating industrial working conditions. A hundred years later, however, with the decline of organized labor and the rise of free market economics, factories that exploit immigrant workers are once again doing business in the U.S.

Must these young women have died in vain? Must we return to those bad old days of massive profits for the few through exploitation of the many? Must the workplace return to the grim, inhumane conditions so vividly depicted in novels ranging from Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist to the more recent The Dress Lodger by Sheri Holman?

How do we resist a backslide into the 19th century?

One way is to support worker's rights and union rights -- at the polls, in letters to your representatives, letters to the newspaper, wherever your voice can be heard. Money talks, and while those with the biggest bankrolls get to shout the loudest, the collective voice of many can be just as loud.

Another way, which takes even more effort these days, is to seek out clothing and goods that are not made by exploited labor, goods made by union factories, fair trade collectives, local businesses, and individual craftspeople.

Every time I knit or sew a garment, especially if I use handspun yarn from local sources, I reflect on how I am not contributing to the exploitation of garment workers. But I can't manufacture everything I wear -- shoes, jeans, and foundation undergarments particularly -- so I'm trying to find sources for union-made and fair-trade clothing. The choices are, alas, limited -- mostly to t-shirts and similar casual wear, some underwear, and fair-trade clothing in... well... casual "hippie chic" styles that look great on some folks, but might not go over well as office wear. Anyone have any good sources of union-made or fair-trade office attire? Let's start a list in the comments and see what we can come up with.

ETA: I just sent this letter to all of my federal and state representatives:

Today, March 25th, marks the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. Nearly 150 young people lost their lives in about one-half hour, many of them forced to choose between dying in the flames or perishing in an eight-story fall. The fire gave impetus to the union movement and to the push for workplace safety regulations. Today, corporate-driven politics are pushing us straight back to 19th century labor practices, stifling unions and pushing for the "right" to exploit workers. Please help fight this backslide. Please support union rights, worker rights, workplace safety, and policies that reward corporations that keep jobs on American soil instead of shipping them overseas. 

"You could sell that!"

Photo from Wikimedia Commons

It's inevitable. Once you start knitting, sooner or later there will be someone who says, "That's so great -- why, you could sell that and make money!" There's been discussion of this over on the Selfish Knitters group on Ravelry, where we've been dissecting what's up with the whole "you should sell your knitting" thang.

It's generally meant as a compliment, of course, meaning that your work demonstrates such skill that it would have value as a marketable commodity -- except without so many syllables. Personally, I think it's a sad commentary on our culture that a hobby is seen as worth engaging in only if you can make money at it, but there it is, and knitters aren't the only ones hearing this comment. Woodworkers, spinners, quilters -- I think everyone with a crafting hobby hears it.

Once in a while, though, a knitter will encounter someone who insists -- even demands -- that you should sell your knitting. You must. And will think there's something terribly wrong with you if you don't. What kind of weirdo wouldn't want to turn their hobby into a profitable business? Why, anything less is just a waste of time!

So then the knitter explains: So, you think I could sell these socks? And that someone would pay a whole $10 or $15 for them? Dear muggle, the yarn alone cost $25. Socks take 20 to 30 hours of my time to knit. Skilled labor is worth a bare minimum of $10 per hour, so if you know how to break into the $300-pair-of-socks market, please let me know. And even I'd be making less than my time on my day job is worth.

That's when the "you could sell that!" person protests! "B...b...but you do this in your spare time! You wouldn't really charge for your labor, would you? That's so... so... selfish! You should just charge what the materials cost you, and why are you using such expensive materials? You'll never make a profit unless you use cheaper yarn!"

So what's it going to be, O person with the bright business idea? Am I to sell my knitting and make money as you first said? Or am I to sell my knitting only for the cost of yarn, so that I end up with neither profit nor the knitted item I worked so hard to make? Please explain again why you think this is a good business plan, and by the way, please never, never ask me to be your business partner in any venture because it's clear that you don't have a lick of business sense whatsoever. Or maybe you're aspiring to be one of those CEOs who flushes the company down the toilet and walks away with millions in bonuses?

