I posted my first vlog yesterday! I have a lot to improve on, but I like the idea of doing a vlog every so often, do you? Also, sorry about the sound quality. I think it’s my Macbook fan. I should probably close some apps before filming videos. Oops!
Luxury Yarn Shawl
Dovetail Shawl
Mitre-Square Shawl
If you’re interested in test knitting any of these shawls, comment below to let me know which. They’re all “as much yarn as you have” shawls, and gauge isn’t important. I’d quite like to see how they look in a variety of yarn weights, actually. I want to get the Mitre-Square Shawl out soonest, the other two aren’t such a hurry, as I obviously have some more designing to do for the ebook. :)
Also comment below or video response with your knitting speed (& whether you were knitting st st, ribbing, garter st, etc.)! I’m curious. :)
If you’re doing NaNoWriMo too, add me as a writing buddy. My username is: maiden & I’m already behind!
There’s been a profusion of butterflies here over the last few days, all fluttering madly and hardly ever landing during their fleeting lives. This little chap stopped for a drink just long enough that I could snap a few photos. Doesn’t he look like he flew a bit too close to a pot of blue pigment?
I love being by the Aegean. I love the landscape & the colours & the myths. I like to imagine the coastline without any of the buildings that now clutter it; it must have been even more achingly beautiful back then.
Some things never change though… I bought these skeins of lace-weight cotton at the market for 1.50TL (about 60p or 90¢) each. So cheap! But hand-winding lace-weight is disheartening work; the ball doesn’t get bigger and the skein doesn’t get smaller. The Turkish word for a skein is “çile”, which also means “suffering”. Coincidence? I only wish I looked half as cool and serene as the girls in this painting by Lord Leighton.
The cotton is for a pair of shawls I’ve been working on, inspired by summer & classical literature. I’d say more, but perhaps they should remain a MYSTERY? ;)
I was so so so cheered by all the lovely messages, newsletter replies, tweets, and of course blog comments I received yesterday. And a mention on the Electric Sheep Podcast was just the icing on the birthday cake. Thank you, thank you, thank you, lovely knitters! Replies are on their way.
I’m usually a pretty upbeat, positive person, and I adore doing this here, with you. I still find this a little hard to define, because as you know I do a lot of random, sillythings, and knitwear design sometimes seems like a small part of it. I love ideas more than anything, and design more than most, and knitting as much as, well… you, and all together they make me very happy indeed. But every day I meet people who scoff at my work, who ask me snidely how much I make, and inevitably wonder when I will get a proper job (& my own place). Luckily for me, none of these people are in my family. I don’t get hurt by these comments (that would be ridiculous), but I certainly get cross. There was a time when they made me doubt myself, and I sat in a dark office and did work that made no one on earth happy, least of all me. But now I brush them aside and try to use my crossness to fuel me in my work. Still, if it wasn’t for the positive feedback I get from you, I don’t know how long I’d be able to sustain this.
So THANK YOU! & if you’re just heading out on your own path and working for yourself, please don’t listen to the naysayers. Listen to your own true, brave voice and no other. Trust your own confident, capable hands. Don’t let anyone come between you and the joy of steering your craft.
You might be interested to note that my cynics all share one common factor (apart from cynicism, that is): they’re inevitably non-knitters. Which leads me to believe that there is a higher preponderance of nice people among knitters than in the general public. I have some theories about this:
Knitting is a calming occupation. Because knitters relieve stress through knitting, they’re less likely to lash out at others.
Knitting is a creative act, and it’s my belief that creating something makes people feel more fulfilled, so that they don’t have the urge to belittle the work of other people to make themselves feel better.
Knitting is contemplative, and anyone who takes the time to slow down and listen to their thoughts is better able to assess their relationships with others.
Knitting teaches you patience.
The devil makes work for idle hands. A knitter’s hands are always busy.
Of course we all have a long way to go, but I do believe that knitting can help us get there. Don’t you agree? :)
It’s nice to find a strand of hair on one of your handknits, or a golden curlicue between the pages of a book. A remembrance of the moment a (beloved?) human or pet came near. Or maybe it was just you, a few hours or years younger. Then there’s the superstition that knitting a strand of a person’s hair into your stitches will bind them to you. If you’ve ever done this by mistake, you’ll know how difficult it is to unbind that hair! I imagine these objects must be covered in the Dust of human consciousness (or “the ply of human life” as Woolf called it).
