I teach knitting classes
Most popular:
• specialized sock-heel workshops
• plaited cast-on class for socks, hats, and coffee cup cozies
• certified Knit Companion trainer
I travel to book readings and signings.
You can schedule a class or event on my Shoppe page.
See! Two sides of fabric, one needle! LOVE IT!
I like double knitting. I like doing the same thing with weaving (two layers at one time) but that’s a different sotry. I think I like double kniting for the same reason I like knitting two socks at a time on two circs—when I’m done, I’m DONE.
This little guy was born of necessity: Christmas. Well, Christmas and teaching a class in double knitting. If you’ve never knit both sides of a bag at the same time, you’re in for a treat. This little, easy-to-learn-on bag is forgiving and quick to knit. I made a slew of these for Christmas last year and am currently panicking about what to do for this Christmas since I can’t really do this again.
Ah well.
The pattern is free and you can download now.
I needed to do something with my handspun. I have (ahem) a fair amount of small amounts of my yarn lying around here. It’s like living in a yarn store for The Borrowers. So I pondered and considered and dreamed and finally thought of a pattern that wouldn’t care if my early yarn was uneven—a feltable dryerball!
If you’ve never experienced a dryerball, lemme tell you—it’s nifty. Put some essential oil in there and you’ll never need Bounce again (unless you use the sheets to keep the mosquitos at bay).
The pattern was easily adjustable to a pincushion… so I did!
for 99 ¢ you can add to cart
I really REALLY hate having hair on my neck when it’s not long enough to hang down my back. I love banana clips for two reasons
This was fine and dandy when we lived in Arizona, but Virginia has winter. Not much of one last year, but still. If my ears are cold, ˆ am cold (under the transitive property of YourMomToldYouThatYouLose88%OfYourBodyHeatThroughYourHeadSoYouShouldHaveListened). I needed a hat—one that would fit over my hair clip, and I needed one fast and I needed it cheap.
¡Voici!
I love this little bonnet! I also love that it’s a cheap and easy way to learn to steek (if you’ve never steeked before, you’ll need far less Scotch to wind yourself up to cut an 8$-skein-of-yarn-2-nights-of-knitting than you would on the $140-of-shetland-five-months-of-knitting project. Nuff said).
Instructions and pictures are included with all of my patterns so if I have something odd (double knitting, steeking, knitting a ball in the round) I have the how-to right there in the pattern. Need to get your hair off your neck this winter, just add to cart for $4.
So today’s post doesn’t go back to the age of the dinosars, but it does go back to when I was teaching in New York.
After our evacuation on 9/11, a few teachers and I taught a bunch of our students to knit and we donated what we made to Women in Need shelter and the Bowery Mission. Many yarn companies and publishers stepped in to support us with donations which meant the world to us (SoHo Publishing, Elizabeth Eakins, and Patternworks, being the three names I recall most on support packages). It was very VERY good for all of us to have a purpose and a goal and a Thing We Could Do to Help Others.
And one of the others we wanted to help was our Principal.
She lost her sister in the attacks and so the kids and I took turns knitting her a giant Wedge Shawl (you can see why we wanted to give a little something back to her if you take a look at Story Selection #1 here). I’d made a bunch of these shawls—they’re easy, reasonably fast, and very, very comfy to have around you. She was pleased, I think.
I think I learned this pattern originally from our LYS, but since then I’ve added to and modified it a bit–which is what you see in the Wedge Shawl pattern I have on Ravlery. You probably could do this in any yarn at any gauge, but I’ve usually gone with worsted and 13US or 15US. It’s good mindless knitting and when you get the turns down, you can do it in a movie theater.
Ask me how I know.
My latest version was for my eversobestest friend in Los Angeles (the one we will stay with during the surgery). Soon I will post pics of her with her gorgeous daughter and their new shawl.
* * *
A couple of years ago, while I was finishing edits on the first Defarge book, I was contacted by an old high school friend (She’s not old. I am.) who was interested in doing a blog hop for the holidays called A Dickens of a Christmas Blog Hop.
It was fun and I learned a lot, contributing free A Christmas Carol podcasts (staves 1–2 and stave 3 and staves 4–5) and this little hand-warmer design—The Cratchette. Thing 2, of the Ear-Surgery-Sale is the model for the Dickensian picture you see in the pattern.
Please, Sir, can I have some more?
