Come Here Often?

This is one of those items that looked smashing when initially done, but had problems:

1. The yarn was so heavy the jacket pulled way down and the flounce ended up around my widest part (Stacy and Clinton would have a LOT to say about that).
2. The seams were a nightmare, even when you're loosey-goosey about seams and rarely even care if stitches match up.
3. And, most importantly, I kept thinking I could improve it by doing this, or that, or the other, and it just turned into the Jacket That Never Was Finished And Caused Persistent Underarm Chafing.

However, I do love the colors.  I love that Colinette tries, how they try, to give us patterns that kinda sorta make Point 5 wearable in sweater form.  Someday I may find that pattern.  As cute as it is, there's that stretch thing - and I blocked the mo-fu out of this sweater - knit it small, blocked it stretched out like a masochist on the rack for a fun weekend, hoping-hoping-hoping that would eliminate the vertical stretch.  And it didn't work.

So there you have it.  Ravelry page with more pictures (of my cat helping) here.

Enjoy your knitting! I'm off to check out Looped Yarn Works in Dupont Circle - very excited!

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"My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father...

Oh, the sad sad things I do when I'm bored... with too much Colinette Point 5 in Alizarene.

So this week, I've been home sick (nothing long-term, I hope, just a bad tick bite and subsequent infection) and bored. (And here's my plug for a Lyme vaccine - get ON it, medical science!) I bastardized a hat pattern, not sure what I'll call it yet (I'm thinking "Helga"... I'm thinking "Bollyhat"...) but once I figure out a name and what the heck I actually did (was watching Glee DVDs, listening for the cheery 'ping' of work emails coming through), I'll write it down.

Meanwhile, I have this awesome Tarina Tarantino pin that I haven't done jack with since I wore it to a par-tay a year and a half ago, and it looked like it could work on this! Or not. Or not? Hmmmm....

Anyway, someone is getting a lovely set of scarf and hat - or maybe I'll keep it - I think there's enough yarn to make Shasa (my 18 month old Tibetan Terrierist) a little sweater. I do believe in a diverse representation of my work, but she's just not old enough to dress up and sit still yet.

Chester has informed me, through his agency, that large rhinestone pins will not ever again be permitted in a photo shoot. Or else.

Happy Saturday!

Coming soon, I think: Lots of yarn in small living quarters - tips and tricks, and Yarn Project Management 101. I'm negotiating with the spokesmodels.

And, because I can:

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HECK YEAH - Real Men Wear Pink

So. Here is something that takes about 2 hours to knit (Russian-style, did I mention how fast we Russian-style knitters are?) and can only be called a statement piece.

The yarn - my beloved Colinette brand Point 5 yarn in colorway Alizarine (probably also known as PeptoBismal swirl) in the Pansy scarf pattern from the Colinette pattern book Artyfacts.

Should this be the post where I spell out my frustration with getting Colinette yarn in the US in all colorways? In the past three years, almost every store in these United States that used to carry it, stopped. So seeing it in person in the US is not easy. The one place in the US that seems to maintain a strong relationship directly with Colinette is Flying Fingers Yarn Shop in Tarrytown, New York.

I have yet to make the pilgrimage, but must someday climb on the Yarn Bus! (People. If you click on no other link, you have to check this out. Truly a case of real life trumping fiction - I could not make this up.) It's been featured in The New Yorker magazine. I'm just faux-intellectual enough that this gives me goose bumps...

Gotta give props to Flying Fingers. They have saved my everloving behind a couple times when I haven't had enough of a skein to finish a project - and owner Elise shares my deep love of all yarns Colinette. The other great Colinette lover on the planet seems to be Sarah Durrant, of Australia, and she is also great at figuring out how to finish a project when you can't find that one last skein of something Colinette.

Colinette yarn is exported from Wales. Now, for you lucky Celts and Brits and Scots and Welshies, and for world travelers, there's this place where all the yarns are produced. Mad textures and colors - solids, stripeys, lots of fiber, lots of fun... true fiber artistry. The Colinette Mill Shop (ye olde mille shoppe, I'm picturing, a la Disney theme park for knitters) in Wales. And if you live in the UK or other select countries you can order their products online at the Colinette website. For really good prices! But I, alas, live in the US, and so have never seen ART or Hullabaloo, and unless I get to Tarrytown someday, I'm giving up all hope.

ORIGINS OF COLINETTE: From what I can find, Colinette Sainsbury is a real live person, an artist from Italy, and I've heard one person say they remember her selling her handpainted yarn out of a pushcart in Covent Gardens. Urban myth says her son now runs the business, and I'm glad for that (a world without Colinette - how would I exist?), but this distribution issue and the huge price discrepancy between EU prices and everywhere else (is shipping REALLY that expensive, and I know, I know, I know the distributor needs to make a living) - rough for a customer to navigate and unless you're really a freak, like me, you can move right along at the LYS (Local Yarn Shop) and start fondling the pretty stuff one bin over. Maybe they are staying small by design? This whole thing makes sense to someone, and I wish that I was in the know... rant rant rant.

OK, enough ranting about the sumptuousness of Colinette and the current sad state of distribution at retail across the US. I'm just trying to say that if I had to pick ONE YARN BRAND EVER to knit with, I would have a hard time saying goodbye to Noro and Artyarns, but it would be Colinette, hands down.

Sigh. Any updates as to the state of US distribution would be appreciated in the comments section under this post. Please note the date you make your update - many thanks...

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