The main aim of what I'm doing is to set up the colour chart so that I can change the colours easily, so if I want to change all the light brown to light red, for example, it's easier than going through and clicking on each box or cell individually. To do this, set up styles for each colour box. First off, make sure you're on the Home toolbar, by clicking on the Home tab, and that you can see the tool bar. Click on the Home tab again if you can't see the toolbar.

Now click on a box, you should see the Normal style highlighted on the Format part of the toolbar. It's at the bottom of the highlight box in the picture.

If you click underneath that, you should see a down arrow. Click on that, and you'll get the formatting dialog box.

Click on the "New Cell Style...". That brings up the next dialog box, where you can give the style a name (I just used a colour name to start with).

The important thing we have to fix is the cell background colour, also called the Fill colour. Click on the format button, and you'll get a palette with lots of choices (and you can add your own, but that's a topic for another post).

Click OK and OK, and you should find the cell you clicked now has that colour as background.

Once you've set up one style for each colour you plan to use, you can chart the design by choosing that style for each cell that should be the same colour. To change the colour, ctrl-click the style name in the format toolbar, and choose "Modify" in the drop-down menu. This brings up the same formatting dialog box, so you can pick another colour. Then all the cells with that style will change to the new colour.

Last year I went down on the train, this year I drove as the schedules didn't allow for an early-morning departure. After having made Bitterroot with beads on it, I wanted to know a bit more about beading techniques so I signed up for the Thursday afternoon bead class with Betsy Hershberg. I didn't expect much more than to learn a couple of techniques that I could use when I choose, sparingly since my image of myself doesn't include a lot of bling or beads.

Bead Knitting Sampler: Betsy’s incredible beadwork is a testimonial to the beauty of combining beads and knitting. She will guide you through an introduction to all that you need to begin adding beads to your projects and her enthusiasm will be contagious. You’ll learn beading techniques while completing a sampler from a pattern Betsy supplies. With your sampler and written materials, you will have a reference for future work.

Betsy started off by telling us she was our dealer and sure enough by the end of the session I was off buying yarn she recommended (Aziza 5/2 tencel from Just Our Yarn) and ordering her patterns. As if I don't already have enough hobbies... (I did manage to restrain myself from getting into weaving, saving that for another year).

The surprise in Evelyn Clark's session on Icelandic Modern--traditional lace patterns and new techniques for an Icelandic Lace shawl was a little different.

Icelandic lace shawls are wonderfully wearable and fun to knit. Since the stitch patterns are simple, the knitter can focus on colors--either traditional or contemporary. In class we will talk about the characteristics of Icelandic lace, discuss how the design probably evolved, and look at the characteristics of wool from Icelandic sheep. Students will knit a small shawl to practice a provisional cast-on, a sewn splice to change yarn colors and a chained crochet cast-off with tips on reading lace charts. The same pattern can be used later to knit a full-size shawl.

Here what was surprising to me was the way the Icelandic shawls use doily and tablecloth edgings similar to the German ones in Niebling designs, or the designs collected by Marie Niedner. Somehow I didn't expect Icelandic shawls to be (apparently) influenced by German tablecloths, although there's no reason for them not to be when I stop to think about it.

I learned a few tips (cast-ons, the sewn colour splice, how to stop the top of the shawl going in the wrong direction), but mostly it was just a joy listening to Evelyn's stories of visiting Iceland, and the Nordic Heritage Museum in Seattle. I felt a little sorry for the relative beginners in the class who were trying to concentrate on knitting from charts (new to some of them) and listen to Evelyn at the same time; it was much easier for those of us who were familiar with charts and knitting lace. A very enjoyable day and I have a shawl on the needles that will eventually be a reminder, each time I wear it, of Madrona 2011.

Next up, on the Saturday, was the "powered bling" class, a.k.a. eTextiles, taught by Syne Mitchell. The (minor) surprise here was just that I decided none of the things I'd started knitting were suitable for use with LEDs and EL wire, so I have to create something else. Also, that the multimeter I bought on the way down, not having been able to find mine, needed a 12V batttery. This is not a standard size.

eTextiles for Knitters and Weavers: Learn how to design textiles that light up, sense temperature, play sounds, and more! Imagine a sweater that glitters with a hundred LED stars, socks that count how many steps you take, a scarf that tells you how cold it is outside, laptop bags that announce when you’re in a wifi zone, etc. Modern eTextile technology makes creating this sort of interactive garment easy, attractive, and fun!