I had little free time, what with finishing the book, so I knew I needed a quick-to-knit-mitt that would be very, very warm (because honestly, poor Bob Cratchit!). This is what I came up with. It’s pretty darn simple and a few knitters on Ravelry have found even more ways to modify it and make it sing. It makes for an easy and fast Christmas giftie. So there it is! The Cratchette.
And who knew that in the middle of posting about my patterns I would be having a surprise sale!
I planned these posts before we found out about Thing 2’s surgery but it’s timed out well because all of my Raverly Store patterns will be 10% off through this Sunday, August 26, 2012 (some are free no matter what, too!). So if you want a Cratchette or a Wedge Shawl pattern, please start with the sale link if you’re within the deadline.
And if you haven’t already, please sign up to get my free newsletter to get links to sales and new patterns as they’re released.
My son needs surgery.
Not planned surgery but that kind of kick-in-the-gut surprise surgery that is halfway between, sure okay and It’s An Emergency.
The Long of It
If you’ve followed my blog or podcast since 2005-2006, then you know that my younger son was born with Microtia—a not-as-rare-as-you’d-think condition that gave him a very small ear and no ear canal on the right side, but a working middle and inner ear.
Here’s the cute lil ear he was born with
Here you can see the difference in size between his right (Microtic) ear and his left.
Back in 2008 we had Medpor surgery and I blogged about it here (and will blog updates there on this adventure, too). With Medpor, a surgical plastic form is placed and covered with a skin graft and then it magically (really, it looks like magic) molds itself to the form ¡et voilá! Insta-ear. It’s amazing. Later we had a canal added and, yes, he can hear now on that side.
This is the miracle ear before his canal surgery.
However. At some point that plastic frame started to poke out of the back of his ear. We only caught it at the beginning of this month and I let the surgeon know last week. He let me know we had to get into surgery asap or—and this is the scary part—if the plastic has been exposed for too long they will have to Remove It And Start Over.
We’re happy to see our surgeon again (he’s fabulous) but it’s the difference between a 2-1/2 hr surgery and an 8-1/2+ hr surgery. Plus if we start over it means more skin grafts, another 115 stitches, and recovery right as school is starting. I know you parents know how much your heart aches when your child is in a new-school situation (which he is, knows no one at the new school) and that it’s even worse when something about your child is “different.” We’re hoping the bandages from his surgery will be off and his swelling will be down so it won’t be too bad.
* * *
So why am I writing about this here on my knitting blog?
Because we need help.
Working from home and taking care of the kids has made it impossible to try to track down a “real” job (plus, finding jobs for teachers with 10+ yrs of experience is a tad tricky in this economy) and four people on one income in the third most expensive area of the country has been…ah… challenging. Nonetheless, from my home office I’ve been blessed to be able to write patterns, edit and design for the Defarge books, teach online classes (sign-up links are in the left sidebar), teach around the country, and offer extras to my Subscriber-Supporters over at my CraftLit podcast. It’s been nice, but it’s not a living. And making “a living” would have made this surgery thing a lot less scary.
Friends in LA and the good people of CraftLit and Cooperative Press have helped us with gifts of housing and airfare, but I’ll still need to feed the kids, purchase Thing 2’s post-surgery meds, and get to and from the surgery while in LA (not to mention the further specter of going through a whole replacement surgery). So, to raise funds for the trip and any other “surprises” that get thrown our way, I thought I’d host a sale and more! (Thank you, Tara!) There are lots of ways to help that get you something nifty, too! For example, you could:
to the cause.
And even if you don’t purchase any patterns or become a sponsor, I want to thank you for heading over here to see what’s going on. If you’re willing to Facebook or Tweet this page to anyone who might be interested in the above I would deeply appreciate it. All I can offer as a thank you is my free podcasts—and for non-knitters you’d probably prefer Just the Books, the sister show to CraftLit (all the lit with none of the craft), in case you might enjoy sticking a good book in your ear when your hands are busy doing something else. Gulliver’s Travels starts at episode 249 both on Just the Books and CraftLit and we’re almost at Part IV (the final part). If you start now, you may catch up before we’re home from the surgery!
And the next book is Jane Eyre.
Regardless the reason, here you are. You came and read, and for that I am truly grateful.
Right now I’m particularly grateful to the many pattern purchasers (hope you enjoy!) and also for the direct support of:
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The early responders made me weep with relief last week when the light at the end of the tunnel looked like an oncoming train.
You who have joined in this week have let me sleep at night. Truly. Thank you more than I can say.
