There’s only one unbreakable rule for making the MARA scarf. You must use yarn that you love. The sensation of soft yarn as it slides over tender flesh should be a quiet pleasure. No matter what’s happening in the world around you as you knit, your yarn should be a pleasant companion for the many hours you’ll spend with it.
LAURA PHILLIPS can be found at [email protected] and www.lauraphillips.net and also at www.thelandofmoo.com.
KIM HELMICK’S BASIC RIBBED SOCKS—CUFF DOWN
Socks are a wonderful knitting project. They are small and portable, so I can work on them anywhere. They also provide the opportunity to learn every knitting skill imaginable without a huge commitment of resources or time. Different forms of short rows, color work, lace, or cables—socks allow the knitter to experiment with new techniques. This is my basic, no-frills beginner sock pattern, written so that even fairly new knitters can succeed with their first sock project.
Materials
6-ply sock yarn of choice
U.S. size 3 double-pointed needles—set of five
Tapestry needle for grafting toe and weaving in ends
Gauge
5½ to 6 stitches per inch
Abbreviations
k = knit
k2tog = knit 2 sts together
ktbl = knit through the back of the loop
p = purl
p2tog = purl 2 sts together
RS = right side
ssk = slip 2 sts, separately, knitwise, then knit them together
from this position
WS = wrong side
Cuff
Cast on 48 stitches loosely. (Cast on over two needles if necessary.) Being careful not to twist stitches, join in the round.
Work in k2, p2 rib pattern until sock leg is desired length (4 to 7 inches).
Heel Flap
Leave half the total stitches (24 sts) aside for the time being. Place the remaining 24 stitches on one needle, and work back and forth as follows:
Row 1 (RS): sl 1, *k1, sl 1, repeat pattern from * to last stitch, k1
Row 2 (WS): sl 1, k across row
Repeat these two rows 11 or 12 more times (ending with Row 2) until heel flap measures approximately 2 inches.
Turn Heel
Continuing on the 24 stitches of the heel flap and beginning with a right-side row:
Row 1: sl 1, k12, k2tog, k1, turn (8 sts remain unworked
on end)
Row 2: sl 1, p3, p2tog, p1, turn (8 sts)
Row 3: sl 1, k4, k2tog, k1, turn (6 sts)
Row 4: sl 1, p5, p2tog, p1, turn (6 sts)
Row 5: sl 1, k6, k2tog, k1, turn (4 sts)
Row 6: sl 1, p7, p2tog, p1, turn (4 sts)
Row 7: sl 1, k8, k2tog, k1, turn (2 sts)
Row 8: sl 1, p9, p2tog, p1, turn (2 sts)
Row 9: sl 1, k10, k2tog, k1, turn (0 sts)
Row 10: sl 1, p11, p2tog, p1, turn (0 sts)—14 sts total
remain on needle
Pick Up Gusset Stitches
Knit across the 14 stitches on your heel. Using an empty needle (now designated as Needle 1), continue on and pick up and knit the 12 or 13 slipped stitches along the side of the heel flap. Pick up an extra stitch at the end (close to your instep stitches) to help avoid a hole at the top of your gusset.
Needles 2 and 3 hold the instep stitches. Work in k2, p2 pattern across these two needles.
Grab the last empty needle (now designated Needle 4) and pick up and knit an extra stitch at the beginning plus the 12 or 13 slipped stitches from along the side of the heel flap. Continue to knit 7 stitches (half of the 14) off the original needle holding your heel stitches. Slip the other 7 sts onto the beginning of Needle 1. You now have an empty needle to continue knitting in the round.
Gusset Decreases
Round 1: Needle 1—k7, k remaining sts through the back of the loop (ktbl). (This twists the stitches and prevents a line of small holes.) Needles 2 and 3—work in k2, p2 pattern across. Needle 4—ktbl until 7 sts remain, k7.
Round 2: Needle 1—k to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1. Needles 2 and 3—work in k2, p2 pattern across. Needle 4—k1, ssk, k to end.
