Looking backwards and forwards

Looking back to my post of 24th October, I said I would be selling the pretty Cymbal on.  Well, once the equal slot ribber arrived, and I got into making the drop stitch crav-hats, I have rather changed my mind.  The machine is running so much smoother now, and it is nice to be able to do the experimental stuff on a machine totally separate from my "museum production" one.  Being the same make, it makes for useful comparisons in case of hiccups.

The photo is of a set of Russian joined balls of sockyarn, all ready to go for more experiments.

Capping it on Boxing Day

For the hats I had been trying out, I had been using either a 50 gram or a 100 gram ball of yarn.  I wondered if I made a pair of handwarmers from a 100gram ball whether that would leave enough for a hat (say about 5 60grams) of the size I wanted.  Then standing at the ironing board this morning, my hanging bag of Russian-joined re-wound yarn was just a few inches from my eyes - why hadn't I thought of that before?  No restriction on weight or yardage!

So I made my fifth stocking cap, 72 cylinder, drop-rib-stitch rib, cylinder tension as low as it will go, counted 180 full rounds in between the shaping rounds.  Half measurement is 15 inches..  Then reading one of my Crimble pressy books, thought about a tassel. This can also be pushed through other end to anchor as a scarf.

Crav-hat

I made a stocking cap which was long enough at 30 inches to double as a small scarf or cravat - hence crav-hat.

 

 

A Merry Christmas to everyone.

 

Room to manoeuvre

My knitting room ceiling sprang a leak some time ago, leaving a hole  The roof was mended earlier this year, and I really thought it was time I got somebody in to re-plaster.  The end wall was only touched up (by me) when we had the electrics done 8 years ago  - I haven't even looked to see if there is any forget-me-not paint left in the shed as it won't be any good after all this time.  Local small hardware shop has provided white paint, and used this thinned down as a primer over the work.  They don't have any colours, so the whole of that wall is now going to be white.  It will be a slow job.

This is not a blog about paint!  But I have had to move a tall cupboard/desk/bookcase to get at all the wall.  The top was heavier than I thought, and I certainly won't try to get it back up there by myself. This was piled high with knitting patterns, my 30-odd machine knitting notebooks of 40 years, extra piece of equipment for that machine, my small Elna sewing machine (about 45 years old and still functioning), all our financial files, etc etc etc.  Quite a job to empty it and try to throw stuff out.  Oh, the memories!  The Joyce Grenfell type sketches I wrote when in the WI (Joyce also found them a rich source of inspiration), holiday receipts, leaving cards from various places of work.

I have decided to be ruthless and pass on the last of my collected knitting patterns.  I did get rid of men's babies, hats, etc a couple of years ago and hung onto these - a huge four folders worth of ladies, circular yoke, Shetland and Fair Isle  Who will want them?  Have got one contact already to send 2kg worth to.

When done, I doubt the room will look any emptier, as no actual furniture is going, and is so small re-arrangements aren't really possible.  But I might get a bit more shelf space instead of cluttering up the floor.

p.s.  found the paint in the shed was perfectly okay!  Not Forget-me-not (which must have been the previous colour), but Moody Blues, so the end wall is blue again.  And two of the four folders of patterns have been passed on.

Ten Years Ago

On 16th November 2010 I made my first pair of handwarmers for the museum.  Thanks to  numbering from the start, I can now report I have made 635 pairs, which is the equivalent of 1.22 pairs per week.  The only slight alteration from the original pattern has been to backstitch bind off the thumbs as well as the tops of the fingers.  And still love doing them.

Zoom

The video of me in the Griswold Room came out better than I expected - I think Matt had done some thoughtful editing over the spots where I said I didn't know what the make of the machine was!  The presentation seemed to go down well from all the reactions going on in the chat line at the side, especially during Nan's Story.  The Q&A session went on nearly as long as the video.  When I looked at it later, that wasn't too bad either, except I was sitting too close to the screen.  A couple of email conversations ensued over the next couple of days.  I have saved the basic video on a shared drive - contact me direct if you want to see it.  Otherwise, you have to me a member of the Circular Sock Knitting Machine Society to access the whole thing on their website.

And more good news - because of the presentation I got a 20% discount off my order for the equal slot ribber dial!  The items have now been shipped and are somewhere in the sky between Canada and here as I write.  I took my courage in both hands and some bicarb and vinegar, and took the pretty Cymbal to pieces again.  The right upthrow cam now moves freely.  So I have totally changed my attitude to this machine, but the oil is still coming away rather black.  

