Episode 4A: Wrapping Up in Scarves

Hosts

Sherri, host, knitter, spinner, and fosters dogs.

You can find Sherri as
TangledThread on Ravelry
Instagram: geminatepodcast

Tamara, co-host, knitter, knitwear designer, hiker, mom

You can find Tamara as
tammo on Ravelry
Instagram: tamaramoots
Blog: www.tamaramoots.com
Knitwear Designs: http://www.ravelry.com/designers/tamara-moots

Current Projects

Sherri:
Silver Lake by Amy Miller out of Tahki Yarns Cotton Classic DK.  Sherri's Silver Lake
Lined hat knitted without a pattern started top down out of handspun. Fiber is Bonkers Tencel 'n Merino given to Sherri by Tamara. Sherri's First Hat of 2020

Tamara:
Sherri Pullover by Tamara out of Valley Yarns Amherst in the color Harvest Gold on US Size 8 (4.00 mm) needles.
Malachite Cowl design out of Dream in Color Jilly in the colorway Green Lantern on US Size 2 (2.75 mm) needles.
More mittens. Tamara's basic recipe given in Episode 3B out of Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted on US Size 6 (4.00 mm) needles.
Salt River Sweater test knit in full swing. Sample sweater out of Valley Yarns Northfield in the color 03 Chestnut on US Size 6 (4.00 mm) needles. 

Finished Projects

Sherri:
Cheating at Checkers by Susan Ashcroft out of  Knit Picks Galileo and The Fibre Co. Road to China Light. Sherri's Cheating at Checkers 

Tamara:
InGENEous Mittens by SK Designs out of Berroco Vintage DK in the color Petunia on US Size 5 (3.75 mm) needles. https://www.ravelry.com/projects/tammo/ingeneous-mittens
6 new hats for a hat design! One in each of the sizes Baby, Toddler, Child, Adult S, Adult M and Adlut L out of Knit Picks Wool of the Andes in the colors Winter Night and Clarity. 

What We've Been Wearing

Sherri:
Bookworm by Heidi Kirrmaier out of Berroco Blackstone Tweed in the color 2684 Concord Grape. Sherri's Bookworm
All the wool socks. 

Tamara:
Basic Adult Mittens out of Lamb's Pride Worsted. Every day. All winter.
Aurora Hat by Tamara out Berroco Vintage Worsted in an oatmeal color Adult S size.
Snow Day Hat by Tamara out of Lamb's Pride Worsted in a bright red.
Emma Sweater by Tamara out of Knit Picks Simply Wool in the color Wallace in Adult L size.

Topic of the Show: Scarves!

Scarves are portable and make great gifts. One of the best thing about scarves is that you can make them as long or as short as you like and as thin or as wide as you like. There are more than 52,000 scarf patterns on Ravelry. Using Ravelry search features to narrow down your search is a great way to get to a reasonable number of pages to scroll through.

Tamara's favorite scarves are worsted weight, wool, texture or cables and long enough to be draped loosely around the neck and still have long, long ends hanging down to the knees. Tamara also likes a completely different type of scarf that is small, thin and made out of specialty or novelty yarn because they are a great way to use up funky yarns and show off your knits even when it is too warm to think about wearing wool. Like this, this or this.

Sherri likes the product of scarves way more than the process of making. She's got 6 scarves in her rotation and can't wear more than that in a winter so she's not planning to make more until these wear out. Sherri talks about how the wearable blanket scarf of Lenny Kravitz inspired Sherri's version of  Pickers Delight by Christa Giles. Also, Clapotis by Kate Gilbert with Sherri's version made out of handspun and her version of the Noro Striped Scarf by Jared Flood.

Plus Tamara did some research on how to wear a scarf. She found some great YouTube videos out there. Here two favorites were this one that goes through 25 ways to wear a scarf in 4.5 minutes and this one that goes through 20 different ways in about 6 minutes. Turns out Tamara almost always wears her scarves as the Modern One Loop (once around the neck and the ends back in front to hang evenly down the body), the Classic Drape (no wrapping at all, just over the neck and down) or the European Way (also called the European Loop where you fold it in half, the ends go through the loop to hand down the front and the loop stays in front at the top). She just didn't know the names before. Tamara is going to try The Braid (at about 3 min, 30 seconds of this one) and the Purse Accent (last one on this video).

Something New: Grafting in Pattern

Sherri and Tamara learned to graft in pattern. They didn't discuss resources ahead of time so were surprised when they both found the same tutorial from Solene Knits. Sherri and Tamara have kitchenered projects before but grafting in pattern was new to both of them. Tamara actually used this tutorial from Lucy Hague more. The condensed guide really helped after going through the entire photo tutorial. Tamara thinks she'll never be able to do this without referring back to the tutorials. Sherri had an ah-ha moment where it all clicked. Grafting in pattern worked really well to graft two ribbing panels together but Tamara had problems getting it to work grafting two seed stitch panels together.

Podcast Announcements

Join Geminate Podcast group on Ravelry and follow us on Instagram at geminatepodcast. 

Tag us on Instagram using #geminatepodcast and #gp20hats2020 and #gp20in2020

Ravelry Board on the Geminate Podcast Ravelry Group for a thread about Scarves. 

That's Entertainment

Sherri:
Listening to the Stash and Burn podcast
Listening to the Buffering The Vampire Slayer podcast
Watching Good Bones with Mina, Karen and crew as they take on the rescue of distressed properties that other renovators wouldn’t go near.
Listening to the Dresden Files audio books.

Tamara:
Watching Dark Matter series on Netflix.
Watching The Expanse series on Amazon Prime.
Watched The Rise of the Skywalker....accidentally in 3D which could have been bad but the older boy knew a science trick to save the movie for her.
Reading Soulless by Gail Carrigan.
Reading Vanishing Fleece by Clara Parkes. 

Board Games 

(with Knitability Rankings from 0 with no time to knit at all to 10 with time to finish half a sock during the game)

Arboretum. Knitability: 0. Enjoyable game that takes quite a bit of thought and card holding which makes knitting during the game almost impossible. Arboretum is a strategy card game that combines set collection, tile-laying and hand management while playing in about 25 minutes. Players try to have the most points at the end of the game by creating beautiful garden paths for their visitors.

DC Comics: Heroes Unite. Knitability: 0....maybe a 1 if you have enough players. Deck-building game. Fun. Fast. Lots of cards - some cards attack, some cards defend. Good game but super hard to knit during the game because it is fast-paced and you have to do things in reaction to other players even not on your turn. It is such a fast game that you have plenty of time to knit after you've played.