Round 3: Needle 1—k across. Needles 2 and 3—work in k2, p2 pattern across. Needle 4—k across.
Repeat Rounds 2 and 3 until 12 stitches remain on Needles 1 and 4.
Foot
Continue to knit the stitches on Needles 1 and 4 (sole stitches) and follow the rib pattern on Needles 2 and 3 (instep stitches) until sock measures 1¾ inches less than total length of foot. (You can gently try the sock on. You want to knit the foot up to the point of the bottom of your big toe.)
Toe Decreases
Round 1 (decrease round): Needle 1—k to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1. Needle 2—k1, ssk, k across. Needle 3—k to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1. Needle 4—k1, ssk, k across.
Round 2: Knit all stitches around.
Round 3: Knit all stitches around.
Round 4: Repeat Round 1 (the decrease round).
Repeat Rounds 3 and 4 (knit all round and a decrease round) until 8 stitches remain on each needle. Then do decrease rounds only until 4 stitches remain on each needle.
Graft toe using kitchener stitch.
Sew in ends.
KIM HELMICK is a freelance writer and photographer from Iowa who also edits the monthly magazine Fort Dodge Today. Her knitting and photography blog can be found at http://kshotz.blogspot.com.
RACHAEL HERRON: HOW TO KNIT IN THE DARK
Touch is as important as sight. A purl bump is as evocative as a smile, and a ribbed ridge can suggest where to turn next.
A double-point needle, left in the wrong place underneath a pillow, can be a fine murder weapon, if one knows just how one’s enemy might fall heavily asleep. It would be hard to prove, of course. And that’s just the point.
In the dark, soft is always soft.
The soothing sound of knitting needles clicking in the dark becomes even more relaxing—a nighttime chant, a prayer, the rhythmic rosary of craft.
Doing something when you can only trust the tips of your fingers to guide you is a good test of skill. Close your eyes right now. Do what you’re doing. See how far you get.
Night knitting, folded correctly, is the best kind of pillow. The working yarn has to trail across something. And if it happens to trail across the person next to you, make it count. Make it work.
Glow-in-the-dark needles are like the Captain EO ride at Disneyland—it was a good idea for a limited time, but was the headache really worth it?
When you wake from a good dream, knit a few stitches. This way, you catch the dream and keep it forever.
Keep just one candle lit when you’re working on something important. He’ll tell you he’s happy his sweater is almost done, but you’ll know what he really means—you look more beautiful than ever in the soft glow, and you feel it when he kisses you over the needles.
RACHAEL HERRON is the author of How to Knit a Love Song (Avon), the first of the Cypress Hollow Yarns series. She writes a blog (http://www.yarnagogo.com) and lives in Oakland with her family, many spinning wheels, and a collection of animals that defies enumeration.
TERRI DULONG: DON’T LOOK BACK!
My mother taught me how to knit as a child and although I learned all the basics, after I reached my late teens it would be a forty-year hiatus until I had needles in my hands again. It was my high school girlfriend Alice who coerced me to return to knitting five years ago and since then . . . I’ve never looked back. Seldom does a day pass that I don’t knit at least a few rows.
Between all the wonderful yarns now available and a multitude of patterns, I’m fully and completely addicted to this extremely relaxing activity. Knitting soothes my soul, allows my mind to wander, and produces lovely handmade items both for myself and to give as gifts.
Courtesy of my friend Alice Jordan, I’m sharing a very simple pattern to make dishcloths or facecloths and they’re a nice gift for friends and family. Great for the seasoned knitter or the new beginner. So grab t
hat yarn and those needles and get started!
Yarn: 100% cotton (such as Sugar and Cream by Lily) Needles: U.S. size 8
Cast on 35 stitches.
Row 1: k3, *k1, p1, repeat from * to last 3 sts, k3
Row 2: k3, *k1, p1, repeat from * to last 3sts, k3
Repeat Rows 1 and 2 until the piece measures 7½ inches
or desired length.
Bind off. Weave tails in.
