Weekend Progress Report

So . . . it's, um, an interesting interpretation of the original,yes? I mean, really, if you were going to repaint the Mona Lisa, wouldn't you spruce her up a bit? Maybe give her a red dress?
Mine is definitely more . . . pink. The purples are pinker, the lights are lighter, the overall tone is more jeweltoned, as opposed to classic Thoroughbred horsey colors.

The preparation for the knitting was definitely more difficult than the knitting itself. There's a five stitch motif that's repeated twenty-two times on each side of the star thing in the center. I spent alot of pre-knitting time with the chart -- changing the legend over and over as I changed which Spindrift's would substitute for which J&S's. So the chart, which at first seemed to be as incomprehensible with it's 17 different color symbols as a Greek menu, became as easy to read as a newspaper. You can see above I have a lot of markers in - this is completely unnecessary if you are capable of counting to five, but I like them - it makes the knitting even more machinelike, completely nonchart dependent. I think of the star in the middle as like a gymnastic tumbling pass - one long stretch of 47 stitches. Sometimes, as I'm going across that part of the chart, I even have a commentary running in my mind accompanying it - yes! she stuck that landing! Lot's of little things going on in my head that make this an entertaining knit.

And, anyone who thinks you can't do fair isle if you can't knit with yarn in both your hands, think again. Above is one repeat of the 32 row pattern, plus a little bit of the second repeat. I started it last Wednesday - I'd say I'm motoring along with my one-handed, pick and throw, work. I can actually carry the yarn in both hands, but, surprisingly, I just find this way works better for me - especially in the Kaffe, when you're managing three colors per row.

Below, I pondered whether my Kaffe was really still a Kaffe, and Lisa dubbed it "Kaffier than Kaffe." I'm not sure what I'm supposed to call this thing - now that I've switched up the colors, indeed, it's not really close to the original at all at this point. A Starmore, if you go by the designer's intent - is a marriage of pattern, color and yarn - and I've only got one of the three. Maybe it's now a Starmore*, with fine print reminding the blog reader that's it not quite an authentic Starmore - kind of a Starmore knockoff.

If anyone is interested in knitting a true, honest to goodness Starmore, Virtual Yarns is supposedly updating their website sometime this week, and many of the kits that were sold out should be restocked. If you aren't so much into authenticity, and are willing to pick your own colors, check out your local libraries. Philadelphia County unfortunately doesn't have any of the fair isle books - but there are four copies of The Art of Fair Isle in Bucks County - my dad checked one out for me over the weekend, so I should be able to peruse it over Passover. And, of course, there's ebay - this pattern is in Vogue, Fall 1989, and I think you can still get all of the original J&S colors, I just chose to work with what we had a Rosie's.

And those colors that I bought at Rosie's that didn't find a home here - I think they'll end up in that Eunny Jang vest, I forget what it's called. Although, I'm not sure if I'll ever find a home for that neon purple Aubrelita.