February 2018 was when Cyclone Hartmut dubbed the Beast from the East, brought England and Wales to a virtual halt with unusually low temperatures and heavy snowfall. In spite of the sub-zero weather and slippery pavements, this knitter had other things on her mind. The second Wednesday of that February was the 14th meaning that … The love issue

For the parenting period of this knitter’s life, knitting never really became a family affair. By the time my kids were old enough to make their own choices about what to do with their time, they chose not to knit. I went from being disappointed, to ridiculously analytical (could rejection of knitting be a metaphor … Live and Lett Lopi

I opened the shop on Monday morning to a smell that seemed to come from a time before this one. The source was in the back room – a not-washed-up preserving pan sticky with the dregs of mulled wine made to keep Saturday’s patiently queueing customers, warm. The smell was sweet, a bit orangey and … The ghost of knit nights past

The shop gets awfully noisy at this time of year. I had to ask a caller to speak up on the phone yesterday against a background din of the reciept printer that was churning out a mile-long scroll of customer orders. Meanwhile the tape dispenser was burping its mechanical grrtttt noise at regular intervals as … Urgent or important: The knitter decides.

I count my stitches two at a time, others take them singly or in fives. I watch perfectly fluent English speakers whisper numbers in their mother toungue as they thumb their way along the stitches. We each have our own habitual ways of doing it, but counting is a part of what all knitters do. … One stitch at a time

This time of year is full of questions.. like how many stitches to cast on for a scarf, how to avoid curling edges, or what to do about joining in a new ball of wool etc.. And although I know there are multiple solutions to any one of those problems,  I’ve learned that new knitters … A short knit story of time