The Meaningful Stitch - Episode 1 - A New Beginning

hello there and welcome to the meaningful stitch this is the very first episode and it's something that i've been wanting to do for a very long time and i finally plucked up the courage to do it today so um i've got lots of things to share with you but to begin with i just wanted to introduce myself and what i'm intending to do with this digital online space this home from home that i'm going to be creating and inviting all of you to join me in so i am amy palko and i live in edinburgh with my husband who we've been married now for 23 coming out for 23 years and our three children so two of my children currently live at home and my third is lives in a flat not very far away from here so very local which is lovely and which is to say that my children are all grown up so my eldest is 22 and my son who's living away from home now is 20 about to turn 21 and my youngest is 18 just about to turn 19 in a couple of weeks time and he will be going off to university uh just shortly also so that's a big it's a big shift in our family uh so what i was thinking really why i wanted to to begin this is that i really wanted to share with you some of what my own personal craft and sacred practice is which is knitting i knit all the time a day does not go past without needles in my hand and the yarn passing through my fingers it's an incredibly important part of who i am and how i choose to to inhabit this world and i really want to share my projects with you and what is lighting me up and what i'm excited about and and where my craft is taking me next so that's why i'm creating this the meaningful stitch and i wanted to begin actually by sharing with you a card that i chose from a beautiful deck of cards which i will show you the box from it's called the sacred rebel oracle and it's by alanna fairchild i really love this at this particular deck um my work in the world is as a goddess guide and so i support women to view their lives through the lens of goddess archetype and i think that this particular oracle guide is a really beautiful complement to that and so it's one that i use quite often in my work and so it felt very fitting to choose one for um for beginning today so this is the card that i chose you can see it's called come to life and i just wanted to read you a little bit from the guidebook but just because it's so beautiful the message of this oracle is be alive don't imagine you can go back to sleep you're too awake for that now there is no falling back into old ways if you do so it will be short-lived and it won't feel the same as it used to you may grieve this you will certainly eventually celebrate it you have crossed a threshold from an old way of being in an old life and try as you might you cannot return i think it's a really beautiful way to begin um a new project a new creative project such as such as this podcast and so i'm really pleased that that was the oracle that um stepped forward for us today and i'm pleased to be able to share that with you all and maybe it connects with you in some kind of way uh this call to come into life i think particularly now that we're entering entering into september which of course for the northern hemisphere is moving into this time of autumn and uh and it's a i always think of september last last week of august the first week of september is that a time of new beginnings you know i think a lot of people think of the new year as the new beginning but actually the new academic year begins in september generally and so it does hold that sense of our possibilities and of creative newness and recreation and so i'm really excited about that maybe that's something that you're identifying with also so what am i wearing i think we better begin there well this is the lunet shawl it's a beautiful pattern by natasha hornby and you may have seen this mentioned on another podcast if you're if you're watching many knitting podcasts um on the caddy jacks uh podcast and jackie from um from that podcast got in touch with me and um through instagram and asked if i would like to knit this shawl also and if i did then she would send me her leftovers and so she did that and i had to buy a little bit of extra i shrubbed the cream which is snailed in yarn uh from the falkland islands i had to complete the project but i'll take it off so you can see it fully but really this is the beginning of what's become an incredibly important friendship to me and uh and really it's just it's been jackie that's really kind of encouraged me along with my mum hi mum to um to have a go at doing this podcast thing and and so i thought it was only appropriate that i wear this beautiful shawl today and it's mosaic knitting which is a form of colour work where you're only ever holding one strand of colour once one strand of yarn for every row so it's a bit simpler and a bit easier to um manage your yarn in your hands and then perhaps stranded colour work is and what i would say though is that the real um tricky part of this shawl is this star stitch textured pattern because it's quite easy to lose track of your of your place in that and i have to pull back a little bit the other piece that i found a little bit tricky about the shawl was the picking up you have to pick up stitches so this bit this the construction of it is to begin with this shallow triangle in the center here with the vertical stripes and then you pick up all along the edge of that to knit this large border on before finishing off with your tassels and i found it quite tricky to divide my stitches up and so that i did that evenly