TERRI DULONG is the author of Spinning Forward and Casting About (Kensington), the first two books in her Cedar Key series. You can visit Terri at www.terridulong.com and contact her at [email protected].
CAROLINE LEAVITT: THE SWEATER
I’ve been knitting since I was a Girl Scout, but I’m not an expert knitter. I’m often impatient and what I really love is simply the peace and pleasure of easy knitting while I’m watching a movie (I can never do just one thing at a time). There was a time, though, when I made very intricately designed sweaters. My first husband wanted a sweater. “Make it with a brontosaurus feeding on vegetation on it,” he said, and because I loved him, I said I’d try. I had no idea how to do it, but I first made countless drawings of what I thought the sweater should look like. Then I used graph paper and colored pencils to block it out, and finally I was ready to fling myself into the project. Surrounded by balls of brown, green, red, beige, and sky blue, I made a scene on a sweater! The sweater took me four months but it was exquisitely gorgeous. Worth every stitch! My husband loved it and wore it. Right up until the moment I found out that he had been cheating on me. I took the sweater from his drawer and scissored it up and threw it in the trash. He took it out and tried to sew it back together. I scissored it up more. Now, happily remarried and still knitting, I know I shouldn’t have destroyed that sweater. The marriage was over, but there was no reason for that gorgeous sweater to be!
CAROLINE LEAVITT’ss ninth novel is Pictures of You (Algonquin Books). A book critic for People Weekly and a book columnist for the Boston Globe, she can be reached at http://www.carolineleavitt.com.
JEAN BRASHEAR: THE FOURTH TIME’S THE CHARM . . .
You could view me as a walking knitting disaster (which I have been) or perhaps a moderate success story, I guess. My first attempt at knitting, I was eight or nine and a Camp Fire Girl with a leader who wanted us to learn—quickly. Picture little kid, skinny needles, wicked splitty yarn. Add too-tight stitches, short deadline, no one at home who knows how to knit, and you have a recipe for tears and a sick stomach. It was years before I could make myself tackle knitting again.
Fast-forward to the young woman who decides to create her own dress from a yarn halter top attached to cascading rows of scrap fabrics (don’t ask—I have no idea what I was thinking). I was still too traumatized to knit, so I quickly switched to crochet, and because I was poor, I found a great deal on rug yarn and jumped on it. (Yes, ouch.) The dress actually drew a great deal of admiration (probably because of the lack of undergarment, but let’s not go there) but scratchy does not begin to describe the experience. Add in summer heat, well . . . Disaster Number Two.
I live in the South, and there’s not much call for warm knits (thank heavens nowadays there are summer yarns) so I cannot begin to tell you what was going on in my head with Disaster Number Three, the floor-length knitted skirt (in bold red, white, and blue stripes, no less) I decided I needed to make. Straight skirt? Oh, nooooo—could I be that rational? That circumspect? (Impulsiveness remains, to this day, a challenge I haven’t conquered—with a sizable dose of stubborn thrown in, an occasionally lethal combination.) This was a full skirt, row upon row upon row that I got so sick of (not to mention so hot working on) but wouldn’t quit, that my grandmother took pity on me and spelled me. (Though I’m pretty sure she was shaking her head the whole time—love is a wondrous thing, isn’t it? Not only did she swelter along with me, but she never told me I was an idiot.) I have no idea what happened to that skirt, but a whole village could stay warm inside what amounted to a knitted teepee, I swear.
Later on, when I had children, I tackled knitting again and actually turned out some sweaters—with patterns, even! A gray vest sweater for my beloved and a memorable (never let four-year-old boys pick out their own yarn) green and orange striped one for my son (don’t know what happened to that one either . . . a mercy, IMO). So . . . fourth time’s the charm. Sort of.