Not forgetting, of course, that the fibers we work were themselves once hairs on a creature. And those hairs are probably made up of strings and loops. And that each loop is a solid memory, and knitting is a bit like a time machine: it’s larger on the inside, and in a few minutes you can undo a whole day. It’s like loosening the fabric of space & time… It’s brilliant!
* brave early blossoms
* mindless shawl knitting
* the perfection of grey & yellow
* james bond
* a spam comment that said: “Tiptop. :)”
* script frenzy with scrivener
* the quiet campus
* & you?
After the knitting needles & the yarn, the one staple of my knitting time is TEA. Turkish tea, English tea, herbal tea, horrible tea, over-stewed, under-brewed, too hot, too cold, in a cup, in a saucer, in a mug, in a glass. No milk, no sugar, thank you.
I never watch TV, but I do sometimes watch films or Youtube videos if I’m knitting something easy like, say… a Minty? Otherwise I almost always either put on an audiobook, or tune in to BBC Radio4. In Our Time is one of my favourites, and now that they have such a generous archive on the web, I often listen to old episodes I missed. Here’s one on tea, for example!
I do occasionally read while knitting, if the knitting is simple & the book is obliging. At the moment I’m reading Aurora Floyd by Mary E. Braddon.
I usually knit on my own, but of course, I’m never lonely. ;) I mentioned that I recently started a knitting group & that’s been great fun. Even if none of my friends are around, I do sometimes take my knitting to a café, just for a change of scene. That’s one great thing about city-living.
I’m certainly not very ceremonious about knitting. I wake up, put the kettle on, sit down, and start. Especially if I’m excited about a project, this poses no problem. Throughout the day, the knitting is interspersed with a million other activities so that I never get bored (being a Gemini, this is essential): checking Ravelry, answering correspondence (usually tardily, oh dear! :( ), paying attention to my parents, writing, tinkering with the site, going to Ancient Greek class, messing about in Inkscape, writing up, charting, laying out, and proofreading patterns, taking photos, etc. etc.
I also love listening to music, and probably spend at least 30mins every day doing nothing else. (And having two consecutive blog posts with lyrics for titles is nothing to me!) I admire people who can write an essay while listening to rap. If I’m writing up a pattern and listening to anything with words, I will start writing the words. My favourite music commands all my attention. If you want a boost of energy or motivation for the new week, I recommend you turn off the lights, put in your earphones & listen to this:
Thanks for reading, dear knitters! I hope you’ve enjoyed my posts for Knitting & Crochet Blog Week 2011. It’s been a great opportunity for me to reflect & to discover amazing new blogs. Thanks, Eskimimi, for organdising such a Great Online Event! Now I’m ready to start all over again!
I’m not tidy, but I’m organised. These images have been carefully framed to illustrate my organisation & craftily evade the piles and deluges of mess as-yet-unorganised-matter. I like having layers of clothes and yarns lying around, because they are a constant source of inspiration, suggesting new colour-combinations, and textures. At the same time I love being organised, because then I can find out what is unnecessary or what doesn’t belong, and I can (hopefully) become more efficient. Efficiency is closely related to grace and elegance for me, two values I strive towards.
Luckily, I’ve recently come to notice that I have a very good visual memory when it comes to putting things in places; I rarely ever lose anything. Unfortunately this applies to biscuits as much as it does to keys. It also applies to other people’s biscuits…
Anyway, yarn! I mentioned on Monday’s post that I recently moved house, and this was a great opportunity to re-organise. I have been going through a bit of a pink phase / pink haze, so I covered my files in stripey pink, to match some old sheets I found, and decided to arrange some of my yarn to match. These shelves divide my sleep area from my “work area” & can be accessed from both sides, which is very handy. At the top is a plastic wig-stand that I recently spray-painted; it used to be a very obnoxious green. Right now it holds my penultimate Minty (I really need to blog about my Minty obsession); my other hats are artfully scattered and layered on available furniture.
