The Pattern

The pattern part of the story is less exotic because it takes place at home and on the phone with Sarah. Tho there was some listless conversation about "What are we going to make?" when I was visiting her in North Carolina in August — where it was, if possible, even more hot and humid than in New York and we really could not give any serious consideration to the subject.

Back home again as September swept over me, I was suddenly ready to get to it — September always hits me this way and I end up with admirable aspirations involving the gym, every closet in the house, and my  literary life, not to mention every knitting project in any state of not-done-ness.  Fortunately, I was able to focus my energy on the Koigu before committing myself too publicly to anything else.  And Sarah was presumably similarly inspired because we started plotting.

First, what kind of knitted garment do we both require?  Something cozy to wear around the house (or preferably in our respective leather chairs while knitting) in the evenings.  Not a sweater, exactly, nor a shawl.  Then, we remembered our Beyond the Triangle class with Brooke Nico at Vogue Knitting Live! in Seattle.  She gave ideas for adapting traditional triangle shawl patterns to knit other types of garments.  The one that came to mind was used 3 repeats (instead of the usual 2) of the triangular pattern to make a larger piece — and that, by widening the spines, you could make into a sort of loose jacket.  Imagine 2 triangles that make a right triangle (the dividing line between them is the spine).  Add a 3rd triangle and it lookes like 3/4 of a square (with 2 spines now).  Tack it together where you want your sleeves.  Brilliant!

And, lo and behold, did I happen to have a book of triangule lace shawl patterns?  Why yes, yes I did.  Evelyn A. Clark's magical little book Knitting Lace Triangles — which gives instruction in using or combining 4 basic lace patterns in lace triangular shawl design (with directions for transitioning from one lace to another that alone is worth the price of admission!).  We ordered a copy of the book for Sarah and decided to go with one of the book's patterns that pleased us both quite nicely.

At this point, I offered to do the swatching and number figuring (for adapting the shawl pattern to the 3/4 square with wide spines).  And I started poking around Ravelry too, just out of curiousity.  Saw some exquisite lace shawls!  And stumbled upon a reference to a 2nd edition of th Evelyn A. Clark's book.  Well, certainly I wanted to get my hands on that!  Only I did not seem to be able to do so.  I checked out my usual book sources and it was as if the 2nd edition did not exist — even though the first was out of print.  Curiouser and curiouser.  Beginning to doubt my own sanity just a little bit, I returned to Ravelry the next day and did indeed find the reference to the ghostly 2nd edition — and then discovered that it was an e-book!  Well, that explained everything!  And through the magic of Paypal I was able to suck the 2nd edition out of the Void and deposit it in my iPad.  And with all the basic information from the first book as well as additional lace & edging patterns, it is a terrific addition to my reference library (even tho I confess a preference for actual hold-in-my-hand books over e-books). 

The swatching I did — which makes fascinating knitting but, I think, poor reading — led us to decide on US 7 needles and stockinette rather than the garter versions of the lace patterns.  We ordered the circ needles (24" for getting started and 47" for later as the shawl gets wider) and they have arrived.  We have each wound our yarn from skeins to cakes.  I have all the numbers.  We are good to go.  We plan to cast on together on FaceTime and perhaps to set weekly goals for our little Knit Along.  

It is just a matter of getting started.  Yep, just a matter of getting started.  Any day now.  Any day that Sarah, who has 3 young children (2 of which have just started back to school and who play on soccer teams and the 3rd of which is a teething 11-month old who aspires to full toddler-hood and all the rights and privileges thereof) and a husband and a visiting mother-in-law — and they all subscibe to the custom of eating 3 times a day or more and have a clothes-wearing habit…..well, we just need about half an hour on FaceTime with no interruptions when we are both awake and metally alert (that East Coast/West Coast time difference gets us every time!).

Oh, it will happen.  In the meantime, I pulled out my Shipwreck Shawl project to take the edge off!