We’d Make Terrible Druids
Someday we’ll have a new house, and so we hope that Ian Boyle will build us another solstice-catching pillar. (Lots of pics here of the pillar in our yard now.) “Charles, the winter solstice is coming up, and we need to measure the angle of the sunrise, so Ian can orient the pipe correctly,” I said, more or less.
Charles took his compass outside at sunrise and measured the direction of the sunrise. “Hmm,” he thought, “this angle seems familiar.” Well, it’s exactly the same angle that our pillar’s pipe is oriented in order to catch the summer solstice sunset.
Okay, we should have been able to figure that out on our own. But we didn’t even think of it. And I thought we were sort of in touch with nature. Obviously, this is the kind of thing you miss, when you spend all your time knitting and crocheting.
Textile Collecting 5—Andean Hat with Alpaca
In the comments about Textile Collecting 3, a reader said that she thought these hats would be made of alpaca. I think they always were in the past, but most of the hats I have are not natural fibers. The one shown here is the only one that has any natural fiber to speak of.
This one doesn’t show the best technique of the bunch—the stranded threads seem to be pulled too tightly. But the cream-colored yarn feels wooly and soft, like alpaca.
The ear flaps look a little different from the other hats. Here’s a close-up, so you can see.
The little balls at the end of the ties are cute. They’re embroidered, maybe on felt?
Textile Collecting 4—Andean Hat with Buttons
Do you love these buttons?! They look so great, and they probably help keep the ear flap down. This is a lovely hat, worked in a fine gauge of 17 stitches to the inch. The straps are woven, with beads along the edges of the tape.
I love the stranded garter pattern just above the ear flaps. Those Andean guys sure know their knitting.
Textile Collecting 3—Andean Hats
This cute hat fits close around the head, and then it has a long, narrow tube at the top, ending with a tassel, similar to a hat knitster posted recently (and here).
The knitter apparently substituted colors, whenever the original color wasn’t enough. You can see it in the detail photo, in the lower, center diamond.
Of the hats we have, this has the coarsest gauge, measuring in at 12 stitches per inch.
Textile Collecting 2—Andean Hats
Men are responsible for these fine-gauge, highly detailed knitted hats of the Andes. They knit them for their little children. You can learn a lot about them from Cynthia Gravelle Lecount’s book, Andean Folk Knitting: Traditions and Techniques from Peru and Bolivia. It’s out of print now, but you might be able to find it online or at a library.
Thanks to a friend who worked for an airline, we had a long weekend in Ecuador about 18 years ago. A street vendor in Quito had this hat for sale. My husband acted as interpreter for me. The vendor asked whom the hat would be for. Charles said, “It’s for my wife.”
“But it is too small for her,” said the vendor. Charles said that, yes, his wife knew that, but she wanted it anyway. “Why?” asked the vendor. He couldn’t think of the Spanish for ‘she collects stuff like that,’ so he said, “She wants to own it.” It was clear at this point that we were a few bricks short of a load.
The vendor quoted a price of around $35.00, which seemed like a great price to me. She explained that it was a good price, because there is a lot of work in one of these hats. “My wife um, makes things (he couldn’t think of the word for ‘knits’),” said Charles, “so she knows how much work is in it.” We paid, and I was one happy turista.
Charles loved the patterning and the fineness of the knitting, too, so we now have a good collection of these knitted hats, which I’ll post these next few days.
A Charming Gift for the Knitter Who has Everything, and for Anyone Else, Come to Think of It
Sea Cat’s mother knits. No one on land or sea knits more beautifully than she does. She sits down one day, with several balls of seaweed wool and interesting treasures from the sea, and knits and embroiders Sea Cat a ”closely fitting, elegantly tailored, wonderfully complicated, waterproof, decorative, scintillating catsuit…”
He looks great. Someone becomes jealous: someone really old and important and powerful. Knitting saves the day.
Besides the fact that the heroine of the story is a knitter, Sea Cat and Dragon King, by Angela Carter, is charming, clever, and sweetly illustrated. Every knitter should have a copy. Every son and daughter of a knitter should likewise have a copy.
To read it aloud takes about 45 minutes. I read it to my 3-year-old, Ella, when she was under the weather one day, and too tired to fidget. She was hooked, and since then we have read it many, many times. The pretty line drawings by illustrator Eva Tatcheva keep young eyes occupied, while their ears listen.
The language is beautiful; no word is wasted. The story moves well, with rich and amusing detail. I enjoy the book immensely, and I think anyone (even non-knitters) who loves a good story will like it.
There are a number of copies available at amazon.com. You can still get it in time for Christmas!
Textile Collecting 1
I like to buy interesting textiles, old and new, if they are in good shape and if I can afford them. Over the years, some good stuff has come my way. I want to share images of these textile treasures, so others can enjoy them, too. These posts will always be called ‘Collecting.’
