Pre-Sewing

One could think that the sock is almost finished- but noooooo! There are many, many, ends to weave in and some dreaded sewing to do. We are planning a sewing party. We wonder if some fine, expensive, scotch should be served. Well, maybe to those who finish- kind of like a reward!

Getting Plaid

They're not the best photographs and don't come close to capturing the rich colors of the chromolithography. But if you click on the pictures to blow them up, you can better see the colors and patterns.




These two, above, show the 'ur' plaid, of the Campbells of Argyle. There are pages and pages of Campbell biography in the book, but I'll spare you. Except, maybe, to give you this snippet: "The [Campbell] appellation is personal, and is composed of the words cam, bent, or arched and beul mouth, and the individual so distinguished, was of the race of Diarmid o Duibhne, who is much celebrated in the traditional story, and was cotemporary with the heros of Ossian, an antiquity which few clans can claim with equal confidence, but the Campbells do not come forward very prominently in national history until the time of Robert the Bruce."

Yes folks, that's all one sentence. . .

There's nothing about the plaid specifically, but this, about the illustration: "The artist, in accordance with the character of the family of Argyle, who were distinguished as staunch adherents of the 'solemn league,' has exhibited the figure in the character of one of those doughty opponents of prelacy, poreing over the sacred volume to strengthen his resolution to stand for the convenanted work of Scotland's reformation." Got that? There'll be a quiz tomorrow.


Don't think this shows up very well, but the colors, above, are deep red, olive green, and salmon. Yum.





Above, one of my favorites. I like the colors a lot. And this one, unlike most of the other patterns, really looks like argyle if you tip the angle of the squares so they're diamonds instead. You can even see the lines running through the pattern.



Yes, a lot of the details are crotch shots. Hmmm. Where do you suppose those stockings end? (My sources tell me that Scots wear nothing under their kilts. Personally, I don't know, but wouldn't mind finding out. A guy in a skirt is kind of sexy, unless he's one of those Cher impersonators. And then, not so much. . .)




Here are many, many images from a terrific book in LCP's collection. It's James Logan's Clan's of the Scottish Highlands (London, 1845) 2 volumes. (WW)

A-S-S Women

Typical -- we hardly have enough room to work, what with all the food, patterns, and other stuff. . .

Hal would make a great knitwear model, don't you think? He could probably even pull off one of those overly-cably sweaters that no man looks good in. He's rugged without being obnoxious about it.


Someone thought it might be a good idea to weigh the yarn that went on the bobbins. Why was that again? So that that certain someone (who's way ahead of everyone else, by the way) could show off her fancy-pancy scale? Ok, maybe a certain someone else has scale envy.


Here's Val trying to decide what her color scheme should be. (Can you tell, she's trying not to kill me for taking her picture.) Congrats, Val, on getting into Brown. You're a super-star.


Val and her doughnut bobbins.



Val's line colors. I love how these bobbins look with Ewa's yarn on them. Like little pieces of candy. Luscious. Yarn money shots.


Val doing her first row of colors and learning about bobbin management. It's so exciting to see those first few rows of the pattern emerge. Val -- did you get any work done last night??


We made a lot of progress on our socks on Sunday. I guess we should've -- after all, we were at JWR's house for close to 6 hours. (Was it really that long??) Here's Ang with her sock, ready to work the sole. I cannot believe how much sewing we're going to have to do. I'm bringing booze to our sew-up session.

Lookin' Kinda Sockish

Now that I have the heel and the gussett done it's starting to look like a sock! The gussett goes fast because you are knitting on less stitches than usual. And I guess the foot will go faster too. I usually burn out on the foot...

rrrrrr-gyle

See what I mean? One of the books that passed through my hands today. Argyle is everywhere. It's starting to creep me out. (WW)

R. Guile

I'm seeing argyle everywhere. When in NYC a few weeks ago, it seemed like everyone was wearing something with an argyle design on it -- baby jackets, women's sweaters, backpacks. We recently got a sizeable donation of books to the LCP, including some with fancy endpapers. They reminded me of, what else, argyle:

Close-up, above.

So what, exactly, constitutes an argyle pattern? The diagonal lines? The diamond pattern? Is it any kind of plaid? I thought the answer would be easy, just a matter of browsing the OED for a definition. But all it has is an entry for Argyll, "a vessel of silver or metal, like a small coffee pot, in which to serve up gravy, so as to keep it hot." Hmmm. Not quite the thing I'm looking for.

There are plenty of Dukes of Argyle (and Argyll), from Scotland. So the name must come from the clan's plaid pattern, right? Here's what the internet has to say:
-----
Main Entry: ar·gyle
Variant(s): also ar·gyll /'är-"gI(-&)l, är-'/
Function: noun
Usage: often capitalized
Etymology: Argyle, Argyll, branch of the Scottish clan of Campbell, from whose tartan the design was adapted
: a geometric knitting pattern of varicolored diamonds in solid and outline shapes on a single background color ; also : a sock knit in this pattern
-----
So the design has to have diamonds? How far can you take an argyle pattern before it's no longer argyle? Or just enough but barely argyle? It's a philosophical question but also, possibly, a challenge for our next socks. Anyone?? (WW)

Hell Flap, Too

Here's my hell flap. It does a slightly different pattern that I usually do. It says to slip 1 as if to purl, knit 1 repeating across. I usually just sl 1 k 1. It is different. I kind of helps you know where you are and what you just did. I didn't loose track or make any mistakes for some reason when I did it that way.
JWR