I have a pop-up laundry basket that holds my “bundles” of yarn. These are all in their own plastic bags, which look ugly, so I leave a few odd balls on top. Another plastic laundry basket has a few bags of random yarn, and two needle-boxes on top. There’s also an old copy-paper box under my desk that has some old WIPs. Any current knitting is usually on top of my desk. Unfortunately, pretty much everything is on top of my desk, so sometimes I pin things to my corkboard, just so I can see them.
I also have four crates, which hold odd-balls (the bottom one has my stamp collection). I must mention that a good deal of my stash is still in the UK. I travel around a lot & have no idea where I will “settle”, so some elements of my knitting paraphernalia reflect this. For example, I still use an old Graze box to keep my notions, needles, bits & bobs, because it’s light & won’t break. I almost exclusively use circular needles, because they’re easier to squash into a suitcase. I really need to get a bag to store them though, or invest in some interchangeable circulars. DPNs are in jars on my desk. I’ll show you those when I get around to knitting some of those cute cabled covers for them. I’ve scanned the interesting bits from most of my knitting magazines / books. Books are the worst to carry, so this is really worth doing! Vacuum bags are great for storing / transporting yarn too. Of course, all knitters know that the most space-efficient way to store yarn is to knit it! :)
I have been thoroughly shocked & distressed by the aftermath of the earthquake & tsunami in Japan, as I’m sure all of you have too. I’ve been wondering how I should help, because I really want to give something a bit more tangible than money. Then I read this post by a designer I admire, Olga Buraya-Kefelian who lives in Tokyo. She will be donating 85% of her sales until the end of the month to help those affected by the disaster, and what’s even more admirable, she & her husband will be buying & sending supplies themselves, rather than just passing the money on. Here are some of my favourite Olga designs. I hope you’ll consider buying some too…
What delights me about this form of giving is not only supporting the crafting community, but also demonstrating that it isn’t always easy to distinguish what might seem like a “trivial hobby” from the Grand Happenings of natural disasters, nuclear threat and high & mighty politics. When it comes to helping people, there is really no scale.
I’ve been lucky enough to convince a few of my friends to meet up with me on Sundays for a little communal knitting. I know knitting clubs are commonplace in the US, but in Turkey, no one ever sits in a café, knitting. It’s decidedly strange.
I didn’t get much chance to knit with friends while I was in the UK either, as I was always out in the styx. I can’t tell you how envious I am of the London Stitch ‘n’ Bitchers. :( In short, knitting has always been a rather solitary endeavour for me, & in general, not regrettably so. There are few things (& none of them come to mind at present) that I prefer to knitting with a mug of tea beside me & a good audiobook or Radio4.
But I digress. We had our first meetup yesterday & I taught two of my friends to knit & it was pouring outside & we got to sit & sip our coffees & ohh, it was so delightful! My friends were naturals, too. They sat with my gaudy leftovers & looks of concentration so intense, it was unthinkable that they should fail. By the end of a couple of hours, they had several neat rows of garter stitch, barely a dropped stitch between them, & (I hope) an enthusiasm to keep going. I look forward to next Sunday!
Another advantage of city-living is buses: waiting for them & riding in them. I wish someone had told me a few years ago that I could chart lace or write a blog post on a phone, instead of idling away my commute staring into space. Phones are handy enough & private enough that they make all kinds of work possible on-the-go. I don’t know, maybe it’s just the novelty (the last time I bought a phone was 8 years ago, after all).
At any rate, no commuting today. I am in my bedroom/studio, huddled away from the falling snow & bitter wind. Yes, so much for my attempts to will spring to come with my knitting; winter still prevails. It’s alright though, I have a hot mug of tea, & Radio4, & something new & sunny on the needles.
Needless to say I’m never alone, not with my fantastic online knitting circle! I wanted to thank you for over 400 faves on the Parasol Stole. In less than 2 days too! I’m astonished & utterly delighted so many of you like it. Thank you!
hot water bottle cover with pocket - £3.00 (approx. $4.70)
houses slipover - £3.00 (approx. $4.70)
earring & key holder - free
bow pouch - free
* Paypal will show you the precise currency conversion before you confirm the sale.
(round)about
My name is Derya and I'm 25-years-old. This blog is an experiment in better living through knitting. Learn more about Laylock in the Introduction. If you'd like to get in touch, leave a comment or email me at: d.y.davenport AT gmail.com.
3 November, 2011 | 
tags: 
400 faves on the 
Parasol Stole