After my Close Encounters with ugly people, I got to go re-visit Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.
Thing 2 had an ear appointment down at UVa, and that, my friends, is a two-and-a-half-hour drive for us. Thing 1 was dragged along. Life was made tolerable by home-made (two of them gluten free) Egg McMuffins.
We toodled down to meet the wonderful doctor who told us that, indeed, Thing 2’s ear canal skin graft had mucosalized (how, you may ask, does a skin graft morph from epithelial, skin-type-skin to a mucous membrane? Because the skin lining your middle ear (past the ear drum) is mucous membrane. It evidently creeped in under the ear-drum-graft! And this is why I dug anatomy class in HS!) which is why he’d had a gooey, chronic ear infection for a YEAR.
Chemical cauterization (without pain! Yes!) and scheduling a check-up appointment in two months and we were out of there! I didn’t have time to finish a single row on the Highly Secret Design for Defarge Does Shakespeare.
UVa is in Charlottesville which is gorgeous. Thomas Jefferson thought so too because his hilltop estate is there, just below the city. It’s both bigger than I remember (in that there’s a visitor’s center now) and smaller (in that the house is, like all from back then) of smaller size than I recall (though bigger than Mt Vernon’s rooms by a long shot. Jefferson was our royalty, after all).
If you’re ever in the ‘hood, I highly recommend a visit. The boys liked it well enough and it gave me a break before heading back home. Next time I go back with the watercolor set.
(I think Thing 2 preferred our whistle-stop last week in Times Square)
Actually, not so much God, but a guy who thought he was.
In reality, he was Jordan Baker.
He cut across three aisles of parking lot with nary a glance to the side and were it not for my brakes, he would now be paying for my funeral.
I had a rare opportunity–rare for me when it comes to people like him–where I said, “you know, we were THAT close when you cut across without looking”.
He smiled and said, “good thing you have good breaks, then,” and sauntered off.
All hail Jordan Baker, brought to life here in Virginia.
Where’s my passport?
As I sit here–knitting desperately to try to finish by the closing ceremonies–I’m next to the heavy, bitchy, chain smoking woman who actually just said on the phone, “because, honey, money talks and bullshit walks so put me on the pre-announcement list and shut the f*** up.”
I want to switch countries.
There have to be other, better, places with knitters where we could live and find work, right?
SQUEEEEEE!
Right before I left on vacation I had a FABULOUS phone call/CraftLit interview* with Sally Holt (she of the genius KnitCompanion ® app) and Lucy Neatby (she of knitting genius)—and then I had to shut up about it.
It almost killed me.
But now the secret is out and I can share this joyous news with you! I’m giddy with excitement and I’m here to tell you that after you take a look at the Lucy Neatby—Collection One app, you will be giddy, too.
This ground-breaking app for iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch combines a collection of Lucy’s patterns together with her wonderful Learn with Lucy video series. All packaged in the patent pending KnitCompanion ® platform to provide highly interactive knitting instructions. The techniques covered in the videos are linked directly to the steps of the pattern that need the techniques so you can knit with confidence because Lucy is by your side. All patterns are setup with easy-to-select options for sizes, motifs, and other options. We think of it as an electronic pattern book on steroids!
And the even better news?
I have a free version of the app to give away!
That’s right!
If you to CraftLit or Just the Books during the month of August 2012 you will be put into a drawing for your very own Lucy Neatby—Collection One app!
You could make a one-time donation (with the button above) or you may prefer to sign up as a Subscriber-Supporter (and receive all sorts of ongoing audio goodies from the folks who work on CraftLit). Either way—donate once or as a subscriber—you’ll be put into the drawing. If you win, but don’t have an Apple device, you can gift the app to a friend—then make them hand over said device on-demand!
And even if you don’t donate, please leave a comment here. Lucy and Sally will see it and I’m sure they’ll be excited to see what you think about their new and awesome app!
*The interview will go live on Episode 264, August 10, 2012.
| For interested Book-Only lovers, I recommend subscribing to the Just-the-Books option. There you won’t be bothered by knitting and crochet pattern freebies, you will just get the marvelous audio bits. | If you like to knit or crochet, consider subscribing to the CraftLit feed and you’ll get even MORE exclusive goodies for free and before everyone else gets ’em. (Current freebies include Cheddar, Wensleydale, and Holly Golightly!) |
| Important—please click the “RETURN” link to complete your subscription process and sign up for your extra fun bits! |
Important—please click the “RETURN” link to complete your subscription process and sign up for your extra fun bits! |
I have a long and proud track record of failure at the various knitting O[ymp1c5 and this year may be no different. I’m made a remarkable amount of progress (for me) while being at the beach and other places that aren’t particularly conducive to knitterly pursuits.
