Disaster Strikes

We all complain. Even with the happiest of lives, there’s something to find fault with. But sometimes you remember that your problems are inconsequential compared to what others face out there.

I don’t have to give good reasons to donate to charity – you know them already. Many of you already give to causes near and dear to your hearts, and maybe they’re piling up as the years go on. But when disaster strikes like it did in Haiti yesterday, consider chipping a little more into the global good-will fund, and give a hand.

For you knitters, YarnHarlot (Stephanie Pearl-McPhee) is (or was) keeping track of donations to MSF by knitters in an education/publicity campaign that she’s called “Tricoteuses Sans Frontières.” Check it out, and chip in if you can.

Seasons of change

Something in the last weeks has inspired me to start looking for a project. The crisp leaves, reading a book or two. Not a knitting project, per se, because I have enough of those on the books to keep me occupied for a while. No, instead I’m looking at two publishing projects -the first, a compilation of knitting patterns with spin toward yoga and wellness. Some garments, some gifts, some accessories for yoga practice, accompanied by reflections and suggestions for the harmonization of yoga and knitting, working toward a more peaceful, more healthful, more charitable life.
The second is again a book of patterns, perhaps children’s items, this time inspired by Russian folk stories and fairy tales. These ideas are far less concrete, and will be longer in development, but might be the most fun of all. I’ll give details as this progresses.

You’ll all be hearing from me soon with plans afoot.

-Katie

Nifedipine Dreams

At a certain age, you may have to stop taking good health for granted. If you’re lucky, the afflictions you face are minor annoyances. For those not so lucky, they’re daily battles. My father once mentioned to me that more and more, it seemed that people at parties or gatherings would just complain about their health. One can’t sleep, the other has sciatica, a third’s got high blood pressure. These are still the lucky ones. Egads.

I’m not quite there yet, but this is my first foray into the world of the ailing.

Since January of this year, I’ve been coping with a little-understood ailment called Raynaud’s Syndrome (also,  Phenomenon, Disease). In the cold, or in times of intense stress, blood circulation slows or stops to the outer extremities – the fingers and toes. The digits go sickly white, lose feeling, and after a while stiffen from lack of oxygen.When they warm up, they turn purple-blue and bright red. A veritable color-show before my very eyes.

The internet told me that Raynaud’s is pretty common for women in their 20’s and 30’s, and the more I talk to others, particularly those in the latter age bracket, the more I hear the groans of recognition. They experience it, their sisters, cousins, aunts. Some to a great extent, some very mildly.

My own Raynaud’s case is not fun, and is on the more brutal side of the spectrum for a “non-threatening” condition. My fingers start losing blood at the icy cold temperature of…72 degrees Fahrenheit. For those of you who saw the New England summer this year first-hand, you’ll know that the average temperature for the month of June was 65 degrees. Not fun, I said.

When I’m having a Raynaud’s attack, my hands still respond, the joints still move, but I’m relying solely on muscle memory. My fingers can’t feel when they’re poked by something sharp, when they touch something blisteringly hot, or as happens more often, when I’ve found my set of keys at the bottom of my bag.

My rheumatologist has been awesome. That’s right, I have a rheumatologist now. I’m incredibly thankful for being at Harvard and being able to make an appointment with any number of specialists and not be concerned about their competence or my insurance. My rheumatologist found some interesting things – early stage arthritis in many joints, a positive result on a somewhat inconclusive blood test – and has put me on a slew of medications. An inflammation-reducer. Something for the arthritis. And most recently, Nifedipine, for the Raynaud’s.

Nifedipine is a calcium-channel blocker, which lowers the blood pressure and keeps the blood vessels open wider. Great, you say? Well, maybe not if you have low blood pressure to begin with, as do many young, fit women. I haven’t come close to fainting yet, though, so I’m feeling positive. The interesting side-effect, though, and the one which prompted this long and rather self-indulgent post, is the dreams.

Now, it doesn’t help that my students and I are reading Freud and neo-Freudians. It also doesn’t help the Carl Jung’s “Liber Novum”, aka “The Red Book” is just about to be released, and I’m really curious about its innards. But I’ve been having absolutely trippy dreams, and it’s this drug that’s doing it to me.

Dreams where “the juice of babies” is used via some sort of technology to propel massive flying passenger ships, and likely weapons of mass destruction. Those where I have feline offspring. Some cataclysmic, others just bizarre, and all very vivid, though fast-fading as dreams often are.

Looking on the internet for possible side effects of Nifedipine, one of the common, not-so-serious side effects is “vivid, abnormal dreams”. One of the more serious ones is “psychosis.” And here I am, thinking, “What would Jung say?”

Ahoy, September!

It’s coming, it’s coming, and I’m rather nervous. The beginning of a new phase of my graduate studies, a lot of extra (unpaid or underpaid) responsibilities that I’ve taken upon my shoulders, and big hopes! You may have noticed that my blog has been neglected for a few weeks. Part of it was because I’ve been a slacker (hah!), but also, I’ve been spending a lot of internet time fixing up two important websites – one, the Course ISite for the class I’m TFing in the fall, and another the activities pages for Dudley House, the Harvard graduate student activities center, where I’ll be running the knitting group, hosting dance lessons, and otherwise spending my free hours. (They gave me an office. My department can’t compete with that!)

Some news – I looked on Ravelry today, and saw that someone else has completed their Hobo Bag! A complete stranger! I also had a request for sewing instructions for the lining from another complementary stranger. This means a lot to me, even if I may not have so much time for my designer career in the next weeks. Every girl likes to have a fan club.

Just a hint on what’s to come in the next days: reflections on short-row toes, and some words on knitting for charity.

A cure for the blues

This summer has found me in a funk more often than I would have liked – I blame the weather, which had us drowning in April showers up through the first week of July. Summer’s here now, and there’s a lot of enjoying to catch up on.

For one, I’ve finally broken through the knitting blues that I was submerged in. I attribute it to a couple of started and abandoned projects, a baby blanket in colors I picked out online and wasn’t thrilled about when they arrived, and another “obligation” project that I’d promised a friend. Those out of the way, I’m free to flex my creative skills and work on the new and exciting.

The first of these projects was the Art Nouveau Cowl, which I just finished yesterday afternoon, finished photos soon forthcoming. It was a treat to work with such nice yarn, even though threading the beads was a literal pain in the fingers. I hope it gets good use this winter – and if not, it’s an excellent gift for a deserving…friend? mother? cousin? Who knows.

Then, we went to WEBS. It wasn’t the life-altering experiece I thought it might be (I should set my sights on Rhinebeck for that), but it was a fabulous shop, with good prices and a nice discount tier. We picked up 7 skeins of Cascade 220 for a sweater for Jonathan, which I started designing this past weekend. Yes, ladies, that’s right, I’m making my boyfriend a sweater without having procured an engagement ring first. I’ll let you know how it turns out!

Although I’ve done a small swatch for that sweater already, I still need to reswatch with the right color and the right needles. First, I should probably wind up all that yarn mechanically; although, I have been enjoying hand-winding as of late. First, though, I’ve cast on for a new project for myself for this weather – a “Tantric Puzzle Top” (ravelry link) which sounds pretty sultry, you have to admit. It’s a one-piece sleeveless top that wraps up something like a ballet sweater, and has a lot of flexibility in the design, so I’m making it out of light green linen with a lace leaf motif. It should be fabulous. The green linen, incidentally, was from a yoga mat bag I finished up last year around this time. A pretty bag, but not a good design (swatch your netting before you make the whole bag! It might stretch in an unpleasant way!). I kept the elaborate cabled strap, top piece with a fancy knot and psychadelic striped bottom, and will consider what to do with it later. Maybe another yoga bag (the dimensions are right) or maybe something else…think think think…

Today I walked to campus instead of biking, and I was kicking myself for not having brought sock yarn to knit with…and as I head to meet a friend for coffee, I’ll be sure to have the linen ready to go. And on that note, away I go!

Art Nouveau Cowl, pt. 1

Hi all!

Just wanted to share with you the beginnings of a beautiful little treat that I hope to have written up in time for holiday gift-making season, the Art Nouveau Cowl.

Subtly studded with beads for extra sparkle, and knit in the most decadent cashmere I’ve laid hands on, this is a scrumptious project.

Evidenced by the cat paws visible in the photos, Lydia the kittia agrees.

O Canada!

Sunday we hit the road to visit Jonathan’s family in Québec, which is where I am presently. As someone who studied French all throughout high school, who passed a French exam in graduate school, and can read French with relative ease, it still amazes me how lost I am when I get here. This trip was a turning point, though. I realized that a fair amount of my difficulties were not necessarily with the French language, as much as they were with the Quebécois dialect – pronunciation variations, lexical choices, and just a level of slangy familiarity that I’m not used to. I’m getting the hang of the «pis», «nousautres» and «là» peppered through every sentence (but, for the record, I’m not getting the hang of the French Canadian keyboard layout. It just took me about 3 minutes to figure out where the « and » were, and they’re marked on the keyboard itself). But it took me this long to understand that «oi», a diphthong like «wah» in France French, can often be pronounced «way». And while «a» at the end of a word (where it isn’t a grammatical marker) may be rounded quite liberally by native speakers, they’ll laugh at you when that same sound slips out of your mouth. Accents.

I’ve spent the majority of the last week not speaking, which gives me plenty of time for listening and thinking. And planning knitting patterns. I’m a quarter of the way through the cashmere cowl I started last Saturday, but ran out of beads and was forced to stop. Pictures are forthcoming, and a write-up eventually. Once I’m back in Cambridge, I’ll hit up the bead store and continue work. I’m also working on a swatch for fingerless gloves from the alpaca Jonathan brought back from Chile, which will hopefully be in the works tonight or tomorrow on the long drive home. And then there’s thoughts of a sweater for Himself…but I have to put more thought into that…and start scoping out the mega-sales for a sweater-sized pile of wonderful yarn.

More Designs – Noro Hat

So, kicking around in the repositories of my hard drive are a few more patterns that I’ve written up, mostly simple patterns for teaching classes from, but some intricate things as well. I’ll be cleaning them up and adding them in as the weeks go on, but here’s another tasty treat from the archives: the Noro Fairisle Flower Hat.