but i took my time and was very careful with it and uh this is the this is the wrong side but actually i think it is incredibly beautiful um mosaic stitch always reminds me of like a woven fabric almost rather than a knitted fabric and and they always have this incredible geometric patterns if you're interested in following up more on geometric patterns in general and mosaic knitting in particular then i do highly recommend that you check out and barbara walker's mosaic knitting book it's got lots of um different stitches and patterns to to check out and not as garment patterns or um as structured pieces it's more of a stitch dictionary and but it's very beautiful and lots of really interesting and bits to look at in there so highly recommend you check that out and this cardigan is my wishes cardigan and this is a hokie lochitelli pattern you can see i've got a little bit of bubbling here i'll tell you a little bit more about this yarn just shortly but um it's a hokey locately pattern again in kind of ingenious construction starting with the neck band and and then knitting it all as one piece and with a number of and you can just about see them uh rows of increases to create kind of a dropped hem at the back and shorter at the front and it's a very elegant piece i think and it's also very comfortable piece to wear and it's also very warm piece which i'm needing today because um it may be august but august in edinburgh um can be a chilly affair and i would certainly say that it's a little bit on the cold side and laterally we've had a lot of rain and a lot of wind and the temperatures have been dropping and so i really felt i needed a really wooly layer and that's what i that's what i've decided to to wear today and the yarn is actually bearing up really beautifully it does like i said it does have a little bit of pilling but really not very much and this is a piece that i've worn a lot uh in the past and it's an older piece of mine and the yarn is actually being reclaimed from an older um from an older piece so in edinburgh and in scotland in the uk in general we have what are called charity shops and if you're from the uk you're probably wondering why i'm saying that it's because i've discovered that charity shops aren't in all countries so so we have these charity shops which are um shops that are set up by individual charities and they sell second-hand clothing mostly second-hand clothing but also um it can have furniture or bits and pieces or whatever and i found this um old jumper in a charity shop for 10 pounds and um it had moth holes in it and i decided that i was going to take home because i love the color and but that actually the jumper itself didn't um didn't suit me but it was a large jumper so there was going to be a lot of wool content that i could a lot of yarn that i could save from it and so from there i took it home unpicked all the seams i unraveled all the pieces i wound them by winding them onto my my yarn winder and then i skinned them and then i steamed them because it's 100 wool by steaming it i got rid of quite a lot of the the um the kinks and the in the yarn and uh and yes used it to to make this particular piece so um so i took something that um that that wouldn't have been worn and was needing saved i am from from the from the moths moths or something which are a big deal in edinburgh unfortunately so um so i have to keep all of my yarn in in bags and i have to keep all of my knits in plastic boxes just to make sure that that they're being kept safe but yeah so i rescued the yarn and i admitted this this piece from it so and for me that's an incredibly sustainable way and a very accessible way also of accessing our materials for our craft so there you go that's what i'm wearing today oh and i'll just mention as well that um hokie who um designed this pattern jorge lochitelli and she is having a fall cow just about to start so i think a lot of her patterns are on 20 off um i've knitted quite a few of hokey look at ellie's patterns i really like her cardigans i love the way that they sit on my shoulders i would describe my shoulders as or my grandma would describe my shoulders as sloppy shoulders because she's a dressmaker and so she's made me a lot of pieces in the past and that's her description so yes these suit my sloppy shoulders so i've knitted the leica cloud and a cardigan which is beautiful and i've just completed an elton cardigan relatively recently too um but she has lots of beautiful patterns and lovely shawl patterns as well as um sweaters so i do recommend that you that you check that out and maybe um join her cat her cow which is starting next month okay so moving on uh what am i knitting right now so what i'm knitting right now i've got yarn in my mouth is this and it is a velicor tea or felicor crop i think it's called by andrea murray i have um split for the sleeves so i'm now just working the the front here so it's knitted from the bottom up and it has this beautiful textured pattern on it which is created with right twist stitches and slip stitches and my yarn is not the yarn that it specifies in the pattern and i would say actually that i very rarely knit um anything with the specified yarn in the pattern i'm i consistently substitute yarn i would say though that this was one of the very few that didn't [Laughter] so this yarn that i'm using is a really beautiful very sheepy yarn it's got a fabulous smell so i'm using garth noor number one which is a shetland wool and it's single ply and i think you get about 350 meters to 50 grams so it's it's a heavy lace or a very light fingering i would say and