In 2000 or 2001, Eva and I tagged along with Charles to Crete. He worked and we played. I was amazed and thrilled to see several crochet shops. Yes! The windows were full of tablecloths and other items made from cotton crochet thread. I’m sure I took a photo of one of these shops, so if I ever find it, I’ll post it here.
The Greek student Charles worked with was kind enough to go with me into one of the shops and interpret for me and the shopkeeper. The student explained to the shopkeeper that this American lady loves to crochet and she would like to see some of the work in the shop and maybe buy some.
The shopkeeper was evidently skeptical about my ability to crochet so she tested me by bringing out the piece pictured at the top. I made motions to show that I knew the pinwheels were crocheted separately, in the round. The shopkeeper seemed satisfied that I had at least some practical knowledge.
I bought a few pieces, including these two. The top one is about 23 inches (59 cm) square, and the other one is 33-1/2 inches (85 cm) square.
I also bought a couple of crochet patterns. Guess what!? The crocheting ladies of Crete do not go by written patterns like we do. They buy a photocopy of a doily or whatever, and just crochet what they see. If it’s a really big piece, like a tablecloth, the copies are blueprints! They use their skill and knowledge of crochet along with a good deal of common sense to figure out the patterns.
I “Felt-It” was Time to Experiment
The laundry isn’t piling up fast enough any more! I walk around the house wondering ‘what else can I wash in hot water?’ That’s because I’m trying out some different yarns for felting, and my favorite lazy way of felting is to throw the items in the hot-water wash.
Caron International’s ‘Felt-It’ comes in six multi-color mixes. Here’s color number 0003—Wildflowers. From left to right, we have a freshly-crocheted flower; the next flower has been through the wash cycle once; the rightmost flower has been washed twice. ‘Felt-It’ felts beautifully!
Many knitters really like Cascade Yarn Company’s ‘Cascade 220’ for felting, and I can understand why. It looks great when felted, and in comes in many, many colors. The yellow flowers at right show ‘Cascade 220’ before and after felting.
The multicolor yarn flower is ‘Quartette’ from Jojoland International. It is a blend of merino and cashmere. Very nice! Jojoland sells entire bags from their web site, so you might prefer to find out where they will be setting up a booth, so you can buy one ball of yarn at a time.
I love how the popcorns in the flower center became even more defined after felting, which is not what I expected.
Trout Just Love Angora!
I typed “angora yarn” into the Google search box and pressed ‘enter.’ The third listing from the top was “Pure Imported Angora Yarn—www.fishusa.com—FishUSA has 100% purl Angora Yarn for fly tying or knitting.”
FishUSA? Fly tying? Well, sure enough! For $1.95 you get 11 feet of 100% angora, three-ply yarn from France, wound on a card. You can use it to knit a very tiny sweater or to tie a fly pattern called “sucker spawn.” According to bigyflyco.com, fish love to eat eggs, and this little pattern is meant to look like the egg sac of a sucker, which migrates to the tributaries of Lake Erie in early spring. Angora yarn is the preferred material to tie this fly, according to FishUSA.com.
Current fish fashion features angora in fluorescent chartreuse, peach, pink, yellow, and orange; salmon egg pink, red, and a few pale colors. FishUSA has regular-size balls of angora, which one could knit, but the range of colors is sadly limited—no fluorescents.
The Great Lakes Steelhead and trout really go for the angora sucker spawn fly. Obviously, they have very good taste in yarn.
Images from bigyflyco.com and fishusa.com.
More Wool and Mohair Warehouses
Alpine, Texas is in a valley, surrounded by three different mountain ranges near Big Bend. You can see some of the grassy peaks in the shot of the Big Bend Wool and Mohair Company, which was not too far from our hotel. Like most of the wool and mohair warehouses we saw, it was next to the railroad track.
Alpine is the home of Sul Ross State University, where Charles was attending a conference. The university may be one reason why such a small town is such a great place for book lovers! We spent a long, long time at Front Street Books, which has new and used books. I bought a stack of old needlework and craft books. Charles chose a bunch of books for me to give him for Christmas.
Volunteers run a bookstore called Re-Reads, which helps support the Alpine Public Library. I struck gold there: a Perry Mason casebook, featuring four full-length Perry Mason novels, three of which we didn’t already have! And for only $2.00. A bargain at twice, three times, four times the price. We are fans.
Alpine has a yarn store, but it closed at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday. I arrived, ready to shop, at 11:45. Inside, I saw sun-faded sewing notions on the window sill and a sad little display of crafts on a table. A lone bag of yarn was strewn on a shelf. A room further back was too shadowy to see into, but I feel certain I didn’t miss much. I won’t give you its name, because you can look it up if you’re ever there.
As we drove back eastward, we saw the Texas Wool and Mohair Association warehouse in Mertzon, Texas, which is west of San Angelo. The sign at Ballinger Wool and Mohair looked like it was recently painted, so I think they’re still in business. I’d like to check back at these places in the spring when the wool comes in.
