Knitting for Grace

It is always a joy to be asked to knit something for someone else and in the past couple of weeks I have been asked to knit for a neighbour's grandchild. The patterns required were good old fashioned jumpers with buttons down the back in 4 ply wool. Of course, this meant the abandonment of the cardigan, the socks and the chunky jumper which has been sitting there for some time now and, inevitably, I had been  out and bought yet more wool and started a couple of projects - a scarf and a baby surprise cardigan which will be a surprise if I ever finish it and I am sure that I am not the first person who has come up with that comment. The little jumpers took longer than my usual double knitting baby items but were a delight to knit. I know that one of the patterns had been knitted by my mother for my, now 30 year old, daughter and the second pattern was one I had not seen before and so can only assume that it was one of my grandmother's, possibly bought for one of my 40 something cousins. Buying my new stash expansion items in a little wool shop recently I glanced through their books of "vintage" patterns and recognised so many from my own supply and from items I remember being knitted for my own children. I love the idea that all over the world people are knitting items for children in the same way and with the same patterns that previous generations did. Enduring skills and love demonstrated through the production of something personal and precious. I long to find the pattens for the wonderful jackets my paternal grandmother made for me and my cousins. I am sure they came from her sister in Canada and I still have 3 of the jackets upstairs - over 50 years old but still precious and personal - how can I give them away.

100 raspberry chickens and a second pair of socks

A new year brings new projects and the first to be completed is the order for one hundred raspberry pink chickens for wedding favours at an Easter wedding. After a couple of days I realised that what was needed was a production line with a variety of stages. I assembled the knitted chickens in groups of five at stage one. Stage two involved the sewing up of the finished item, stage three the crocheting of the combs, stage four the sewing on of the comb and the final stage was the felt beak and the stick on eyes. A whole sofa was taken over by a sea of pink but within the week all were finished and packed away to be taken to the bride to be. The project proved to be a learning experience - yet again. My initial thought had been to just get all the knitting over and done with but one hundred chickens in garter stitch was a daunting, and boring task. Breaking the task up into manageable and varied stages was the answer which now seems obvious but didn't at the initial planning stage. Costings also proved an issue. I thought I had costed the materials with accuracy but had somehow neglected the fact that each chicken has 2 eyes and that makes 200 not the 100 I had budgeted for and guesstimates for the number of balls of yarn is not my forte. Time is always a dilemna for the home knitter - if I was making an economic charge for the work then the question would be whether to charge a piece work rate, by the hour, a total for the project? I remember working as a student in a "pot bank" or a manufactuer of pottery items for the non initiated. My job was as a freehand paintress, painting sock and shoes on, ironically, egg cups. As a student I was paid a weekly rate but all the women around me worked on piece work rates and so managed to get through double the number of plankfuls of egg cups that I did. I decided to ignore my inaccuracies in calculating the cost of materials per chicken and put it all down to excellent experience. It was fun and certainly a good topic of conversation. I hope they have a wonderful marriage.

Now that I am free of chickens I can concentrate on the other projects - Charlie's cardigan is making slow progress but I have completed a jumper for Grace and have returned to Jessica's second pair of socks. This time I am trying a different pattern and the two circular needles approach. I am not using proper sock wool but a pretty double knitting which is giving a pleasing effect. This is just another experiment and the socks will never be more than feet warmers on a cold night but a learning experience again and I am feeling the need to learn more and more new things in this new year.

The predictability of hens

One of the many advantages of keeping hens is that changes in the hours of light and darkness are very clearly defined. Over Christmas it was dark enough to go down to close up their houses at about 4.15pm. Today I went down at 4.35pm and it was only just dark enough for some of them to have put themselves to bed. Hens are very predictable. They like to be outside in daylight and safely inside once it is dark outside. Our hens are also individuals and some go to bed earlier than others. It is inevitable that I will go into the kitchen, put on my hat and coat, roll up my jeans to put on my wellies, walk purposefully down to the hen coop in order to lock them in safely for the night to find one or two of them still wandering around. It is always the same pair - Maldwyn lll and Kevin. Sometimes Kevin has gone inside but, hearing me open the gate, will come rushing out to join Maldwyn. Kevin is not so much of a problem. She is one of the hens who cowers when she sees me so is easy to pick up and place inside the house. The trouble is that once she has been placed inside but realises that Maldwyn is still wandering around, she pops out to see what is going on. Maldwyn can rarely be captured and it is a case of patience or returning to the house, taking off the wellies and hat and coat and waiting until she has decided to go in. Then it is back to wellies and coat and hat and returning outside to quickly shut the henhouse door before any decide to escape again.
The columbines have not been laying for a few weeks but today there was a soft shelled blue egg so hopefully one of them is staring again. Perhaps, as the nights get lighter, they will all start laying again. An average of 3 eggs a day from 9 hens is not a good return on the cost of layer pellets, corn and hay. It is fortunate that I treat them as pets.

Finished the socks!!

Three days into the "this time I will stick to it" diet and a day spent yesterday cleaning house ( in terms of the wool pile) prompted me into action. The pesky socks were still there in the knitting box. The new projects of Charlie's cardi and the raspberry pink chickens were far more attractive prospects, as was the chunky hoodie that I had started with the wool that looked and felt beautiful but was hellish to knit with ( and that I had forgotten until I found in my cleaning mode) but the socks were still there, staring at me. I examined my motives - why was I leaving them - too difficult a pattern? boredom? the fact that Jess had actually worn the one finished sock over Christmas and seemed happy enough to wear odd socks so was there any real reason to finish the second one? I had to finish them and today, on a dark gloomy day with the wind and rain battering outside - and the hens in particular, I sat down with a cup of tea and finished the sock. I still didn't follow the pattern religiously but the result looks fairly ok, in fact the second sock looks better than the first one. I did follow the toe pattern properly this time and it does look better. I didn't do the heel as it said but even that looks better. Am I a natural sock knitter? I think not but I will not be defeated and will try again, another pattern maybe but socks of some description. I hope Jess will be pleased.

New year knitting

Family visiting for Christmas is such a delight but some things have to go on hold - knitting, family history research and private time on the computer. Someone else always seems to "need" the laptop and the tv remote control and more time is spent in the kitchen than in the sitting room. Now everyone has returned to their respective homes and a short trip away has been successfully accomplished it is me time - new knitting, laptop time and You've got Mail on ITV.
I have two major projects on the go post Christmas - noting that I still have the "other sock" to complete - the first is a cardigan for Charlie. He asked me to knit him something and we searched through my old stock of knitting patterns. There were quite a few cardigan patterns for men - mostly costing 9d which may put a date on them. He selected one, I took measurements and we went off to choose some wool. He wanted burgundy, we got green. He wanted a specific pattern, I went for a combination of 2 and have just finished the back. It is probably the largest item that I have knitted for a long time and I am not sure if I am finding it enjoyable or not. It is certainly different to my usual baby patterns or small items and the wool is difficult see in the gloom of our room but it is a project and I like a new project.
The second project is quite a delight. I had a text from my eldest daughter as I was stuck on a train between Gloucester and Cheltenham. She had been out to lunch with a friend who is getting married at Easter and they had been discussing wedding favours. The suggestion was that I could knit chickens to go over little Easter eggs - over 100 in raspberry pink - what a quirky and amusing idea - and one that will keep me occupied for some time - and an easy break from the green cardigan.