Now, I've given in more or less good-naturedly to this knitting infection. I've accepted that the tangled and fiddly gods of knitting have some sort of bizarre use for me. I have knitted, ripped, sworn, counted and tied myself to the sofa in their service. Slowly, I am acquiring something that might, if you squint at it in poor light, look like a preliminary and embryonic form of skill. But generally I have preserved a certain detachment from this knitting madness, an amused distance wherein I participate, but do not submerge. My first yarn-buying experience was restrained, even dignified.
Then, yesterday, I saw yarn. The shop colour-codes their beads, so you walk into whole sections that glow orange, or blue, or red, and there's green yarn with the malachite, and yellow with the amber. And it's beautiful yarn - mohair, mohair/wool, cotton, pure wool, mohair with strange bobbly bits. Great big chunky skeins of it. Jewel colours. Soft.
Everything went a bit black, and it wasn't just charcoal mohair and haematite. I came to clutching multiple skeins, drooling and babbling. Jo, with whom I was shopping, should have been restraining me, only she's also a colour fetishist and was also under the spell and kept on pointing out new and beautiful stuff.
I don't know how much I have. I don't know what weight it is. I have no idea what it's suitable for. But it's mine.
The purple is hand-dyed pure wool: the blue, strangely enough, is banana fibre. It has an amazing texture and a sort of slubby drift to the colour that I really like.
Can someone tell me if the weird mohair with the sort of loopy, bobbly bits stuck to it is particularly difficult to knit? I covet it, but it scared me. I feel I am not worthy.
8 comments:
Ohhhh yes... you're one of us now.
*cackles evilly*
*stops to reflect on where that zombie thing might have come from*
*remembers that zombies don't cackle*
*resumes cackle*
*wonders about peculiar use of asterisk brackets*
*doesn't care*
Umm... yes. Where were we?
The mohair isn't exactly hard to knit, but it's not great for a first project. By the time you've finished the swiss cheese scarf, it's probably worth trying it out, and if it gives grief you can just put it aside for a bit and try again later.
Problems to watch out for with mohair boucle (that would be the tecknikl term, "boucle"): the loops and such can make it hard to count stitches, and the stickiness of the fibre might also lead you to accidentally knit 2 together and such, so your rows may be even more erratic than at present.
And more worryingly, mohair is a bitch to pull out. So once you've made a mistake, you should give some serious thought to whether it's better just to live with it than to frog. This can be a hard decision to make as a newbie.
On the other hand, that stickiness means you're not likely to drop stitches; and the fabulous texture means you can knit something reeeeeelly easy and it will look sumptuous. I recommend doing basic garter stitch on huge (8mm-10mm or even much bigger) needles, for instance. You'll get a really drapey fabric - especially if you go with proper 15mm or 20mm broomsticks - and will be able to enjoy the exquisite yarn, without worrying about detailed stitchery.
Actually, enjoy it while you can. This is the kind of yarn that you will always admire, but once you're addicted to complicated stitchery like cables and lace, you'll struggle to do the kind of simple (boring) projects that mohair boucle wants to be. I can think of some openwork stitches that would work (would look fabulous, actually), but not many.
Anyway, I love your colour choices. And banana fibre is cool, isn't it? You can also get yarn made from maize, soya, seaweed...
Wow, those are gorgeous...
(Hmm, i need to go look over my stash, and see if I can justify adding to it - mmmmm, yarn...)
everymoment
I second Robynn, but would say as ell as big needles you want BLUNT ones, less likely to ctach those little boucles (could it be a noun?) with your points.
Lovely yarn, enjoy it.
Stash building = you're a knitter.
BTW - socks are easier, in some ways, you (nearly) always have the right side of the work facing you. But that can wait til you're ready.
Wow! Those are gorgeous. I too would have lost consciousness and emerged, blinking, with yarn.
I like Robynn's big needle mohair suggestion. I have quite a bit of mohair in my stash just waiting to be knit up.
Things I Hate About Blogger: non-threaded comments. Phooey.
Thanks for info on the boucle, Robynn, v. useful. Fortunately I'm too broke to buy it at the moment, but in another few weeks should feel up to it both financially and psychologically. I like the idea of enormous needles. Will check for blunt ones, Emily, useful tip, thanks!
Happy to have my taste/stash proclivities validated, but I am still unconvinced that I will ever be ready for socks.
But you don't need to knit socks. You can use those lovely dpns to knit mittens, tubular scarves, interesting hats, purses..........
And you NEVER have to purl in the round* - you just knit and knit and lovely stocking stitch drips off the needles :).
*except when you do
There's a pair of large wooden (or possibly bamboo) needles in the stash I gave you. Mohair can be really itchy next to the skin, so perhaps a scarf isn't the best plan. A rug sort of thing? Keeping those old knees warm while you watch Buffy?
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