A Song of Socks

There are things when you dress
That you put on your toes
There are boys who wear tubes
And girls who wear hose

If you wanna keep me warm
When the freezing cold wind blows
Don't give me your love and forget it
Just give me a pair of those

I want your socks
I want your socks

I'll wear 'em on my feet
I'll show 'em to my friends
'Cause I like the feel
Of those hand-knitted trends 





The second in my series of socks for myself are the Rainy Day Socks made from MadelineTosh sock in the lovely Wash colourway. They were fast and the pattern was easily memorizable and they are perfect for spring wearing. I made size small on US 1.5 dpns. I did adapt the pattern, which called for a kitchenered toe, to a star toe. I'm all about the Easy!


But I found it hard to continue to knit things for myself. After all, the little guy needs socks too - he is growing like a sunflower! I just bought him two new pairs of shoes, because his toes were bumping the ends of his old ones and there were absolutely no handknit socks in the drawer that fit him! I think the last time I made him socks, his feet were only 3.5 inches long and now they're 5.5 inches! Oh no, that's not right! I did knit him these Sherlock socks a year ago, and they were 5 inches long - but they were no where to be found.


And besides, I'm impelled to create for those I love, so I've switched my attention to making as many pairs of little socks as I can before Camp Loopy starts on May 27th. So far, I've managed three socks and I hope to finish 3 more in the next week - all stripey:



I have my own method of toe-up construction and they are fast, fast, fast and easy, and fit so well! 

 

And because the little guy's socks take so little yarn, I'm left with a fair amount of widowed and orphaned skeins in colours that don't suit me (but that he loves). Should I save them for the next growth spurt?

There and Back Again, 2012

Yesterday, my boyfriend went with me to the NH Sheep & Wool Fair in Deerfield. This was his first time going and it was fun for me to have a friend with me. I usually go by myself the first day and with friends the second day. But they moved it to the Deerfield Fairgrounds this year, and I knew I'd never find it without help. Sure enough, even my boyfriend, who has the best directional sense on the planet, had a hard time with this one.

Let me just say, I was not a fan of this venue.

This is the entry (may I say the beautiful, cool, green, New Hampshire countryside, forest entryway) to the Hopkinton Fairgrounds where the Sheep & Wool Fair has been held for the past several years:





This is the entryway to the Deerfield venue:



At the end of this road, you are then faced with this:



It's only when you get to the top of that very steep hill that you are at the barns where the fair is held. I saw many elderly people struggling on that last hill.  The grounds seemed stark in comparison, too - dusty and paved. I couldn't find the the sheep-herding which I've always loved to see and then at the end of the day someone told me that you actually had to drive to it - you couldn't see it from the area where the vendors were.

Okay - enough with the complaints - on to the good parts!

There were little tents with small companies on the road to the vendor barns and these are always fun to peruse. I saw some new people, but some of the old standbys that I love were missing.



Inside the vendor barns  it was a world of colour and texture! My boyfriend mentioned that he saw many empty vendor spots, but by that time I was just up to my elbows in the joy of fiber and didn't notice!





Aren't these colours gorgeous? This is Tidal Yarns in Maine. The very nice artist who makes these yarns told me that the reason they all look so lovely together is because she uses the natural dyes from nature. It really does show in the evidence of these colourways!

I found another of my favorites, Dillner Hillside Farm:





One of the things I absolutely LOVE is using yarns that are labeled with the animal who donated their locks for the skein! This is what Jessica Dillner does with all her yarn.  Last year I had yarn from Max:



This year I got yarn from Wallace - you can see his little face on the label:



Many of her handspun skeins use natural dyes such as goldenrod and that adds to to very soft subtle colour:





I found two yarn companies new to me, Tucker Woods Yarns - the makers of that lovely tweedy skein you see below, and  Dirty Water Dyeworks who I've run into online before, but not seen at the Wool Fair. Their skein is the beautifully-dyed MCN water-shaded one in the picture.



My other purchases included some little things for gifts and swaps, and a large haul of antique horn buttons:



This is just a small portion of this great find - I bought 3 bags full of these! But I left one bag behind for you!

Its true, my boyfriend didn't hold out for the entire stroll through the barns... once he spied this shady nook he was glad he'd brought his iPad.



We really enjoyed all the animals - they were hilarious this year - and LOTS of babies!







Big yawn:



and sweet fluffy bunny pals:



That was it for us - we both were wondering what that bright shiny thing in the blue sky was and we both ended up with sunburns and I had additional freckles, so we trekked back home to cuddle with the sweet Tedders.

