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Mary Jane Mucklestone

Hand Knitting Blog & Knitting Patterns

Andean

Squam!!!

January 4, 2011 by Mary Jane 11 Comments

Yippee Skipee! I’m teaching at the fabled Squam this year. Holy Canoli I can hardly wait. I’ve always loved summer camp and Squam Arts Workshops is the dreamiest of grown-up summer camps, held on the shores of pristine Squam Lake in New Hamshire. I am looking forward to seeing old friends and meeting new, sharing my skills and learning new ones. There is an amazing line up of teachers,

  • Cat Bordhi
  • Denny McMillan
  • Gudrun Johnston
  • Jessica Marquez
  • Lizzy House
  • Mary Jane Mucklestone
  • Maya Donenfeld
  • Megan Ingman
  • Michelle Madden Smith
  • Pixie Campbell
  • Rebecca Ringquist
  • Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
  • Terri Dautcher
  • Ysolda Teague

It will be a bright sunny spot to look forward to, through these remaining months of winter.

I’ve developed a couple of classes just for Squam, Fair Isle Baby Hat and Checkerboard Wristlet; each one inspired by one of my recent travels to the color knitting meccas of Shetland and Peru.

Hope you can join us!

More on my classes Here

Filed Under: Events, Knitting Tagged With: Andean, fair isle, Squam, Teaching

New Skills from Peru

June 15, 2010 by Mary Jane 16 Comments

I’ve been practicing my newly learned skills. On the left is the beginnings of a intarsia colorwork hat made with a corded join. We’re viewing it from the public side. It is actually made by purling from the inside. There are practical reasons for this, working from the “wrong side”  it is easier to control all the little bobbins, and make sure they are properly twisted when encountering a new color. It is also easier to wrap every stitch if you’re obsessed enough to desire this elegant interior. I vacillate between making everything super tidy and amazing with every stitch twisted, to the slightly quicker stranding, which is pretty in its own way.

On the right we see a some grutas, or lumps….like you’d find in your oatmeal…only these will be soon be found adorning a sweet and cheerful baby hat.  I’m making strands of grutas, a fairly new development in gruta technique. What at first seems tedious, quickly becomes habit forming. Practice at your niece’s soccer game, and you’ll be surprised how quickly your ribbons of grutas grow!

…now that I wrote that, maybe they were called grumitas, which I have written in my chicken-scratch notes in another place. When I look up in Google translator, I find bultitos for little lumps…any one out there know? In Quechua or Spanish?

Update!

reader Trudy says:

“I just looked up in my big Spanish dictionary – gruta is a “cavern or grotto”, grumo is translated as “lump” – as in a lump in sauce, or a clot 9(of blood), or cluster or bunch (of grapes). So I think it might be grumo – and the diminutive would be grumito(s)”

So you Spanish speakers and Andean textile experts can have a laugh on me…taking about making stranded grottos…which sounds kind of nice, really, like the hotsprings outside of San Miguel de Allende, that are linked pools from deep and cold following streams to warmer, all the way up to the final hot pool that is ….yes!…in a grotto. La Gruta…that must have been the source of my mistake.

Extra! I found I noted down “kurpa” when Phetra from Pitumarca was teaching me the knitted in variety…

Extra! Extra! Cindy found the translation for “kurpa”

Runasimi (Quechua) – English
kurpa
adj. crisp
[Sikllalla Runasimi]

s. a flat clod of earth; clump; clump of earth; sphere; bullet; ball; clod of dirt; dirt clod
[Sikllalla Runasimi, Qosqo]

ta da!

I’m test-driving a workshop in these techniques this week in Boston.

I’ll also be informally demonstrating grutas at the Maine Fiber Arts booth at the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens at this weekends Garden Fair: The Maine Gardeners and Artisan’s Festival. The festival will feature garden luminaries Eliot Coleman and Barbara Damrosch, woo hoo! I’ll be there Saturday and Sunday afternoon.

