G. Knerd

One thing that’s very dangerous about going to Germany is the yarn.  Germany is where the sock yarn comes from (Regia, Stoller & Schall, Trekking…), and as far as I can tell the German culture still embraces the idea of handicrafts like knitting.  You can be strolling around a department store (which might span several city blocks), minding your own business, when – suddenly – you find yourself in The Yarn Section.

That’s right, it’s completely normal for a department store to have a selection of yarns on par with a modest local yarn shop.  Just, you know, because while you’re out shopping you might end up needing a few balls of yarn, right?

Why can’t we figure that one out in America, huh?

I actually didn’t break my yarn diet too badly while I was there, though – I had very limited bag space, and somehow I managed to remember that fact whenever I was fondling a particular skein.  In the end, I returned to the US with this:

My favorite is the blue and white striped yarn.  Not because I like stripes (I’m finding I actually dislike them immensely except in rare circumstances), but because the dye pattern is based on the Swiss flag.

Yarn based on flags!  Why don’t we have that here?

Unfortunately, they only had Switzerland.  This will join the Danish, Portuguese, and Brazilian flag yarn in my stash that I found last time I went to Germany, all of them to eventually join the pair of German flag socks I made.

The other two yarns are both Woole Roedel, which is apparently a chain of stores in Germany.  If you speak German it seems that you can order online, but I can’t actually tell for sure.

I did also pick up a bit of yarn for my favorite knitting friends.  Erica (of the Wedding Blanket II) asked for “strange colors, and lots of stripes”.

Wish granted.

Shruti, on the other hand, was much harder to shop for.  She’s allergic to wool, which is bad enough in a muggle but just tragic in a knitter.  Also, the German sock yarn industry is pretty dominated by wool – they don’t really go in for cottons or synthetics (except insomuch as they can be paired with wool).

However, perseverance and a careful lookout for hot pink eventually yielded success in some synthetic-but-still-unbelievably-soft yarn:

It’s a little on the thick side for socks, but it might be great for gloves or a cute little hat or something.

And…that’s it for yarn from Europe.  Feels a little light now that I’m back at home – maybe I need to go back to get some more?

The Blanket Thief complains that I have a messed up view of karma because I basically think it works like a bank – that you  can take withdrawals in the form of good things happening to you, that you make deposits by both living through shitty things and doing good to others.  I think he thinks I’m taking the system too literally.

I’ve always had a problem with being too literal.  He knew that when he married me.

Anyway, a couple weeks ago a woman in my choir sent out a call to all the ‘knitters’ for any spare yarn or supplies they might have.  She works with at-risk youth, and apparently one of her new charges is living on about $30/month.  She’s also a knitter.

Can you imagine trying to sustain a yarn habit on just $30/month?  And that’s assuming you don’t have to pay for anything else, which is certainly not the situation this young lady is in.

Now, I have more knitting paraphernalia and stash than is really healthy for me to own, so I jumped at the idea that I could both de-stash and help out someone less fortunate.  I dug into the supplies first:

Even though I haven’t used straight knitting kneedles in who-knows-how-long, I have a relatively impressive collection of them.  So impressive, in fact, that I could put together a complete set from 0 to 11 for this young lady and still have multiple sets of most of the sizes still in my possession.  Not quite the same story with DPNs, but close.

Then I broke into the stash.  I tried to give her a range of weights and fibers – any young knitter should have some options to play with.  I didn’t give her anything too expensive (I’m not that generous), but there was some brand names like Lamb’s Pride and Cascade 220 along with some cheaper yarn I’m not likely to ever use.

All in all, it ended up being about 2 cubic feet of yarn and supplies.  I hope, wherever this girl is, that it’s bringing her some joy.

And hey, if it adds up to a little more positive karmic balance for me, I’m not going to say no.

Several years ago when I graduated from college, I went on a tour through Europe.  I stopped in on my Mormor (Grandma for those of you who don’t speak Danish) while I was there, and bestowed this upon her:

When visiting her again during our honeymoon (yes, the Blanket Thief is awesome enough that he let us spend the first few days of our honeymoon visiting my Mormor and not partaking of, erm, honeymoon-ly activities), I noticed that she still has this scarf, and she actually uses it whenever it’s cold (which it apparently was quite often this winter).

Of course, I completely forgot to take pictures of it when I saw it again, just like I apparently forgot to take pictures of it the first time when I gave it to her.  In fact, it seems like the only pictures I have of it are from when it was blocking.

I think I actually followed a pattern for this one, and I thought that pattern was from Knitty, but I can’t seem to find it in their patterns section.  I remember that I used alpaca yarn (possibly even Frog Tree), but I don’t remember what the name of the pattern was at all.  Did it have “leaves” in the title?  Maybe “branches”?  I may never find out.

Maybe I should call it Lethe, for it has made me forget everything about it.  At least it seems to have had no effect on my Mormor, who is luckily as sharp and spry as ever.

I’ve been spending some more time exploring my newest obsession with yarn dyeing.  And I’ve learned something very, very important – apparently, yarn shares some traits with babies, in that just because two skeins of yarn go through the same exact dye bath at the same time, that doesn’t necessarily make them identical.  Just like twins, which also might not be identical even if they’re gestated at the same time.

Sorry, I’ve had babies on the brain lately.  It’s apparently a consequence of reaching my mid-twenties and finding myself in a stable living situation.  Damn hormones.

Ooh, look, yarn!

For this dyeing session I decided to try doing a purple.  I’ve heard that purples are really hard colors to dye yarn, because the red and the blue get absorbed at different acidities/temperatures, and the color tends to “break” into a not-quite-even red-purple-blue mixture.

Frankly, that sounded perfect to me.  I lean strongly toward the not-quite-solid colors – they don’t have enough variation to hide a pattern, but they have enough variation to look interesting.

I actually decided to emphasize the effect by using not just purple dye, but also red and blue dye separately.  I rarely do things halfway.

What I thought was really fascinating was just how quickly the red was absorbed – it was mere seconds after pouring the dye into the water before the water turned blue and the sections of yarn that had been near red or purple dye turned pink.  It took much longer for the blue to be absorbed.

And when all was said and done, what did I have to show for it?  A couple skeins of a color that the Blanket Thief has dubbed “Pixie Dreams” – given their differences I’m going to say these are lots 1A and 1B.

That picture is pretty true to color, but it’s easier to see the fraternal nature of the skeins if I show you the non-flashed picture:

Which just goes to show you – sometimes it’s all about location, location, location, even within the dye bath.