I had a most wonderful gift waiting for me - soft, felted slipper liners and a huge skein of soft deep blue Borderleicester from SuDan Farm in Canby, Oregon. The label says: "This yarn is a gift to you from a sheep named Fyfe. This wool has been grown, sheared, and processed with respect for the animals, land, and humans involved."



Wow - can't get better than that for a day in May!

Sensitive Man

Good morning! I'm just raising my head from a hurried breakfast of blueberries and tea to let you know the reason I haven't been blogging lately.

I have a very sick young dog at home, and anyone who has ever had a dog going through chemotherapy will know that it's a full time nursing job. I don't at all mind taking care of him day and night, giving him his meds every hour, and sleeping on the couch near his bed to be on hand as crises arise - not at all. But at the same time, I'm trying to keep up with a full time job and two part time jobs as well as other personal and family matters. All the dog chemotherapy centers are out of state or on the border with another state, so that means lots of driving - lots and lots of driving = several times a week. 

All of this means there is no time left for blogging. I miss it! But this is important and needs to come first. 

This pre-illness photo shows the dear Teddy (whose real name is Percival) - definitely one of the most sensitive men in our house. 

Sigur Ros - This is a Good Beginning

In spite of my long list of knits waiting to be finished for other people, I've taken a creative break to make myself some socks and stockings.

Like the fairytale cobbler whose children go shoe-less, all of my socks are grocery-store-bought black of an indeterminate fiber and have holes in the heels. Sadly, this isn't a new state of affairs. I gamely sew up the holes and continue wearing them while knitting away on gifts for others.

Well, last week I said (to myself) "No more"! I'm going to knit up a drawfull of stockings for myself before I finish anything for anyone else!

So, the picture shows my first pair, finished yesterday. They are made from Blue Moon Fiber Arts STR lightweight in Sigur Ros (one of my favorite bands). The cast on was 60 stitches and I used size 2.5mm Darn Pretty DPN Needles. I used a simple stitch pattern - 3x2 rib - in a simple formula - cuff down, short-row heel, and star decreased toe (no Kitchener!).

I wore them as soon as they were off the needles - not even waiting to block them, though I know blocking would soften the yarn even more than it already is and help it to 'bloom'. They are super comfy!

I've already begun the second pair: Rainy Day Socks using Madeline Tosh Sock in Wash. I hope the Force for sock-knitting stays strong in me. I want lots and lots!

Bunny Ears, Oysters and Spring Hats

Yesterday, we went for a long drive to visit the boyfriend's relatives. Yes, that is one of his relatives wearing bunny ears. Everyone thought it was very cute but I was deathly and silently afraid she was going wear them out the restaurant for lunch! I'm such a wimp sometimes... now, if she'd been wearing a quirky vintage hat or cloche, like these in my 1923 April Needlework Magazine, I wouldn't have batted an eye!



We went to a wonderful restaurant called The Wicked Oyster.



The walls were lined with the most beautiful paintings by local artists - all very expensive but mostly of the ocean...





The menu was all oysters. Others ordered spinach salad, but my boyfriend and I ordered buttermilk fried oysters with homemade cocktail sauce. They were incredible.



I looked through my stack of old Needlework Magazines for the April versions, but only found two, one from 1923 without a cover and the other from 1934:



The New Spring Styles were loose and flowing:



and the patterns were focused on filet crochet:



There was a beautiful Anemone Tea Cloth illustrated, by the wonderful Mary Card of Australia, but as usual the pattern wasn't included.



I've always wondered if they expected the readers to copy the pattern by just looking at the over-sized photograph of her gorgeous filet designs.

There were no recipes for oysters in these April magazines, but they recommended lots of eggs - deviled eggs being the finger food of choice for a spring holiday luncheon:



and their argument for a Spring diet of eggs:

It's Spring, and Easter, and Nature is "recovering" from winter according to her own ancient laws, while poor old human nature is muddling along, trying to correct the mistakes they have made in selfishness, and greed, in war, and in peace. Learning the laws of being, and being true to them, is all that brings a good crop, be it in the cabbage patch, in the university, or in the college of Life. So much for our brief Easter sermon, and nobody can corner the joy to be had in the spring - it's there for the looking and the sniffing; the earth itself smells good in the spring as the frost leaves it... Use your senses in the spring- meet it with an alertness and an awakening to the simple joys that are free to all. If you can 'sit on a log and pat a dog, do it; it's fun in the springtime.