At the same time, I know others who have taken on less insane tasks than I and are already winnahs, but gosh darn it, I really wanted to make this shrug.
And the shawl.
The “Mrs. Hudson Shawl” for Defarge Does Sherlock.
Yes, indeedy.
Knit in the softest, single-ply, mystery yarn I could find in the stash, it’s a joy to knit up and an easy pattern to memorize (even in my addled state).
Plus, being here at the beach on the Atlantic Coast has given me lots of ideas for socks. Lots and lots.
So many socks.
So little time.
Really, after the kerffuflle with the International Olymp1c Committee (don’t want to denigrate the word, here) I’d considered not watching the bloody things at all. But the boys wanted to and we were bound for the beach which means lazy evenings so… yeah. I cast on.
I’m knitting a marvelous little shrug (Layering Shrug by Juju Vail) with Team Sasquatch. Mine seems to be all fococked with gauge, but the pattern is pretty clear on that point so I hope I’m good. Maybe it’s just one of those “when you see it done…” things.
Then because I’m insane. Or at least very very bad at understanding how time works, I’m also knitting for Team Cooperative Press. This one is a shawl pattern that I’ve been designing for the Defarge Does Sherlock book. I’m nearly done with my Defarge Does Shakespeare Shrug (ah, I sense a shruggy theme) though I’ve got a null set for Defarge Does Chaucer.
I’ve officially cast on both for the Ravellenic Games and am making my slow, meandering way through them. I’d post pix here but it’s late, to be honest. The pictures would be flash-bleached, anyway. Tomorrow I’ll show you more (though I can’t show you much of the Sherlock, obviously. You’ll just have to accept my word on it’s progress and let it go at that).
I will tell you this: I began with Nannette the Nanny’s Garter Tab (it was in a previous newsletter–you can sign up on the left) and have maintained her recommended edging throughout.
And now?
Now I sleep because tomorrow will be a day of knitting, swimming at the beach, and not much else.
…Chaucer!
I mean—ah—let me start over.
ahem
::Orson Welles-like voice:: Who isn’t afraid of Chaucer?
Okay, Chaucer scholars probably aren’t and… ummmm… no one else.
Right?
Because it seems so old.
And hard.
And dry.
And boring.
And yet…NOT!
I’ve been doing a little experiment over at CraftLit and I’m pretty excited about how it’s panning out. Other people seem to be pretty happy about it too, so I thought I’d share the skinny on it over here.
Thus
***FOR THE LATEST INFORMATION on the evolving subscription options, please visit this page at CraftLit. It’s been through a few versions since this page was posted.***
CraftLit and Just the Books (as you may know) are free podcasts where I take you through the old books that are supposed to be dry and boring and I—as I like to say—teach to the joke. I’m all about knowing the good bits—the parts people sub-reference at parties and make other people feel small with. I hate that. I want everyone to get the jokes. The good bits are what it’s all about. That and, you know… understanding the stories in the first place.*
So.
CraftLit has crafty-chat, then the book bits. Just the Books has occasional newsy bookish bits, then the books.
Yes, I know. I’m getting to Chaucer.
Recently I started a premium subscription deal where, for $5 a month, you can keep getting CraftLit and JtB for free AND get freebies on the side. Little exclusive dealies that you might like.
Things like Chaucer! And Wuthering Heights! And audiobook mp3s for the new(ish) mystery Cool for Cats—which you actually cannot get anywhere else!
Right now, C4C and Wuthering Heights** are are running concurrently with new audio uploaded regularly—Chaucer’s on hold for a bit while our reader convalesces. As we finish one book, I’ll come up with another.
There are still a few I’ve not touched.
and click the little red banner in the upper right corner.
And if you don’t want to subscribe, don’t worry. For one thing, this deal isn’t going anywhere. You’ll be able to subscribe and get this audio whenever you like. And even if you never subscribe, when the books are completed we’ll be offering the audiobook versions for sale as downloads you can purchase all at once (without having to wait for the serial-like, regular updates). Subscribers will have free access to the all-in-one-audiobook compilations, too, at that point.
So there you have it. Lots of options.
Lots of audio.
Lots of good, clean, fun.