Students will learn the basics of eTextiles by either knitting or weaving LEDs and a battery into a scarf or hat. We’ll discuss additional ideas and examples while you work.

Fun was had, I have a bunch of wires and LEDs and more than a few ideas, I managed to avoid being sucked in by the weaving bug, despite Syne's best intentions, and I've finally got the right battery for that multimeter. I suspect the kids will have glowing outfits for Halloween this year.

The biggest surprise in store for me was in my Sunday class. I managed to get into Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's class on Knitting for Speed and Efficiency: So Many Knits So Little Time!

Here’s your chance to learn Stephanie’s perspective and secrets on knitting with speed. Want to knit faster? How about smarter or more efficiently? This class examines the various techniques, attitudes and history of the most productive knitters, and is designed not necessarily to change how you knit (unless you want to) but to help you become the most efficient knitter you can be on your own terms.

Stephanie knits on straights, with the right needle tucked in under her right arm. I'm not going to go into the details of what she teaches; other people have covered that. For me what was surprising was the personal reaction I had. My Mum used to knit with the needle held under her right arm, I suspect my great-aunt did as well (although they typically didn't knit in front of me, I think that was mostly kept as work for when the children were in bed or at least not around). When I started knitting that way, it felt like coming home, creating a connection to people I've lost. My great-aunt died many years ago, my mother in 2009; in some ways it's odd how a simple thing such as the style of knitting can create emotional connections. But maybe it isn't, maybe it's the small daily things that are the core of our memories. Something to think about as I consider my current family life, and not something I was expecting to be confronted with on the last day of a knitting conference.

Lace is always amazing. A crumpled bit of what looks like string

 

turns, via the magic of blocking

   

into this

The TCYW Ravelry group's Festivus 2010 was held in December. The basic concept is that each person in the group who wants to take part gives a fibre art gift to one person, and receives from someone else. You know who you're giving to, but not who you're receiving from. There's a price limit, and we all go out for dinner some place nice. This year it was organised by the inimitable Beentsy and Yarnpiggy, and it was, just like last year, an excuse for spoiling each other and being spoiled.

It turns out that having a mystery spoiler/spoilee is also a good way to get to know someone you might not have previously known; my spoiler was Lady Sheepsbane whom I hadn't met before. With help of appropriate Ravelry forum postings she came up with just the right gift (that's the Ravelry link), knitted in the right size and colour. And some lovely handspun yarn that hasn't told me yet what it wants to be, a notebook just the right size (small enough to fit in my purse), and a candy to top it off. A perfect combination of festivus items.

The scarf is knitted from her own hand-spun, with beads on the end. The colour is more blue-gray, like in the top left photo. One of the chocolate bars has chili pepper and cinnamon, the other coconut macadamia curry (yep, really). Four types of tea: lavender, winter fruit spice, vanilla, and rose congou. Hand-made stitch markers. And, to top it off, a pattern for Sivia Harding's Shetland Garden Faroese Shawl. I feel blessed and very lucky!

My friend did love the shawl when I gave it to her, and used it to bring the baby home from the hospital in. It's warm, light, and machine-washable.

I took the photos while the shawl was blocking. I haven't figured out how to photograph large objects yet, so you get a bunch of photos of parts of it. It looks quite a lot like the photos in the published pattern, so you can get an idea there how the whole thing looks.

Learning experience notes: I should have thought about how to make the final grafting easier before beginning the edge. There are techniques for this (such as knitting a couple of rows in scrap yarn before beginning) that would have helped. It took a lot of work to make the graft anywhere close to invisible.

I found a good post on how to block mittens. The template plastic was easy to find in a local quilting store. You can see the template plastic poking out of the mitts in the photos.

The workshop concept sounds deceptively simple: come prepared with stitch dictionaries and figure out how best to fill the triangle shape with appropriate stitch patterns. It's harder than it sounds, but Sivia made it seem, not quite easy, but reasonably straight-forward, with lots of places to make artistic design decisions.

Sivia has some wonderful designs and brought some of her shawls for us to admire and deconstruct, using them as teaching examples. She gave us ideas on how to start the shawls, various ways of finishing them, how to modify stitch patterns to fit nicely into the triangle shape, when and how to fudge stitch patterns to make the entire pattern easier to understand and knit, and lots of other tips. Everyone ended up with charts and swatches, and undoubtedly lots more ideas than they started with. Now all I have to do is finish the design I started (I want to change a couple of things), complete the charts, and start knitting!