The 1934 recipe for spring eggs:

Eggs Florentine

Place two cups of minced buttered spinach in a baking dish. Break four eggs over this, season and pour over all half a cup of medium white sauce to which a quarter cup of grated cheese is added. Sprinkle with two tablespoons of melted butter and slip under the broiler to set the eggs and brown lightly.

Happy Spring! May you have a new (vintage) bonnet on your needles!

Spring and All That...

Spring
by Pablo Neruda

The bird has come
to bring light to birth.
From every trill of his,
water is born.

And in between the water and light
which unwind in the air,
the spring is now beginning,

now the seed is aware of its own growing;
the root takes shape in the corolla,
at last the eyelids of the pollen open.

All this accomplished by a simple bird
from his perch on a green branch.



My same friend who send me the vintage booklets in my last post, sent me this beautiful page of spring sweaters from an unknown vintage magazine. It looks very much like the Needlework Magazine, printed in Augusta Maine and spanning the globe in distribution. And I appear to be correct in that assumption, because I just went to look at this page again and it says clearly: The New Sweaters, selected by the Needlework Editors!

The drawings - quite beautiful! - were made by M.E. Musselman and all reflect a lighter brighter sensibility for Spring. I love the greens especially, but the coral oranges are spot on for this year's trend of tangerine!



In the description, silk is extolled as the perfect fiber for this time of year. They go on to say that silk sweaters are "chiefly ready-made garments" and "It is a matter of personal choice between the silk and the worsted, as both are good. The worsted sweater, however, can be made more easily by hand than a silk one." Ah, don't I know it!



I am very drawn to scarves that incorporate hoods, and it appears that this is a fashion trend over 100 years old.

Scarfs in silks and in worsteds, too, offer most pleasing substitutes for fur neck-pieces for every-day wear, especially for the school girl and the business girl, and for outings in kinds of weather they are just the thing.
Illustrated in the upper left-hand corner is a very new cap and scarf with crocheted flowers. This design can be carried out in many charming colours - in blue with red roses, in orange with blank bands and deep yellow roses, in pale blue with pink roses, in grey with white roses, etc.
For motoring or driving a scarf hood in worsted, as illustrated above, is a real luxury. It is all in one piece.

And finally, a little note at the bottom says that a pamphlet containing the working directions for the items shown will be supplied for 15 cents. Oh how I wish that someone had sent away for this pamphlet and that it had made its way into my hands! I would love to make the motoring hood-scarf, the white center-top sweater-jacket, the coral Spencer with its gathered neckline on the right, and the green cut-away sweater with its white collar and cuffs on the left - just for wearing in the Spring!

Front Page News in Knitting

A final wonderful birthday package arrived on my doorstep, from my friend in Australia! I love the pattern books and ephemera that he sends me so, so much! These booklets are from the late 1930's through the very early 1940's.

This Stitchcraft No. 60 from 1937 is a great example of how knitting styles were becoming more sporty and suitable for everyday wear.



A belt and a hat made a knitted blouse or sweater "office wear" while a pair of trousers or shorts made that knitted sweater just right for the weekend...



I love the little neck bow on this one, and it's always the details that charm me:



Stitchcraft features several crafts, as well as lots of knitting patterns and this magazine still has it's embroidery transfer inside. There are recipes (ham loaf served with beans and sliced boiled potato - a regular starch feast!), sewing tips, and other crafts. This style page is called "Knitted by the Sea" by Anne Talbot and the designs are all knitted, even the suits and coat:



It's only meant to show the reader what's in style though; the patterns aren't included, sadly. The top blouse in the picture is described this way: "A soft boucle yarn in dusty pink is used for the plain little model above, with its pointed collar and puff sleeves"

and the cute striped one says: "An attractive sports jumper uses horizontal stripes, with a navy scarf slipped under a buttoned-over strap of the striped pattern"

But Ms. Talbot's description of hte fashions of the that summer of 1937 are particularly charming, so I'll quote just a small portion of here for your review:

Deauville, Le Touquet, and other Channel resorts are now crowded with smartly-clad Parisiennes and fashionable cosmopolitaines. In the fifteen years that I have been going to Deauville and Le Touquet I have noticed a very gradual, but markedly definite, change in the type of informal costumes work by the "smart set." These daytime clothes have become more practical and more "sporting" in every way. But what is of most interest to readers of Stitchcraft is that the importance of knitwear can scarcely be exaggerated. Knitteds have become so essential to the holiday wardrobe that no fashionable Parisienne would dream of being without a variety of models.