Costal Maine Botanical Gardens
132 Botanical Garden Drive, Boothbay, Maine
GARDEN FAIR     Friday-Sunday • June 18, 19 & 20 • 9-5

Filed Under: Knitting Tagged With: Andean, bobbles, colorwork, corded join, grutas, Peru, technique

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Happy Fair Isle Friday. The sea brings solace. V Happy Fair Isle Friday.  The sea brings solace.  Veesik from my book Fair Isle Weekend knit with DK weight @jamiesonsofshetland Shetland wool. 
#fairislefriday #fairisleweekend #maryjanemucklestone #shetlandwool #fairisleknitting 📷 @jenireid 💃🏽@ellagordondesigns #fairisle
9 from last year. It was a wonderful year for me i 9 from last year. It was a wonderful year for me in so many ways, despite the strange and scary times. Number one was your number one too, baby Otis!  Thank you for all your support this year and the outpouring if love for my new book Fair Isle Weekend. 🙏 we’ve got some adventure and exploring ahead! Even if it’s in our own neighborhood. 🏡 🏔I’m glad we’ve started a new year. May it be happy and safe for everyone. ✨⭐️✨ 
Now go eat some black eyed peas! 
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#topnine #granny #fairisleweekend #fairisleweekendbook #knitting #norwegianpurl #demo #wearalltheknits
Have a lovely evening! #maine Have a lovely evening!
#maine
Happy Sunday in Maine! Clearing our heads at the b Happy Sunday in Maine! Clearing our heads at the beach.
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Twelve21 hats fresh off the needles ~ still 15%off through tonight. Secret code 1221
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#maine #twelve21hat @hiravelry #knittersofinstagram
Happiest of Holidays! Leelee the Wonder dog, Empre Happiest of Holidays! Leelee the Wonder dog, Empress of the Universe extends her love and benevolence to you all and every being on the planet and in our solar system and all other solar and other systems ✨ blessing on us all. On a personal note, Vogue Knitting Magazine arrived Christmas Eve! Such a gift!!! And and slide 3 The Man from Cebu Borneo is surrounded by special snowflake light!
✨ 
MeRrY mErRy🌟
Twelve21 !! Happy Solstice 🌞New pattern today! Twelve21 !! Happy Solstice 🌞New pattern today! Use code: 1221 for 15% off on @hi.ravelry thru Sunday ~ link in bio. Cozy cozy with super bulky or bulky yarn. Two skeins of @quinceandco Puffin made 2 hats (not including pompous) One already gifted and away! Many thanks to busy mommy Sophie for agreeing to an impromptu photo shoot. Pandemic make do - safety in the backyard! 
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In 3 sizes, shown grey in large, black in small. Medium was absconded with 🤣 I mean...gifted
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Newsletter subscribers check your on box for a special discount✨
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#Twelve21Hat #quickgift #knitgift #strandedknitting #strandedcolorwork #maryjanemucklestone #knittersofinstagram #knittingaddict #newpatternrelease
Happy Fair Isle Friday! Kuvvel is a cowl with a tw Happy Fair Isle Friday! Kuvvel is a cowl with a twist! Knit as a tube, given a turn and grafted together. I love testing out different color combinations. The two swatches on the left are simply rearrangements of the same 5 colors as the original. The monochromatic swatch on the right uses 4 shades of @woolfolk_yarn Tynd. The possibilities are endless! I even have a swatch that used glitter yarn, but it’s so hard to photograph! Which one do you like best? Have a great weekend friends - have some fun! Swipe for an example 😂
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 #fairisleweekend #kuvvel #fairisleweekendbook #fairisleknitting #shetland #fairislebook #knittingbook
#maryjanemucklestone #fairislefriday 
#lainepublishing #lainemagazine #strandedknitting #stickning #tricoter #stricken #neulonta  #編み物  #フェア 📷 photos 2&3: @jenireid
So happy to share with you what I was working on t So happy to share with you what I was working on this summer. Such an honor to work alongside editor and chief Norah Gaughan and art director Emily Jones, and with all the talented  designers, writers and photographers. Teamwork ❤️ 
Photo: @gretarybus 
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Repost from @vogueknittingmagazine
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From pandemics to politics, the world has changed. I think you’ll agree that the next issue of Vogue Knitting has also changed radically. The issue is inclusive and diverse, and represents what Vogue Knitting is known for: solid, painstakingly accurate instruction and our signature fashion-forward designs. I want to thank Norah Gaughan and her team who put together such a uniquely different publication. I truly hope you find enjoyment in this well-crafted collection.⁠
⁠
Art Joinnides⁠
President⁠
SoHo Publishing Company

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