nonaKnits

An Old Favorite

Today was the first cozy sweater day of the season -- overcast with a bit of rain, chilly but not cold, and a bit of breeze here & there.  Time to pull out the wool sweaters and to put on one of my absolute favorites.

If memory serves me -- which it doesn't always these days -- I finished this sweater at the turn of the century.  Sounds longer than 8 years ago, doesn't it!  It's the "St Brigid" sweater (sans fringe) from Alice Starmore's Aran Knitting.  I love wearing this sweater almost as much as I loved knitting it.

Needle Organization

When you become a Knitter you also inadvertently commit yourself to a life-long quest for the perfect needle organizational system.  To take a quick poll, raise your hand if you have more than 4 pairs of the same size needle.  Now, raise your hand -- and don't be shy -- if you have more than 50 pairs of needles.  Just as I suspected, most of us have a plethora of needles.  But -- and here's the $64,000 question -- can you find the needle you need, when you need it, without a lot of rummaging and muttering?  No? Well, neither can could I.

Yesterday during my bout of arse-sitting interspersed with house cleaning I totally revamped my needle organizational system and I think this one might just work.  (Note to the new reader: nona's an optimist of the highest order who tends to be over confident).  Regardless of my mental disposition, here's my system:

Oh yeah, my needles are organized!

• I'm using plastic pocket do-das to hold my favorite, everyday  needles -- one for my circular needles (16" and 24" sizes 0 -> 10) and another for my double pointed needles.  Both do-das roll up, tie, and are surprisingly compact. 

• For all my other needles I'm using a plastic bin.  Inside this bin are resealable plastic bags, one per needle size.  This bin organizes the needles that are either not my favorites or that I don't use on a regular basis.

Being organized feels good!

Added 10/29/2007 -- The plastic pocket do-das are officially called "Stick Sacks" and are made by Ashland Sky.  For a list of online Ashland Sky retailers, click here.  There are lots of other great needle organization ideas in the comments!

Sit On My Arse Day

Life as an empty-nester has been busy and fun -- leaving little computer time, yet plenty of knitting time.  The last week and a half have found me simultaneously fighting a bad cough and laryngitis while watching fur-balls and dust bunnies skate across my floor.  Clearly it's time to combine a touch of arse-sitting with a bit of house cleaning.

For the arse-sitting portion of my day I focused on football watching and mini-sock knitting.  I recently picked up a copy of Cat Bordhi's new book, "New Pathways for Sock Knitters".  In her book, Cat introduces 8 new sock architectures or "sockitectures" to use Cat's terminology.  Cat's instructions are easy to read and her techniques novel, but I'm left with a few questions.  How do these alternative sockitectures fit the foot?  And what advantages -- other than being novel -- to they have over the 2 traditional sock architectures?  Only an adult-sized sock will tell!

My first two "learning" socks; Little Sky Sock (right) & Little Coriolis (left)