On a Quest

I would not consider myself an accomplished, nor expert knitter. When I was in my thirties I took up knitting, and actually knit many, many items. It wasn't, however, until the upcoming birth of Iris that I took up knitting once again. I must say that I have knit more then a handful of items since. When knitting the body of a garment, following directions is fun, and I'd say mostly a piece of cake. However when it comes to applying patterns to sleeves(including decreases), the fact that I consider myself 'Orientationaly Challenged', seems to come strongly into play. Despite several attempts and equally as many unravelings, I have to draw out a schemata for each and every stitch! Now that is a handicap. Still, I persevere.



The stitch that intrigues.

Knitting, not unlike tapestry weaving, is a contemplative activity (this sometimes gets me into trouble as I can be known to have to unravel many a row.) From the onset of this, my second stage of knitting, while in the contemplative zone, I have wondered time and again, how was the first stitch ever thought of? How did someone know to loop 'yarn' over a stick and somehow draw another loop through it? I mean, I think about this a great deal, and want to know with a passion. I have researched this, granted my research has been limited to the Internet, and have found much interesting information regarding origins of knitting, but nothing that comes near to answering this quest. I have even tried to think as though knitting had never been invented and see if I could duplicate the 'first stitch', to no avail. I understand more readily how, weaving for instance, could have been invented...catching a glimpse of the crossing of long slender leaves, and transposing from there. So, my search just begins, and I hope to come to know how the first piece of knitted fabric came to be.

Completed sweater, hat and leg warmers for Elsa. One of the knitting projects started on vacation in the Black Hills.


A couple of years ago, I bought this variegated yarn at a friend's shop. I thought it beautiful, little knowing the difficulty of knitting anything that needed matching, with yarn that revealed itself in a striped pattern. The challenge of this outfit was enormous, but I must say fun. I loved the figuring out of changing necklines, matching stripes, etc.

The second of the knitting projects started in the Black Hills. This one is Iris'.


I recently got back to the loom. An acquaintance had given me some wool carpet yarn, and I decided to experiment weaving with this yarn and blanket strips. The first project is the bag below.

Yellow, gray-green, flower bag.

After that bag came off the loom, I was excited to try again. The above burgundy (both carpet yarn and blanket strips) gold and plum bag was my next weaving. Once started on a weaving venture, I have a tendency to repeat myself. So, I am anxious to use more of this carpet yarn and see what the next bag will look like.