Malta

I must admit, I knew next to nothing about Malta before the impulse and opportunity to travel there came up. The only cultural reference I had was the movie and book "The Maltese Falcon", but aside that the whole story takes place in Hollywood, I was intrigued.

Now that I've been, I can only say it's downright weird. Not in a bad way, either.

It's a tiny island- about the size of Queens- and the most densely populated country in Europe. There are Neolithic temple ruins everywhere. Sometimes it's hard to figure out what's a ruin and what's just an abandoned building since it's all built with the same yellow limestone. Malta was an important strategic military ground for thousands of years, and has been occupied by pretty much everyone in the past 6000 years. All the confluence of cultures is apparent in the people, the food, the architecture and art. Phoenicians, Romans, Greeks, Sicilians, the Knights of St John by order of the Pope, French and British have all ruled and left their mark on the islands, and there is a strong African and MidEastern influence as well. Everyone speaks Maltese, and I didn't encounter a single person who didn't speak perfect English as well.





I don't think I saw one freestanding house on the entire island. It's pretty crowded, and nothing that so much resembles a park is to be found anywhere. 6000 years of civilization and that island is treeless and devoid of any sort of natural landscape.







Valletta, the capital, rises out of the sea surrounded by astoundingly huge city walls. It's on a steeply hilly peninsula with narrow streets, making it seem even more claustrophobic.











Oooh, and the food. Mostly Italian. Lots of seafood. They had these delicious little empanada sorts of nibbles called pastizzi, which are filled with either cheese or peas. They do wonders to get you up the steep hills there.





And I did briefly encounter a falcon of sorts:

Etsy Shop Update!

I just got done with a shop update- mostly handpainted top and roving.


Romney top in "Warbler"


Bombyx Silk sliver in "Spruce"


Merino top in "Treeline"

I will have more silk bells listed later this week.

The Week in Knitting

Very little spinning has been done lately, but circumstances have been perfect for getting some knitting done. I generally have to be home to spin, and there has been a lack of being home since I've been home.

Anyway, here is what is on the needles:

The Snapdragon Tam by Ysolda. I've never made a tam before and I feel brave branching out from my usual beanie and cloche comfort zone.



I'm using a discontinued Rowan Yarn- Yorkshire tweed. It's a DK weight 100% wool yarn. I actually bought the yarn to do this pattern:



I'm really glad I knew to walk away from that after just a few intarsia rows. The fact that there would be over 1000 ends to weave in was a good sign that I should stop. Did I mention that I also tried to knit this in the round?



The cable pattern on the Snapdragon is a bit complex and requires some brain power, but it's fairly simple in design and easy to memorize.

Also on the needles this week is the Avast. After letting the cabled band sit for ages, I picked up stitches along side it and started a fairly endless field of stockinette stitch.



Since I can knit this with my eyes closed, I was able to finish the body up to the pits plus one sleeve in this past week...and I've only got another inch to go on sleeve #2. Then it's joining everything together for the yoke. Maybe I can get the knitting done on this by the weekend.

It's a men's large (44 inches). I'm using my standard go-to worsted weight yarn, Valley Yarns Northhampton. This stuff is great for everyday projects. It's fairly soft, it looks great after wear and it's inexpensive.





I'm trying to make time for a big Etsy shop upload today- lots of handpainted roving this time around. I've had this stuff dyed up for a month now and just haven't been home during daylight to photograph it until yesterday.

Damson

I picked out the Damson pattern for my travels last month. It's mostly garter and stockinette stitch with some yarn overs thrown in. Easy to memorize and fairly mindless. I pulled out a skein of Malabrigo sock that has been in my stash for a while, waiting for the right project to call home:



It's in Botticelli Red. I actually thought it would be used for a pair of sexy vampy lacy socks, but the Damson called to it instead.

I cranked through this shawl and had it pretty much done within the week. It even made the trek with me to the top of Pilatus:



And then crap crapity crap crap crap. I ran out of yarn on the last row. I considered doing the scallop edging and bind-off in a contrasting color, but that just screams "I've run out of yarn". I've decided to break my yarn diet (as this is truly an emergency) and buy another skein of Malabrigo. I know that the dye lots may not match up, but I'm hoping it would be similar enough to not be a huge difference.

I guess that my little personal indulgence of not swatching for scarves and shawls and other non-fitted things has just come back to bite me in the ass.

Has Anyone Had This Happen?

Please tell me yes.

I'm working on the Snapdragon Tam. It's a bit complex so it requires some concentration to follow the pattern, but it's well written and not terribly difficult. I started it on the plane ride home on Sunday and I've been able to get a few rows in on the bus every morning this week.