And then sometimes it gets worse. Bright Ideas comes back and says, "I know someone who will pay you $10 for a cowl just like the one you wear! And she's got three friends who want cowls, too! How soon can you finish them?" Or maybe it's dog sweaters, or slouchy berets, or Aran sweaters, or yarn deities help us, king-sized afghans. Because there's nothing a knitter would love to slave over more than a king-sized afghan that she'll never see again, right? Now you've got the dicey task of getting yourself out of being "volun-told" because Bright Ideas already went and told all of those people that you'd love to make the requested items for the pittance that's being offered.

Bright Ideas, do I have to serve you with a stack of cluecakes? Smack you with a clue-by-four? You are mistaking me for a mail order catalog. No, I take that back. You are mistaking me for a free knitwear dispensing machine. Listen now and hear this: I can't make money knitting under the conditions that you describe! And what's more, I don't want to!

If you ever find yourself pinned in the corner by such a Bright Idea, the wonderful people at Think Geek have the perfect shirt for you:

The Shirt of Ultimate Disambiguation

Of course, some people have turned knitting into a business. Some people are speedy knitters and make hats, cowls, mitts, and other small items to sell to boutiques, craft fairs, or online. Some design and sell patterns. A few have managed to become test knitters for big name designers or companies. A lucky fewer still have access to the kind of people who would pay $300 for a pair of hand knit cashmere and merino socks, and if anyone has secret access to that market, please let me in on it, 'kay? Especially if the clients are the kind of people who let the knitwear designer tell them what they're going to wear in the way of knitted garments.

For most knitters, though, knitting remains an unapologetically enjoyable, relaxing hobby that just happens to result in some pretty nifty sweaters, socks, and other good stuff.

And that's just fine.

Putting the House in Order

There is an old tradition -- that I've only recently come to know -- of putting one's house in order on the day of New Year's Eve to ensure that the new year will be a good one. So I spent the morning doing just that. We'd spent the week before Christmas giving the house a pretty good overhaul, so there was mostly just touch up: wiping down the bathrooms, dusting, picking up, doing dishes, wiping down the kitchen, scooping cat boxes, taking out the trash. Knowing that the house is in order -- well, orderly compared with the usual mayhem -- on the last day of the year, in preparation for the incoming year, feels pretty good, and I feel quite at ease sitting down to knit away the afternoon.

Now, if I had my way and could be Omnipotent Goddess of All Things, there'd be quite a few other things about the House of Humanity that I'd put in order. F'rinstance...

• Wall Street bankers, when handed taxpayer's money to bail out the banks that they'd tanked, would not feel the slightest compulsion to accept bloated bonuses. In fact, they'd be putting their banking houses in apple-pie order order to prevent another collapse and bail-out. 
• Everyone would consider health care a necessity, not a luxury available only to those who can afford it, and would thoughtfully craft a way to make that happen.
• As everyone would recognize that only an educated populace can be truly free, a high-quality public education for all citizens would be a top priority.
• Everyone would recognize the long-term price to be paid for cheap, sweatshop-made products.
• There would be no doubt in anyone's mind that if we don't have a healthy ecosystem, we can't have a healthy economy, either.
• The sight of poverty would arouse such compassion in the hearts of those observing that it would spur them to thoughtful action, bringing about the eventual end of poverty.

Actually, I think the last one is key. I think we really need is wave of a magic Omnipotent Goddess hand to give everyone in the world and everyone to come a full measure of compassion for all living, sentient beings on this planet. Imagine how many of the world's problems could be cured with that divine hand-wave.

All together now... ::wave wave wave::

Farewell, Pinkerton

Five years ago last fall, I was driving down a country road on my way home, when I saw something small and white running alongside the road. "Um, that's not natural," I thought. Now, anyone who knows me knows I couldn't possibly keep on driving at that point. I turned the car around, went back, and stopped where I'd seen the critter.

Turned out to be a baby pink-eyed white Guinea pig, no bigger than a hamster. Some yahoo must have tossed it out of a car, but not before snipping the poor baby's eartips off. I hope karma has something special in mind for the perpetrator.

I looked around for any other babies, but the white one was all that I saw. As I happened to have a box in the back of the car, I put the baby piggie in the box and took it home.