my lighter color contrast yarn is actually iona wool so it's wool from a little island and off the isle of mull which is i'm off the west coast of scotland and this is their silver weaving which i've gone on had a little look and they don't seem to be stalking it this year but again it's maybe it's ever so slightly thicker than the garthanor number one um but still very much uh a light uh fingering or heavy lace and then my bright pink as you can see is my it's my accent stripe is this little one here and this is from skein queen who's a wonderful hand dyer down in england and this base is called wriggle lace and again it is perhaps a truer lace weight and than the other two but um but because it's the accent rather than the full fabric it felt quite safe to to use that and as little left over from a yarn that i use to knit my grandma a shawl and i really love using up i love using up my leftovers and i love using them up in meaningful ways and quite literally a meaningful stitch so my grandma is the woman who taught me how to knit when i was so little that i don't remember being taught how to knit and i don't remember not knowing what to do with uh needles and yarn in my hands and it has been a practice for me uh pretty much throughout my whole life and and it's incredibly important i feel gift and that i've been given through my through my lineage through my my ancestry uh my obviously moving further back my great-grandparents also knitted and i think we could take it further and further back so i love the idea that um that the motioned the practiced motions of my hands um are those that have been replicated throughout my throughout my past and moving right back through the the ancestors in my in my lineage because it makes me feel very connected to them um on a day-to-day basis and this particular yarn i really love because it is this hot pink you know and it is such a contrast to the undyed yarns that that i'm using is is such a statement color and a statement yarn and it actually the reason why i knitted this yarn from my grandma's shawl is because uh she used to always wear this kind of color of lipstick before she went to the town to meet up with her friends for their for their shopping and their coffees and and so it really reminds me of of her and this very um wonderful grounded maternal woman and putting on her bright lipstick before heading into time to meet up with her friends and so just really wanting to honor her with that and so by bringing that into this particular piece it does it creates a it creates more layers of meaning within the within the fabric itself so i've pretty much knitted this to the pattern i haven't made um any changes my gauge is slightly off but not significantly so um more in the length and more in terms of rows than stitches and so i'm just following the the measurements i had to make sure that it's going to it's going to fit fine which i think it will and but i'm really excited to to wear it i'm very into this natural black right now so this um you can see it's almost like a very dark espresso uh coffee color which i just i'm really into just now so so that's one that's one project at the moment the second project and what i will say is i am usually a monogamous knitter i tend to knit one project until i complete it i am however i am experimenting with being a knitter of many projects um well two i'm not sure that counts as many but this is my other project right now which is this one here it's a shawl and i can show you a photograph of it just shortly it's just here so it's the half and half triangles wrap and this is once again a piece that has been inspired by and by caddy jackson it's um they are they're both as far as i'm aware jackie and kaitlyn are both working on theirs and it was inspired by one of their friends called debbie who has knitted one also uh the original pattern which is a free pattern and i'll leave a link to that and anything else that i've mentioned and in the in the description below but um the free pattern uses a linen quill which is a yarn base from pearl soho however pearl soho is quite a long way away from edinburgh and so and i chose a yarn that's a little closer to home it's not my scottish yarn that i'm that i'm knitting in my other project it's actually a yarn from germany and it's called holst super soft so it's a very different yarn than is recommended in the pattern and it's a proper woolly wool and and so it does have quite a dry handle to it and it would be described i suppose is a more toothy yarn and some might struggle i would have thought um just feeling this as it is right now to wear this um close to their skin or on their neck however what i also know although this is my first time knitting with this yarn what i also know is that this yarn contains spinning oil and that one of the reasons why it's called super soft is because it blooms magically in the washing process and so that's something i'm really excited about exploring and seeing how that how that works but also i do really like a woolly wool um as much as i love you know that the high luxury silks and yak and cashmere and all of these lovely yarns and i do really love a wooly wool also and so um particularly when it gets very cold and i think a wooly wool and shawl is a is an incredibly warming piece to to wear so and so i'm excited to see how this works i've made a couple of adjustments to the pattern which i'll just share with you just now uh when i get to the end of my rows i am slipping the last stitch with my yarn held forward which is something that i do for all of my coffee cup over there and it's