MaggieBKnits

(That title gets me humming Proud Mary, but I will spare you.) No knitting in this post, although, yes, I have been knitting (yay) Instead-- here's one of my boys: He has just --Today!!-- passed his Private Pilot check ride and is a newly minted FAA certified Private Pilot. Lots and lots of work involved in that certificate! So proud of you, dude.  Love you lots and lots, too.

I am a member of a knitting group that meets once a week at a local library. One of the joys of the group is meeting knitters from many different backgrounds and with a wide array of knitting abilities and interests. Another is, frankly, an hour and a half of dedicated knitting time! The precious woman who started it all is such a delight-- she will try anything, knitting-wise, and I mean anything.  She is insatiably curious, intrepid, bold and joyfully flings herself into new projects. Great fun. Today we all met, but there were only three of us. And I got to help another knitter a bit. She is a very talented knitter (originally from Ireland and oh I love her accent), and had two beautifully knitted socks, whose toes she wanted to graft, but she had never tried to do Kitchener Stitch.  She asked if I'd ever done it, and I said, oh yes, it is a great technique I really love. She said, "well, I probably need to be somewhere quiet and alone to figure it out." I wasn...

I love knitting in January. All the chaos (joyous though it is) of Thanksgiving and Christmas is over, the decorations are stored (well, sort of stored.) Carrying them upstairs to the attic is on my list for the day.  Really. Promise! Don't believe me, eh? All right I will go do it right now.  Hold on a sec... Done.  Wow. Easy. (accountability-by-blog 👍)  So- back to "I love January Knitting." Anything warm and wooly that I start, I have a fighting chance of finishing in time to be useful before the warm weather arrives.  The possibilities seem endless.   The year seems endless. Even with the non-warm-and-wooly items (filmy shawls, for instance) I feel flooded with endless hope and potential.   Ideas burgeon at an astonishing rate, faster than I can write them down. Naturally this necessitated a foray into my chaotic fiber den  knitting room to paw thru old projects and yarn.   I happened across a project ...

I must be unhinged. Yesterday I started a new project (let us not even count the already existing projects, aka wips). The project, yes, requires those shorter circular needles and their annoyingly short grip-this-part-of-the-needle parts. It is-- another Very Warm Hat. I have never had such a dramatic response from my family, to something that I knit. Consider the Awesomeness of Elizabeth Zimmermann:   My son-#2-in-Colorado (where let me tell you the high yesterday was 6 degrees Fahrenheit so he really wants his hat) is hourly checking the progress of the hat I mailed to him on Tuesday morning.  Sons #1 and #3 have both admired the finished hats, and politely indicated they might, in fact, want one.  Husband loves his and wears it literally any time he goes outside in the cold. Even, sometimes, to work.   My daughter, who otherwise considers me Far From Cool (which I consider quite the compliment, frankly, when I see what passes for Cool) also likes it a...

My hands have been so sore, since finishing Mark's hat,  that I haven't wanted to even touch my other knitting projects.  This has gotten me thinking-- what if I were a Shetlander, say, 75 years ago, and my knitting was a crucial financial contribution to my household? It would be awful if I couldn't knit fast, and for an extended time, without serious pain. I feel like some sort of knitting cripple: and am wondering if my knitting style is excessively cramp-inducing, or if I can't "go the distance" for some other reason. Today I --finally-- feel less sore. So, I think I will pick up some knitting, and pay close attention to how I hold things, how I work, whether I squeeze the needles too tightly, whatever. Make adjustments and see how it goes. I would like to be able to do a lot of knitting without fatigue or cramping: maybe I can figure it out. Never too old to learn something new!! Gratuitous picture of a crabby Aussie (ours) who doesn't care if...

Warning. Knitting frantically for 3 days straight, with 16" circular needles, will, in all probability, cause some, well, let's just say, hand discomfort. The good news: the hat for Son #2 is done. Looks pretty darn good, doesn't it? So, the bad news?  This is where I was when he and Rich left to drive to the airport.   Wrong picture.  Whoops.  How did I think there was a circular knitting needle still in that (genuinely finished!) hat? Brain meltdown?  Flips frantically thru the pictures... nope... haven't got a pic of the hat When-He-Left. (Frankly, I was a little weepy so its not that surprising.) OK so  -- I was just starting the shaping decreases at the second end. Pretend you see a picture.  So close.   When I *finally* finished, and sent him the photos of the finished hat, he was in the boarding area for his flight.  I'm going to overnight it to him, for a surprise.  Here is what it...