Pink eyes, li'l pink ears, li'l pink nose -- Pinky would have been a good name if it had been a girl, but as it turned out to be a boy, he was named Pinkerton.

I knew nothing about Guinea pig care, but quickly found the Guinea Lynx site, which has terrific advice on diet and medical care. I bought the largest cage I could find at PetCo, which was fine when Pinkerton was a baby, but I then found the site for Cavy Cages and used their plans to build a cage twice that size at half the cost.

A steady diet of Oxbow hay and Guinea pig pellets, plus fresh veggies daily and crushed Vitamin C tabs on his food, kept him healthy and happy. His only ailment was an infected foot, that the vet treated with antibiotics. For a while he had a companion, a piggie we adopted from a shelter and named Webster, but poor Webster passed away after just a couple of years.

A couple of months ago I noticed Pinkerton was slowing down. He was still eating his food, but not running around his cage as much. Then in the last couple of weeks he was getting fussy about his food.

Finally, last weekend, he stopped eating. On Sunday, Pinkterton passed over the Rainbow Bridge.

He's now laid to rest under the pear tree that he could see from his window. Farewell, Pinkerton. You'll be missed. I hope you're happily wheeking in the heavenly clover right now.

State Fair: Results

So State Fair season is over, and of the five items that I entered in Textiles, these are the winners:

Third place for my Twist and Shout cardigan -- yes, the same one that took Best of Show in the county fair. But oh, ya shoulda seen the one that took first! Mmm, mmm! Also, first place each for a skein of handspun pygora and handspun 3-ply wool, and second place for a skein of handspun quiviut.

Not only did I walk away with ribbons, but I also walked away with a premium for the best beginner handspinner: a nice hank of hand-dyed merino:

All in all, a pretty decent haul. Of course I'm already scanning the premium book and laying out plans for next year, listing more than I could possibly knit in that time. Some folks drive themselves batty trying to fit all the Christmas knitting in. Me, I seem to be well on my way to driving myself batty trying to fit all the State Fair knitting in. Something about those ribbons makes one go, "Yeah, I'll bet I could win in that category, too! And that, and that other thing, and..."

Tour de Fleece Day 10: Rest Day

The Tour de France bicyclists are resting today, and so the Tour de Fleece spinners get a day off -- of spinning, anyhow. Probably a good idea to rest my hands after yesterday, but rest totally? Not quite. I spent today reading academic papers and doing a few things to get ready for my summer class, then came home and made:

one dozen 4 ounce jars of currant jelly. From my own currants. I picked and juiced them nearly a week ago, and then we got hit with a heat wave so it's been too, too hot for making and canning jelly. Today the temperatures finally cooled down. Mmmm, sweet 'n tangy currant jelly!

I may comb out some more of my fleece this evening, then on to spinning again tomorrow.

Tour de Fleece Day 6: Spinning all day, knitting for the win!

Sooo, I went to the Marion County Fair today to demonstrate spinning, and, of course, to check out to see if I might have won a ribbon or two.

I guess so! That's my Twist and Shout cardigan. And that there's a blue ribbon on the left for first place, and the blue one on the right is Best of Class, and the purple one is Best of Show in the adult division. Best of show! Eeeee! The judges loved the yarn choice (Andean Silk from Knit Picks, a soft and squooshy blend of merino, alpaca, and silk) and loved the vintage button.


And there's my Shalom Cardigan with a blue ribbon, too:

And then my camera battery went dead, so I didn't get pictures of the other ribbons. Let's see... my handspun merino, a Malabrigo beret, and my Fetching fingerless mitts all took second, while my Milkweed shawl and Indigo Dandy cowl each took first. Considering the small number of entries in the textile division, it wasn't hard to win something, but among the small number of entries were some really spectacular items. I wouldn't want to be the judge choosing between some of them.

I did a considerable amount of spinning there, and got my 2 ounces of pygora finally spun into singles. They're resting on their bobbins for plying tomorrow.


Looking pretty good, I think:

Then this evening I got out some merino and silk roving from Dicentra designs that I picked up at the Aurora Fiber Festival:


And started spinning some of that. I'm thinking I'll probably chain-ply it to keep the colors separate instead of struggling to spin even sections on two singles for a two-ply: