and knitting

Project Spectrum: March

It's time for me to admit to myself that knit-alongs, or variations thereof, do not agree with me. Therefore I think I should recuse myself from "Lolly's" delightful Project Spectrum. I've thought of a few projects, but the crafty ones thus far have been cursed with failure or lack of effort.

Anyway, it's not as though I'm suffering from lack of projects. I'm still at work on my performance enhancing sweater. The needles I want to switch to for the ribbing haven't arrived, so I've switched to working on the sleeves. I know my affliction is an unusual one, but can I just say that I really enjoy knitting with DPNs?

And, thanks to a gift certificate from my parents, I've recently purchased 1000 Sweaters. It's fun to flip through the various combinations of bodies and sleeves. Rather like Fashion Plates! Some good projects will certainly come of this book.

To assuage my guilt over not completing a proper Project Spectrum project, here's a photo inspired by "Lolly's" Reading Rainbow post. To keep it simple, I decided to trim it down to red and pink books from my etiquette, hygiene and advice collection.

There's a fun assortment pictured here. From top to bottom:

That Girl in Your Mirror
Miss America Vonda Kay Van Dyke
1966

Sex and the Single Girl
Helen Gurley Brown
1962

Etiquette of To-Day
Edith B. Ordway
1913, rev. 1920

Vogue's Book of Brides
1929

Male Manners
Kay Corinth and Mary Sargent
1969

Amy Vanderbilt's Etiquette
Amy Vanderbilt
1952, rev. 1972

Factors in the Sex Life of Twenty-Two Hundred Women
Katharine Bement Davis
1929

Various and Sundry Links - March 30 2006

- Knitter's Rage (scroll down to the second question) [via Knit Think]

- Buy an actual torch from the 2006 Winter Olympics

- I'm not sure if I should thank my brother for sending me this link to a vintage baby octopus nightmare.

- Why aren't there knitting ads that look like this? [via]

- Trend: Burial with mobile phones. I'd love to see this one on The Daily Show's trend spotting segment.

- Brazil. It's different down there

- The NY Times has an article about the CFDA whine for copyright projection that I mentioned in a previous post. A lot of folks have written about it, including Andrea at Making Things.

Technorati tag: project spectrum

only boring people

Is there anything more boring than an in progress photo of a black raglan sweater?

Oh well.

Since restarting after the unfortunate yarn incident, I've made good progress on take 2 of the performance enhancing sweater. The fit is even better this time around. I'm now working on the bottom ribbing section, but I think the needles I'm using are going to kill me. I'm hoping I can find bamboo ones when I go to the LYS tonight.

Various and Sundry Links - March 23 2006

- Dedication Honors Britney Spears Giving Birth (warning: somewhat naughty content and not as funny as they wish they were)

- Dick Cheney's rider list of downtime requirements [via] is almost as entertaining as J. Lo's

- fastr is a totally addictive flickr game

- Pinku's husband is trying to win the robot bartender I mentioned a while back. I wonder if it can dance as well as it pours beer.

- Warning: do not attempt to practice House Gymnastics whilst under the influence of drugs or alcohol as this could lead to injury.

- The Song Tapper lets you find music by tapping out the rhythm on your keyboard

- This is why I avoid going to the co-op.

- ctl-alt-del [via]

Stitch and Bitch

I know a few of you are sick of the kvetching about the stitch and bitch trademark fight, but I wanted to point the rest of you to this list of fun examples of Intellectual Property Run Amok that I found via Lawrence Lessig's blog.

HUEY NEWTON’S widow is trademarking the phrase “Burn, Baby, Burn” for use as a BBQ sauce slogan.

FOR INCLUDING a 60-second piece of silence on their album, the Planets were threatened with a lawsuit by the estate of composer John Cage, which said they’d ripped off his silent work 4’33”. The Planets countered that the estate failed to specify which 60 of the 273 seconds in Cage’s piece had been pilfered.

THE PUBLISHER of Super Hero Happy Hour removed “Super” from the comic book title after Marvel and DC Comics stated they own the phrase “super heroes and variations thereof.”

Sew Fast Sew Easy's efforts to control all usage of the age old phrase stitch and bitch should make them a strong candidate for inclusion in this hall of lame.

Technorati tags: trademark stitch and bitch

carousel begins

Some of you were clamoring for a photo of the Aspen Neck Cowl in action. For some reason, my lovely sister thought that she looked a bit haggish not her best in this photo and demanded that I blur out her face. The end result is rather creepy in a Logan's Run sort of way, but it should give you a better idea of how the cowl looks when worn.

In other knitting news, I had a bit of trauma with my performance enhancing sweater. At some point I accidentally knit a couple of inches with a rogue black yarn, which created an odd stripe. Of course I did not notice this until many inches later. It's now been ripped out and I started over from scratch. I probably should have just ripped back to the error, but I discovered it at 10 PM at night and tore the whole thing out in a fit of pique. It's now back on the needles. I'll post a photo update soon.

Various and Sundry Links - March 17 2006

- I've been reading about the strange reactions some people have to Ambien. Perhaps the knitting accident above can also be blamed on the wonder drug. Let the class action lawsuit begin! Failing a financial settlement, insomniacs should at least get their own hymn like the glaucoma people do (turn your volume up!) [via].

- So, $cientology, you may have won THIS battle, but the million-year war for earth has just begun!

- Copycatfight [via]

The Council of Fashion Designers of America is meeting with members of Congress tomorrow to gather support for a bill to offer copyrightlike protection to clothing designs. While European Union law already contains similar provisions, the CFDA proposal would be a substantial change to the existing American framework. The proposed bill would, for the first time, prevent anyone from copying an original clothing design in the United States and give designers the exclusive right to make, import, distribute, and sell clothes based on their designs.

Seems idiotic to me, especially having read about The Fashion Piracy Paradox a few weeks back.

- When I was a kid, my garage sale fanatic mom bought me at least one of the Vicki Barr books by Helen Wells (also the author of the Cherry Ames books, another favorite of mine). I was pretty fascinated by the stewardesses, in part because of their gorgeous uniforms. However, I'm not a uniform freak like Cliff Muskiet. His site contains detailed photos of over 400 flight attendant outfits [via]. I love the hat on the Emirates airlines uniform (better photo on this flight attendant's LJ). The incredibly exhaustive collection even includes numerous photos of the amazing Braniff uniforms created by Pucci. More Braniff uniform photos here, including the Braniff Barbie that I highly covet.

- Carrie is so very vulgar, at least according to Manolo Blahnik.

- Harrison Ford is Steve Ballmer's evil twin, at least according to MyHeritage. When I play with the site using my photo I get an odd assortment of results: Sammi Cheng, Jessica Alba and Virginia Mayo. I don't think I resemble any of these people, but I'd trust the results more if the site didn't also identify the tile roof in the background behind me as Ole Bull and Margaret Thatcher.

- Take It Ease-Y - A good discussion in the post and comments on the whole concept of knitting and ease.

Project #34: Aspen Neck Cowl

I started this knit blog two years ago today -- right around the time I learned to knit. It seems appropriate that the finished project I am flaunting today is going to the person who taught me to knit, my wee sister Molly. Molly is working on her graduate degree and just completed her student teaching. She deserves a gift in recognition of all of that effort.

The Aspen Neck Cowl is a simple and elegant knit. It would be easy for a pastel color like this pink to look a bit twee, but the ridged reverse stockinette pattern gives it a modern architectural feel. You can wear the cowl slouched around your neck or pulled up like a hood. If you haven't yet knit in the round, this would be a great first project. I'd recommend doing as I did, and knit it inside out, so as to spend more time knitting and less time purling.

The yarn I used is the Pure Baby Alpaca by future global microbrand Fable Handknit. I didn't have much experience with alpaca, but was seduced by the description. The yarn itself is a bit less elastic than I'm used to with wool, but the fiber knits up to an incredibly soft fabric with a gorgeous halo. It's also very warm.

You'll be able to purchase this yarn online from pureknits, a shop that is opening very soon now open. They shipped my test order quickly and the yarn was packaged very nicely. I have a feeling this store will be a big hit.

Full disclosure: I'm a bit biased because the proprietress is one of my favorite knitters. No, I did not get a discount to say this. She has impeccable taste and I'm confident you guys will be as big a fan of her shop as I am.

The Project: Aspen Neck Cowl
The Yarn: Fable Handknit Pure Baby Alpaca in Sweet Pink purchased from pureknits (I used about 2 1/2 skeins)
The Needles: 3.75mm 16" circular
Started: February 23 2006
Finished: March 6 2006

Various and Sundry Links - March 10 2006

- Could you eat a knob at night?

- Sew Fast Sew Easy is up to more Yahoo group trademark chicanery. I'm rather frustrated with Yahoo and the way they let these idiots harass their customers.

- I visited The Museum of Russian Art yesterday. The building is gorgeous and the collection was amazing. There's also the obligatory museum shop, which sold Orenburg-style shawls and these interesting boa scarves by smARTWORKs.

- Libby Dole is a real class act. It's always good to send people surveys/donation requests in a format that looks like official tax documents.

- Knit your Barbie a teensy weensy fair isle cardie [via Enchanting Juno].

- Project Runway is finally done and though I was disappointed that Santino lost, Chloe was a deserving winner. What surprised me is that I thought Kara's decoy collection was the best of the lot. knitters anonymous has posted a copy of the handspun hat that Kara sent down the catwalk or you could order one directly from Kara.

- I want to go back to Scotland and live in this $7 million tree house!

- Swapatorium has been posting wonderful scans from a 1930s Sketchbook of a Girl.

- Diane Keaton Acts

bonnie prince charlie

"The Battle of Culloden (April 16, 1746), was the last military clash in mainland Britain, between the forces of the Jacobites (headed up by Bonnie Prince Charlie) and the British Army. It ended the 1745 Jacobite Rising, and was a massive defeat for the Jacobites".
[Wikipedia]

Alexander McQueen drew on the fashions and military uniform details from this pivotal moment in history for his most recent ready to wear collection.

The collection naturally also featured a lot of knitwear, including the cabled stockings shown here.

Since this is supposed to be a knit blog, I'll point you to a few knitwear highlights:

- an ivory-colored cabled bolero

- a wide-collared grey sweater coat and a similar sweater folded and wrapped into a jacket

- a tartan top layered with knit sleeves

I don't doubt that this collection will prove to be useful fodder for the knitting patterns that show up in next winter's magazines.

Various and Sundry Links - March 5 2006

- I've had a terrible cold for the past week, so it was interesting to see a microscopic view of what mucus looks like. Yum!

- Kate finds the best knit bags. I must recreate this one for myself.

- I hate American Airlines. We had a shockingly rude flight attendant on our way back from Nagoya last year. At least we didn't have an experience like this poor fellow.

- The Fashion Piracy Paradox

- A Sweet and Tender Terrorist

- Yeah, I'm a dork. That's why I think this origami Nazgul is really cool. [via]

- Stitchcraft airs today on Oxygen. It should be interesting -- even for you Lily Chin haters out there. Here are some details from The Hook and I:

The show is billed as a rare behind-the-scenes look at how knitting is used in the fashion industry. “You’ll see how Oscar de la Renta designs his knitwear line.” She says. And she says we’ll watch Adina Klein of Vogue put together a photo shoot. “The show is not about me. I’ll introduce the segments and talk a bit between stories.” Lily says the first show will also include a profile of one of my favorite designers, James Coviello.