This is a pattern written for those with little/no experience with stranding, so those of you adepts out there will no doubt be more interested in looking at the chart (pg.2). It’s also written to encourage those reluctant to read charts to give it a try, and to extol the virtues of two-handed stranded knitting (picking/throwing). Can you tell I teach a class on this?

Hope you enjoy, and please pass along constructive comments!

Download the Noro Fairisle Flower Hat!

A published designer!

Hello friends,

I’m giving this a shot – my first foray into the world of making my knitting designs publicly available. Thankfully wordpress lets me upload PDFs!
Some background: This bag has been my go-to bag for the last 4 years since I first made it. The square base gives you plenty of nooks and crannies for tucking wallets, water bottles, and fresh fruit into, not to mention making laptop transportation easier. The handles are based on a sine curve, evenly distributing the downward force from the load inside along the handle’s edge, allowing a thin but elegant shape near the top, and a hole easy to sling over your shoulder. The stripes appeared out of necessity – I was running out of the two colors I’d originally bought, and my LYS only had a complementary color, and so the third color was introduced. You use nearly all of the three skeins.

The pattern has been test-knitted with good results, and my only regret is that I’ve not been able to write out clearer instructions for the lining part. If anyone has ideas, I’m happy to hear suggestions!

Happy knitting,

Katie

Download Katie’s Infamous Hobo Bag

ETA: I just changed the link so it opens a PDF directly, instead of another wordpress page. In the event that doesn’t work, give  this a try: http://spinspinspin.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/infamous-hobo-bag.pdf

Many apologies, I’ll get the hang of web publishing someday!

Heavenly Jerusalem?

Yesterday I was determined to finish Dostoevsky’s Idiot, and as such had been sitting in Tealuxe way too long, long past my rightful dinnertime. I had gotten rather far in, and was approaching the meeting between Radomsky, Myshkin, Aglaya Epanchin and Nastasya Fedorovna, but the scandal in old Princess Belokonsky’s house still resonated sharply in the minds of the characters as in my own. In that scene, Myshkin goes into an epileptic fit, but not before decrying the Catholic church as preacher of the Antichrist, distorter of the true faith, and a main reason for atheism in Europe. He attributes spiritual desperation and depravity to the manipulation of the true faith, touching deep to the heart of many criticisms, and then… and then he knocks over a china vase in fulfilment of Aglaya’s “prophesy.”

But that’s neither here nor there. While I was reading, intensely wrapped up in these questions of humanity, of faith, of equity, a woman approaches me, asking about the female incarnation of God in the Bible. I didn’t hear where she was from, but she was conducting a survey and wanted to know if I could think of a place where God had a female form in the Bible. Can you imagine? My mind was in its own religious fervor, I couldn’t help but play the game. “Well, Genesis says God created male and female in his own image and likeness.” Hooked. Sophia, this nicely dressed young woman from Jersey, came and sat down next to me. “So, if God created man in his image and woman, then that means there is a female God.” Logic does not compute. I say, “Well, that means to me at least that the Judeo-Christian God transcends male and female nature, and we could attribute male or female characteristics. That is, if you believe in a Judeo-Christian God.”

At which point I realize I’m not talking to a Prince Myshkin with grand ideas, no prophet, but someone who has a series of buzz-words which she doesn’t entirely understand herself. “Judeo-Christian? Well, we believe that Christ came to save, and the Bible is our book, and yes, Moses was the book of the Jews, but then the new Testament,” rattles out of her mouth in a less than coherent manner. I want to get back to the female God business – I’m used to the usual “Jesus saves” story, but female God? Dualistic God? That sounds delightfully pagan to me. Or at least cult-freaky. I start hoping she’ll talk about mother damp earth, or something equally fun, but instead it turns out that her Church is based on a reading of Revelation, which refers to the Heavenly Jerusalem and the Bride of the Lamb. Apparently this means that the second coming is a woman, who has come. Eh. Not as much fun. My attention peters out at about the point where she claims to be using the Bible as an authoritative literal source, but then trash-talks theologians because they’re unable to get beyond the letter of the Bible and see the inferences. I take a small bit of satisfaction in having her admit that many people have interpreted the Bible in many ways over the course of history, many of which “erroneously”. Thus, she shouldn’t take offense when I have no choice but see her reading as just another interpretation out of many, even though she swears her interpretation (no, not her interpretation, she was quick to correct, although she never mentioned exactly whose interpretation it was she was spouting) is the right one.

I was really hoping for a revelatory experience. I truly do dig the Heavenly Jerusalem stuff (mostly from an architectural perspective, and not an eschatological one, I’ll admit), but Sophia, don’t trash-talk theologians and act surprised when someone knows the ins and outs of the Bible without believing a word of it…this is Cambridge, Massachusetts.

p.s. the church she was preaching for is the World Mission Society Church of God. She’s been a member for 5 years, and in her normal life teaches preschool in New York. She seemed like a good person, except when her eyes bugged out and she foamed at the mouth, in forced laughter/rapture. Fanaticism is a fascinating thing.