Well… unless you listen to Chaucer. Then I can’t guarantee the “clean” part.
*but not like a scholar. I’m not. I’m a former high school English teacher who likes good stories. And jokes. And good jokes.
**This is the version recorded by Ruth Golding of Flatland/Librivox fame. She’s marvelous!
That’s all.
I’ve had a bit of a scare.
A big bit of a scare.
You may have heard of our little kerfuffle out here in Northern Virginia (or actually, the entire Eastern Seaboard). We had a wee bit of a storm, it only lasted maybe forty minutes. However, the initial hit was like unto a large Mac truck cruising through our complex. It is a testimony to something or someone or Providence or [insert preferred source for thanks here] that we didn’t have any trees coming through our windows or roofs, Poltergeist-like (see number 4), and only lost power for two days.
When we awoke Saturday morning the husband and I knew that we should not open the fridge or freezer. Instead we decided to drive until we found a place open where we could get food. “Surely,” we foolishly thought, “Reston wasn’t as badly hit.”
It was.
We were nearly to West Virginia before we found food and power (and air conditioning) in Historic Leesburg, a lovely little place experiencing a little trouble with their County Courthouse railing.
Loudon Country Courthouse’s Fence
We had a lovely meal at a little deli and a little walk and then thought maybe we could go put our feet in the river. We went on a little hike to a particularly rancid little beach, but the hike was shady and that was fine. Then we thought we’d take Historic White’s Ferry across the water to Maryland and head home.
This is where our day became Zombieland.
It was impossible to find power. It was impossible to find gas (well… almost impossible because I wouldn’t be here typing if it had been completely impossible). It was impossible to find anything open-slash-to do.
It was even impossible to knit on a 115 °-heat-index-day.
I had flashbacks to 9/11 and trying to find the Red Cross Shelter in NJ. This time it was finding a hotel with AC (or a hotel at all).
“Full.”
“Full.”
“Sorry, full.”
“Full up.”
“No room at the inn.”
“I heard there are rooms in Winchester, VA.”
“Yes, we have rooms on a walk-in basis only.”
So we went home. We checked on the cat (she’s fine fine fine). We decided that since we’d left the windows open and the place was coolish during the storm (at least the temp had dropped a bit during it) that we might be okay*. So we stayed the night Saturday night. Power came on (mostly) at 3am, but the AC was broken. The Interwebs were broken. No one knew anything and most of the phones didn’t seem to connect. Again, shades on 9/11.
And this, my friends is where my little paper thing comes into play. We were a little scared driving around in the car that Saturday.
I didn’t have a map.
I haven’t used a paper map for years. I used to have a Thomas’ Guide when I was in LA which I used like a Bible (and which was as dog-eared and loved, to be honest). It was a lovely thing. A thing of beauty. And I have spurned it.
And I have paid the price.
Once the power went down, the towers went down, the phones were out, the 3G/4G was out.
And we were blind.
I mean, as the daughter of a geographer I’d be hounded out of the corps if I didn’t have a decent sense of direction (oh look… we’re heading west… I think West Virginia is this way…) but beyond that? We had nothing. I navigated this country blithely with my children in the back of the car, 100% at the mercy of a cell phone tower outage, using nothing but an iPhone to make it through Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia.
I was an idiot.
Lucky, yes.
But an idiot nonetheless.
We had to scramble to get to AC and Internet for work and for sanity, so we went nearer my husband’s work in New Jersey (he works remotely from home most days). We visited some sights and had a very nice dinner in Philly.
Thing 2 at the Camden Aquarium
We were in a lovely hotel with a pool and AC and all that, and hoping things were better in VA, we decided to come back today. The boys wanted some ocean action so we took the most direct/easy route and went to Atlantic City.
Big Score!
Things 1&2 getting their beach on
And what did I do before heading out to come home?
I bought a map.
I recommend you do a bit of that too.
It’s a scary thing, flying without instruments. I think I won’t be reading on an electronic device tonight either.
*I know, we totally sound like wimps, but it’s shocking to be put into this position when you’re living in a world that is NOT SET UP to run without power. Our air flow in the apartment is lousy. We have no way to preserve foods other than a refrigerator. It’s creepy just how dependent we’ve become.
MamaO is Heather Ordover, author, designer, mother and knitter... not necessarily in that order. You can get posts from this blog sent directly to your inbox by signing up below, Follow her on Twitter and Like her on Facebook if you're feeling friendly-like.
Vogue Knitting Winter 2013/2014
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