I picked it up yesterday morning and I could not, for the life of me, figure out what was going wrong. I was at the start of a new row, but the pattern had ceased to make sense and fit in with the existing pattern. I searched for my mistakes, went back to see if I accidentally skipped a row or lost my mind on the previously row and interpreted it wrong. Crossed my cables the wrong way? Nope, they look ok.

I spent way too much time on this. I checked Ravelry and Ysolda's website for corrections or anyone having similar problems, but got nothing but raves about the pattern editors. Finally, as I was about to frog it back a few rows to start out where I thought I had a grip on things, I noticed something. I had two stitch markers designating the beginning of the round. The first one was correct, and the second one must have been lying around loose in my project bag and slipped onto the needles in the exact spot where I had stopped. So I wasn't at the beginning of the round after all, HA! I simultaneously felt relief that I didn't have to tink back and I wasn't crazy, but extremely dumb that I didn't just hold the work back a few inches and see the bigger picture and save my self an hour of angst.

Sneaky stitch marker.

12 Sweaters. 12 Months. Or Not.

I hate setting goals for myself, especially when it comes to something that I do for fun in my spare time. I'm terrible at finding something realistic and yet challenging, so I tend to just ignore my fibery failings and shortcomings.

Even more than personal goals, I hate January 1-centric goals. Everyone always vows to do something life changing and fabulous to change what they hate about themselves. Everyone is an optimist on January 1st. This is all good, but the gym is usually empty by the third week into the year.

So here it is, the first day of the last month of the year. I am my usual scroogey self. I am going to take this opportunity to make the rather bold statement that I am ready to knit down my stash to scraps this coming year. I realize this could be a lost cause by the third week of January, but I am in love with the idea of having less yarn and more clothes. As much as I love knitting socks, they can take me as long as a sweater. Plus, sock yarn doesn't take up that much space. You would never even know I had a sock yarn stash if you came over.

So here is my tentative list, which I'm sure I'll be making modifications to as I go. I'm halfway ashamed that I share my living space with this much yarn, but for some odd reason the guilt does not apply to a gluttonous amount of knitwear.

1. Valley Yarns Northampton- 8 skeins. I'm using this for the Avast cardigan, which I started on the cable band last May but didn't pick it back up until now-ish.
2. 9 skeins of my Madder-dyed Alpaca. February Lady.
3. 12 skeins of Noro Silk Garden. Westland Sweater.
4. 2 giant skeins of my eucalyptus-dyed silk/merino/alpaca blend. Opulent Raglan.
5. 5 skeins Rowan soft chunky. Belle Cardigan maybe. I'm kind of at at a loss when it comes to yarn this chunky.
6. 5 skeins Rowan soft tweed that I overdyed in Alkanet. Yarn-Over Steek Vest. (what, a vest doesn't count?)
7. 7 skeins of wild apple hill farm Shetland yarn. I have no idea yet- it is needing a dye job. Then I'll decide.
8. 14 skeins of Elsebeth Lavold Silky Cashmere. It's only 612 yards- they are tiny skeins. Originally, I had a Norah Gaughn top picked out, but it would be more practical to do that one in a cottonish yarn. I was thinking a Hey Teach, but I'm open to suggestions.
9. 8oz Handspun merino. Thought I was making sock yarn. My sample lied. It's worsted.

10, 11, 12....I'm all out of sweater-stash yarn. I guess I'm going to have to start spinning up those fleeces that live under my bed.

______

Chapeau Marnier

Another FO to catch up on! This one was easy-peasy and fast. I started it on a Sunday night and was wearing it on Tuesday. It's the Chapeau Marnier from Knitty.



I used some Knit Picks Gloss fingering weight yarn that was in my stash for, oh, pretty much forever. I had made a pair of Hedera socks a couple of years ago with the gloss and hated the way it looked after one wear- shabby as hell. I took it as a good example of getting what you pay for. However, I thought that perhaps a garment that gets lighter wear then socks would make better use of the yarn, so I kept it hanging around in my stash.

The lace part of the brim required a little brain power, but once that was over and done with, it took me no time at all. Vroooom.

I threw it in my bag and wore it while I was away. It needs a good blocking still- the brim likes to flip up. I also want to get a nice ribbon for the brim and sew it into place. I just grabbed what I had in my sewing kit and tied it on as a quick fix.



It's cute, vintagey and wearable. Unlike some of my non-knit hats, I can crush this up and throw it in my bag when I'm not needing it. As much as I love handmade felt hats from a millinery (Toppers in Boston is my favorite), they are impracticle to travel with and easy to mangle.

Oddly enough, the shade of blue in my clapotis matches the hat! It's almost like having a matching set. Er. Not quite.