So last week when I posted about traditional knitting gone modern, I had no idea where it would end up. I swatched a bit and played around, and had a really unexpected, funny, and useful idea!

You may look at the swatch above and think, “sock”.  So did I.  But then I thought about this-

That would be a pint glass from my regular Friday afternoon hangout, The Bottletree.  It’s one of those deals where you buy the glass for $10 and get happy hour prices on beer forever and ever.  Which is, in my opinion, totally awesome.  But I have to make sure I can get the glass from point A to point B without breaking it.  And I’m clumsy.  And I like to knit odd cozies.  And sooooo….

This is going to be fun!  I’m probably going to rip back and start over with doubled yarn, and probably switch up the color selection a bit (those two browns are melding).  I think I’ll do a reversible “cuff” for the top to tuck in to protect the rim of the glass (stealing this idea from my friend Kristin, who crocheted a cozy for her pint glass a couple weeks back) , that way I can fold it over and out of the way for drinking.

This video shows a variation of the two-yarns-in-the-left-hand I use when I do stranded knitting, using the adjacent fingers to tuck the unused color back and out of the way while working.  I don’t tension my yarn much, so I just lay both yarns over my index finger, separated my my 2nd knuckle.

Another great resource for fair isle knitting are the great folks at Philosopher’s Wool, when I was first learning this video helped a lot (you can tell it’s been up for a while, because they warn it’s “not for dial-up connections”).  Ann Bourgeois uses a two-handed method that really clicks with a lot of knitters.  If you get a chance, check out the companion book, Fair Isle Sweaters Simplified, for more great tips and techniques.

I’ve had traditional knitting on the brain this week; project ideas that revolve around updated versions of fair isle stranded knitting, richly cabled texture patterns, and modern silhouettes in gansey patterns.  A natural fit to bring these type of patterns a modern look is to use a classic but modern yarn, like a hand dyed semisolid.  Texture patterns can still “pop” with a subtler handpaint, and fair isle patterns gain a richer palette.

Currently, I’m knitting a rich cable pattern with Eco DK, a mid-weight three-ply yarn.  This pattern has non-stop cable twists on each right side row, so I’ve been using the “cabling without a needle” technique.  Having a smoothly plied yarn makes life sooo much easier while doing this, as single ply yarns and loosely plied yarns tend to collapse and separate without the structure of the needle holding them up.  I have a tutorial in the works for this technique, because it’s a lifesaver!