A night at the opera

Last night Willie and I, Matt, and Chloe went out to Madama Butterfly at the State Theatre! Puccini isn't my usual musical fare to say the least, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a great spectacle, and the singing was fantastic, especially Hiromi Omura who played Butterfly. The set was simple, with some touches that made it magical: pools of water, glittering stars, and drifting cherry blossoms. I was grateful for the surtitles translating the Italian, as I wasn't familiar with the story beyond the basic naive-Japanese-heroine-meets-caddish-American-villain outline.

I've been to a couple of operas before: The Marriage of Figaro a year or two ago in Wellington, and L'Orfeo more recently. It's a great excuse to dress up and be fancy - a lovely escapist way to spend an evening. It was fun to introduce our newbie guests to the bizarre and sublime world of opera!

The teaser trailer:

Hiromi Omura in the same role, in a past production:

We had really good seats, thanks to a competition Opera Australia is running. The idea is to make an origami butterfly, and take a photo of it in a public place. I took my slightly dodgy butterfly along on one of my raiding-trips to the State Library music-scores room. ;)

A butterfly on a butterfly

A tardy cardie

Knitting garments is time-consuming. I fall in love with cool new designs, and put them in my Ravelry queue, and ponder what yarn I might use and what colours would maximise the general awesomeness. But they take me so long to actually knit (in between working on smaller projects), I've made a total of two finished garments to date: a Beatnik jersey and my Chickadee cardie.

Therefore it's not really surprising that the Cria cardigan I started in September, in a big burst of knitting productivity at my parents' house, has gained only about a dozen rows since I've been in Australia. Luckily, I seem to have my garment-making gumption back, and I'm chipping away at my green Cria. On Sunday I brought it to Willie's sister's house, and knit a few rows while they played music in the next room. I couldn't resist trying it on the mannequin-on-stilts that looms in a corner of the lounge...

 

I still have the sleeves and most of the body to knit. I'm using 4ply pure wool yarn from Anna Gratton, which I bought at a Wellington market back in May - which illustrates just how long my 'garment cycle' is!

Naturally, I've been scheming about what cardie or jersey to make next, even though this one won't be finished for a while yet. I have two special batches of 4ply yarn in sufficient quantities, and a short-list of patterns for each. The first is Vintage Purls Sock in 'Hotel Magnifique', which is all crazy rainbows! It will need a relatively plain design - I'm considering Billowing, Barnsley, Deco, and Candelia. I'll have to work out which would suit me best, and what I'd most like to wear.

The second batch of hoarded garment-yarn is Skein Top Draw Sock in 'Golden', which looks like faded sunflowers. I think this yarn will be able to take a little more detail in the design. At the moment I'm torn between Praline, Conic, and the others I mentioned above. Because these skeins are underweight 'seconds', I'll need to calculate the necessary yardage carefully - the long-sleeved designs might be pushing it.

The plotting-and-scheming stage of a project is totally my favourite!

Starstuff revisited

I finished my stranded mitts! Twinkle, twinkle, little possums...

'Starstuff' mitts in Zealana Kauri (Kea + Blue Pania)

Blocking really worked wonders for my tension - the stitches are so much more even and tidy, and the star pattern shows up clearly. My beloved possum-blend yarn 'bloomed' a little too, so they're even softer after blocking, with a lovely halo of possum fur.

The pattern, Starstuff, is now fully revised and available for download from Ravelry. While the design remains essentially the same, I edited the instructions for clarity, re-drew the charts to make them more straightforward, and made a few small design tweaks to the ribbing sections. I've learned a lot about colourwork (and knitting in general) since I first released my Starstuff pattern in 2010, so the revision was well worth doing.

I used a little more than half a ball of the blue yarn, and a little less than half of the green. I plan to make a coordinating hat, once I've made some progress on my other projects. I'm thinking stars around the brim, and a solid centre.

Possum perfection

Recently I've been knitting with some particularly scrumptious yarn: Zealana's Kauri in fingering weight (4ply). It's a blend of 60% merino, 30% possum, and 10% silk, and it's just as cosy and soft as you'd expect from that combo. Mmmmmm...

Yarn with possum-fur content is very cosy and warm, and has the added benefit of supporting the eradication of a serious environmental pest. Reducing New Zealand's possum population is good for our native wildlife, including precious endangered birds. You can read more about possum-blend yarn on the Kiwiyarns Knits blog, and about the possum problem in general on the NZ Forest and Bird website.

Zealana Kauri in 'Kea' and 'Blue Pania'. Zealana does the best colours!

The possum-fur content gives it a subtle fuzzy 'halo'

I ordered my Kauri from Great Southern Yarns, which stocks brands like Brooklyn Tweed and Malabrigo that can be hard to find in New Zealand, as well as lovely local stuff like Zealana.

Being a two-plied yarn with a bit of fuzziness to it, I thought Kauri would be ideal for stranded colourwork. Happily, I've been intending to revise one of my early patterns, for a pair of colourwork mitts.

A sneaky peek...

The colours are working well together, and my tension is looking pretty good. I've learned a lot about colourwork (and knitting in general) since I came up with my Starstuff pattern. All going well, I should have a fully-revised version done by next week, and a finished pair of mitts to show you. I'm looking forward to blocking them, so I can see the final tidied-up effect!

New pattern: Beachgrass

My new summer hat pattern Beachgrass is now available on Ravelry. Yay!

Yesterday Willie and I took the tram to St Kilda, and pottered around the beach and the shops. We stopped for tea at a neat bar called The Vineyard - hopefully next time we'll be able to get a seat outside. On a sunny Saturday afternoon the competition was fierce!

I wore my new hat, and it really did keep my head cool in the sun. Best of all, because it's a loose-fitting hat with great air-flow, I didn't end up with the dreaded hat-hair. :)

Beachgrass is simple to knit, and has a really relaxed, casual look. Most of the shaping is achieved by blocking, so you don't need to pay close attention until you reach the crown decreases.

I designed it with plant-fibre yarns in mind, but it would look stylish in wool too (for a cool-weather hat). In wool, the brim would be much more stretchy, so getting the size right would be a snap.

For my Beachgrass hat, I used Hemp for Knitting's Allhemp6 yarn, in 'Sprout'. As I mentioned in my previous post (Experimenting with Hemp), this yarn softens quite dramatically after washing. I recommend washing the skein before you start knitting, to make it less rough on your fingers. Pre-washing will also give you a more accurate swatch, because the fabric will be closer to the finished item.

Hemp yarn is very eco-friendly, hard-wearing, and versatile. Give it a try!