Mittension of Rovaniemi

Actually, it was a fairly laid-back class; we were quiet because we were _busy_, thank you.



Susanna Hansson is a good teacher and a fun and pleasant person, as well as one of the most astoundingly fluent non-native English-speakers I've ever encountered. I was happy that she has encountered and used correctly the fine word schlep, which my years at Brandeis taught me was best translated (when used as a noun) as 'A steamer trunk full of rocks.' She did have a good deal of stuff with her.

And though the room (rather harshly lit) was full of knitting teachers there was a familiar face who picked out a familiar colorway:



I don't seem to knit as loose as I once did, as 000 needles turned out to be unnecessary and 1's were fine. I think either I am growing up or my drugs are perfectly balanced because I restarted once because I screwed up the first row and ruined the cast-on, at least once; then I learned I hope for the last time that if you're knitting in the _round_ you read the chart normally (like a typewriter, for you antiquaries) instead of boustrophedon;then I just plain read the chart wrong and skipped a color repeat: and yet I was not crazed or suicidal, or even the least complete in the class by the time we gave up and shopped, being at WEBS after all. I'd have a picture of my partial cuff but I pulled it out again this afternoon because I would really like to do it right. But I may try it again in sport instead of fingering and with a whole line of different colors because I managed to get the first and second and third pale greens mixed up.

One particular thing struck me: Susanna was discussing Saami weaving and one thing led to another and there I was talking about Women's Work, the First 20,00 Years,which some of you may recall my mentioning other times. Anyway, one of the WEBS employee-students went and fetched the four copies in the store and people bought three of them. My kind of fanatics.

Susanna and Lene will have a article in PieceWork this coming winter sometime and The Secret of the ColorChange Will Be Out. It will still be a lot easier to learn with kindly human tuition. I can't show you over lunch. It is really absorbing and those folk (you know, folk tradition) were awfully clever.



Everyone picked colors that went with what she was wearing.

I behaved fairly well at WEBS except for the five skeins of sportweight alpaca... And I have almost finished my mom's second sock!