Except that I still have Fear of Socks (one sock on the needles as we speak . . . been there for six months, and I’ve finished at least a dozen other projects in the meantime—but I’m not giving up, I swear, just . . . steeling myself). And I still have a lamentable tendency to charge off on my own, sans pattern . . . only I’m no knitting genius and there’s no budding pattern maker in me. I still don’t know what all the abbreviations mean and I don’t want to have to think too hard while I’m knitting because I mostly do it while I’m visiting with people or watching whatever, um, interesting TV choices (because there can’t be just one, right?) my beloved is making (so I can stay near him without lunging for the remote) and so . . . I guess the moral is that you don’t have to be a gifted knitter like Barbara Bretton or any of the other knitting goddesses who allow me to hang around when I’m clearly the B Team . . . knitting can still be fun. And therapy.
Award-winning romance author JEAN BRASHEAR brings a wistful, funny voice to women’s fiction in The Goddess of Fried Okra (Bell Bridge Books). “Wholly original, funny and poignant,” says New York Times bestselling author Susan Wiggs. Details at .www.jeanbrashear.com.
MAURA ANDERSON: THE WEDDING SHAWL
I’m a firm believer that gifts you make for another person are some of the most precious gifts you can give. Every part of the process of creation and crafting is focused on the person you are making the gift for, from the choice of pattern and material to the actual crafting. You can’t help but think of the person as you work, and those thoughts, memories, and wishes seem to permeate the item you’re making, becoming one with the gift forever. This gift becomes one of the magical gifts whose meaning far surpasses the physical item.
This is the tale of one of those special gifts.
When I moved to the Pacific Northwest in 1995, I was introduced to a woman, Sue, who shared a lot of interests and we became good friends. She and her husband helped encourage me in my career and my private life. They were guests at my wedding and were goddess-parents of my youngest son. We were often in touch and shared a lot. Sue’s husband was having some serious health issues and Sue had her own physical problems but when I needed to touch base or just vent, Sue was only a phone call or instant message away.
I tried hard to be as good a friend in return, though I admit I often felt helpless to do much more than provide a friendly hug and a soft shoulder. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling to not be able to do more, but I did my best. Then the unthinkable happened—Sue’s husband died, most likely from a medication interaction in his prescribed medications. The police called my husband and me in the middle of the night and we raced to Sue’s house. My husband took care of Sue while I helped with her husband’s body. I know it sounds gruesome but I am still grateful for the chance to say good-bye to her husband and preserve as much of his dignity as I could while shielding Sue as best I could as well.
Sue’s loss was traumatic. I can’t even begin to understand or say I know what she felt because I did not. I still do not. I tried to show her that I loved her and cared about her but eventually she moved out of the local area to try to figure out how she was going to continue on as a widow and what she wanted to do. We fell out of touch for the last three or four years with only the occasional update or e-mail but I still thought about her and wished her well.
About six months ago, I got a call from Sue with some fantastic news. She had met a wonderful man and was living with him but wanted to know if I would be her maid of honor at her upcoming wedding. She sounded great—probably the most upbeat and positive I’d heard her in years and really happy. Everything I wanted for her—happi
ness and security—was on the horizon. I told her I was thrilled to be her maid of honor and we shared a lot of updates before I had to get off the phone.
I immediately knew I wanted to make her something for her wedding. Something special. Something that spoke to her and myself and the journey we’d traveled together and apart. Something that could capture the memories and the dreams we’d shared with each other. I’d taken up knitting after she moved away; I loved lace knitting and I remembered how much Sue loved lace and also how much she hated being cold and that she hated clothes with sleeves. Not the best combination, especially in the Pacific Northwest. Suddenly, I knew what to knit—a shawl. The very first lace shawl I ever knit would be for Sue.
From there I went on a hunt for a pattern. There are a lot of patterns out there and I’m a fan of a site called Ravelry (www.ravelry.com), where knitters and crocheters gather and you can see patterns, yarns, and people’s projects and even buy patterns. I must have looked at hundreds of lace shawl patterns—I must have saved two-thirds of them because I knew someday I wanted to knit them—but when I saw a pattern called Oriental Impressions Triangle by Sylvie Beez, I knew that was the right shawl for Sue. If you want to see the shawl pattern I chose, you can go to http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/oriental-impressions-triangle.
Spun by Sorcery Page 25