When the new 72 equal slot ribber dial arrives I will try it on this one first (because I know the original Cymbal will throw its usual hissy fit if its settings are changed).  On that, the handwarmers and socks are still piling up here.  The museum had to close again this week for the virus, so no sales are possible, staff are going in less, and it may affect the building work.  Goodness knows when the new shop area will be up and running - and there is still plenty of my stock there.  I am also racking my brain for more items that could be put on sale in the shop.  A small tissue packet cover does not look exciting enough.  The packet has to slip in with the side edge at the top.  To put it in flat, four "corners" of knitting stick up.  I know from the past that a square tissue box cover is a bit of a stretch -  but how about if every 4th stitch were dropped?  Would this slacken the fabric off enough?

Now at the end of October, it is time to review what I have been putting by for Crimble, and to see what more there is to knit.  I have totally lost the sugar pink Fair Isle Mouse.  It should have been side by side with the red one.  It will probably turn up on 26th December!

Gris-sold

On 7th September I referred to the Griswold machine I had bought in March, but only really got my hands on in early September.  I put it on my new knitting table.  The table top was originally a small shelf from the old curator's office in the museum.  Recent refurbishments meant there a was a skip full of bits and pieces just waiting for a new home.  I love the fact that the table has two square cut-outs at the back, where the original shelf supports went through - I can see speculation on the use of these at future events!  I haven't altered the size of the piece at all.  The base was from an old cast iron pub table, acquired at the March event the same time as the Griswold.  The table on its own sits very neatly in my utility room and I can open the freezer door (handy for resting stuff on) and get to mops etc the other side without moving it.  The white top makes it "disappear" into the wall.  I don't think it will ever get upstairs to my knitting room, which is fine by me!

I had to a wait for new needles to arrive from America before I could try the Griswold out for myself.  Matt had got it to the stage of ribbing and sock heel - I told him not to worry too much about the looks, just to get it running again.  So there was a bit of surface rust to deal with.  The machine, typical of factory machines, had been painted pale green over the black, and both were coming away in parts.  I took it to pieces twice for new oil, marking up one base screw and placing with red nail varnish.  No new screws or parts were needed, apart from a new needle retainer spring from Gordon, and a spare buckle.  Naturally, it was still rather stiff, but would get better.  I did my own sample sock with 1x1 rib, 5x1 rib, heel turn, plain half foot - no need to repeat myself with a toe or show off my Kitchener skills!  No problems.  However, I am not keen on needles falling into the cylinder if trying to get at one needle when half are up out of work, nor do I like the lack of adjustment on the yarn carrier, which preclude fiddling about with any yarn close to it, say should a hairy yarn get split by a hook.  These are typical of the Griswold brand, and most people wouldn't mind at all, but I do.  Also the stitch length adjuster doesn't like being altered where stitches are in work.  Again, not a problem once you know its preferences.

So I felt happy to advertise it for sale to four newbies who had been clamouring for a machine, as they do.  In the event, only one actually replied, and a bit of a discussion led to a nice price for the machine, and a goodly sum was duly passed over to the museum.  So now I am down to three machines, or two if you don't count the Ashcroft, which will be going to the museum one day anyway.

I am still waiting for an equal slot ribber dial before I make my decision on the "pretty" Cymbal.  I will definitely be selling this on, but whether with two cylinders/dials depends on how I get on.  Every time I go back to my original Cymbal, I realise how beautifully it behaves these days, how easy it is to crank.

Then it throws me a wobbler - not its fault, operator error (isn't it always?).  A couple of weeks ago I had a manufacturer's knot suddenly come undone in some slippery bamboo yarn, right just before the yarn carrier.  The rest of the yarn fell out back to the ball,  On the Cymbal, there are six places where the yarn is threaded through or under.  Number four from the yarn ball is a thin piece of wire bent into a square, the further end of which is a circle (number five).  I accidentally missed this out on re-threading.  Subsequently, I had a lot of problems with the yarn looping in both good and waste yarns.  The stitch dropped but often corrected itself a few rounds later, and with the ribber in place I wasn't seeing this.  I was getting ready to blame needles (I did find one slightly bent ribber needle latch).  On resetting the digital row b counter yesterday I spotted the threading a error.  What a difference it makes!  One can only speculate that the original yarn toppers were the cast iron with four holes design, an the wire was added later .

There's an exciting afternoon ahead - a video of me in the Griswold Room is making its appearance in the CSKMS AGM.  More later!