For very hot weather there are lovely, fine linen and cotton threads, delightful for both crocheting and knitting. Synthetic threads, such as artificial silk and kindred substances, are likewise very cool and when mixed with wool, as they so frequently are, make most practical and beautiful yarns...

The next booklet is Style, by Patons & Baldwins, Volume 7. The corner where the date was is torn a bit, but it definitely appears to be from the same late 30's time period. Note the charming Robin Hood hat!



In some ways, the fashions of that time were like costumes - the cosplay of the 1930's! And here's a jaunty Sailor style from this booklet:



This blouse is cute with its ruffled collar, big puffed sleeves, and little cables... it's called The Charmer"



The next booklet I'll review is called "The Economy Knit Book - 18 Stunning New Styles." from Woolworth's.



I have a couple of very old Woolworth's knitting books and they are so wonderful! This one is no exception, and appears to be from the early 40's when this style of slightly military-looking cardigan jacket was popular:



This booklet is unique in that throughout the booklet the knit patterns are modeled by contemporary Hollywood stars! It's so adorable, with pattern titles like:

You'll Look Ultra-Smart in this Jaunty Viennese Model
Imagine This Unusual Puff-Sleeved Style in Three Colours
Stylish for Weekends - Smart for Business Too!
When You Get That Cruising Feeling!
This Will Look Very Sweet on You
Look Lovely on Your Next Holiday - Here's How!
Knit This for Lots of Use in the Snow Country!

Here is the Woolworth version of the Sailor Suit, with the title, "Announcing the Roly-Poly Neck - Present American Craze!" The placement of that little sailboat applique certainly ensures that it will bob up and down on the the...erm...waves, doesn't it?



Some of the movie stars are Frank Forest (Paramount Studios), modeling "The Favorite Sweater of Men About Hollywood"... Binnie Barnes (Universal Studios), "Introducing a Smart Twin Set"... Nola Warren ("Australian Film Star")... Eleanore Whitney (Paramount Star) "Shows How to Hike in Chic" (though it's hard to believe that she's going to hike in that outfit!):



The final booklet for review is the Lux Knitting Book for 1937. This is a fabulous booklet, one of series put out by the Lux Soap Company.



The booklet is 61 pages and along with the black and white photos there are funny and delicate pen and ink drawings of the knit-wear in use, drawings such as you find in the more expensive knitting magazines of that era!



There's something for everyone in this book - men (that chapter is called "Manly Comforts"), women, children, babies and teens...even tea cosies for the tea table!

The undies are always cute, called Warm Beginnings, but I always wonder how someone could wear Shetland wool next to their skin?



There is fashion commentary here, too, titled Front Page News in Knitting:

"The editor of this book has been in consultation with the Knitting Editor of Vogue regarding the very latest ideas in knitting and crochet"

So interesting, that little note at the bottom of the fashion page. How do you suppose it happened and what does "in consultation" mean? Do you suppose they 'took a meeting'? How about a phone call? I would have liked to have been a bird on wire overlooking that conversation! In any case, here is what came of it:

A classic winter this, simple straight lines, subtle tailoring to your cardigans... and jumpers with concentrated interest on intriguing stitches. Tailoreds, too, and so much the better if you go utterly masculine and sport a trim and spanking "weskit" with your tweeds - or tuck a man's paisley hankie in the neck of your jumper. For the Rest, keep your neckline up and inflate your sleeves a little at the top.

And yet, the styles in the book are distinctly feminine - more so than in the other three magazines!

This gathered, dolmen-sleeved blouse, for instance, dramatic and soft:



My favorite, though, is this bed jacket and I'm determined to knit it for myself:



It's called Snug Simplicity because it is such a simple pattern. The shape comes from the way the knitting is put together. I can't quote the pattern here, because it is not old enough to be in the public domain, but I can give you some hints!

This is knit in a silk and wool blend (British 2-ply) on 7 mm needles for a size 34 bust. The two pieces are garter-stitch knit in two separate rectangles (with a 15 stitch slit at the central point of one long edge on each rectangle to form the collar) and then half of each short end is sewn to the other in a clever way to form the back, the turned-back collar, and then the sleeves are folded over and sewn.

My final treat in this wonderful package was tucked into one of the books - a Lili Knitting Card for another bed jacket!



This is described as "a modernized card system for convenience. A big improvement on the 'page torn from a book' method" The pattern itself would make a great cardigan for summer!

What a super birthday box, wasn't it!?!