something i do for all of my garter um stitch edgings so you can see um let me show you there we go i think you can see it there it just creates a very smooth edge rather than having the garter bumps and which is what i prefer and the other change that i made is that i'm doing a german short rows rather than wrapping turns and so you can see i've got all of these little double these little double stitches here every single stitch is going to be um either wrapped and turned or um or using this little technique of the german short rows and to create a large triangle and then at that point you will pick up all of your stitches and then all of these these little double stitches will all be knitted and then i can introduce my second color which is this one so let me see if i can get like there you go oh that's a good one you can really see the different colors in that the reds and the golds this color is called cinnamon there you go there's host host garn super soft and it is 287 meters for 50 grams so you get quite a lot of bang for your buck and i think it's about 2 pounds 65 for a ball so it's exceptionally good value so i am hoping that after i've washed it and that i'm going to like the fabric that i get from that the other color this one here is called sweet pea and that's also quite a good representation of the color and it's kind of like a soft lilac i suppose that has also got these kind of flecks of gold running through it which i think complements the two really well together so i'm excited to see how this yarn uh how this yarn washes how it feels and once it's all blocked and in the meantime i'm just really enjoying um the meditative practice of garter stitch which i think is always a really beautiful and very relaxing um stitch to do so it's a nice one for the evenings uh particularly when we're watching um netflix or television and but also uh i like to to nick garter while i'm reading as well so i'd set up a book on my ipad and i can knit and um and read at the same time so that's that's uh that proper comfort proper comfort knit okay so that's what i'm knitting what's coming up next well i'm quite excited about this because this pattern literally just dropped this morning and i actually bought it from my bed before i even got up and it's called it's another natasha hornby pattern and it's called lethal and it says beautiful cardigan and it has these amazing welts along the top it's got a little bit of color work it's got some brioche um and again it looks like a really interesting construction and i always love the words that she uses she says here we are trapped in the amber of the moment striking lethal is perfect for warding off chilly weather and allows for easy layering over other pro over other pieces she combines an understated comfortable shape with some thrilling but simple to work details the edges of the cardigan are adorned with welts and slip stitch color work to provide interest and structure the cozy brioche collar and cuffs add drama but also invite you to cocoon in the warm embrace of the cardigan directions for tailoring the fit of lethal to your personal flare are given in the pattern so um i've already looked out the yarn you can tell i'm excited about this but i i will finish my other projects first before i cast on um but this is the yarn that i want to do my lethal in and this is an incredibly special yarn it's a knutted in which is by a wonderful made by a wonderful couple called caroline and knut from sweden and they have their own mill they also have an amazing patreon account where um caroline does um does her videos uh some podcasts and we'll share with you the the creation process of the yarn itself and it's um it's it's just incredibly special and pleta lopey for me sometimes feels a little bit rough um or a little bit harsher this is incredibly soft as you can see this is this is a colorway and which came out in the last yarn release that they did and it's called between petals and i just think it is beautiful it looks kind of like sunshine to me or like high sunshine would look if it was captured in a yarn and again it smells wonderfully sheepy so i have um three plates three 100 gram plates of um between petals and and i'm hoping i'm okay i'm considering um buying some more hair to hold with it because in the pattern uh natasha hornby uses sneldon which is a yarn you can get from in the uk anyway from midwinter yarns which is also where we get our snailden and solu from as well so um well certainly it's nailed in i'm not sure about the solute but yes snailden and all centrum are yarns that you can get from midwinter yarns and but i'm thinking i'm going to use this and natasha holds a bishi bush mohair uh with the alcentrum to get a worsted weight and so i'm just considering whether i want to do the same with mine or not and the colors that i'm going to use um as my contrast i've got some black and this is pleta lopey and you can see it's a little bit um it feels a little bit sturdier this but this feels incredibly soft so i'm going to be really interested to to knit with this to see to see what it's like i have never knitted with plato loppy before so that's going to be a new experience and caroline very kindly put this little extra um uh piece of yarn little opi or the the new to den sorry in with the rest of my order so i'm thinking this is going to be my three colors for my from my lethal cardigan so i'm really excited to cast this on and um but like i say i'm going to be very good and i'm going to complete what i started the other big project that i'm looking forward to starting and i have a date for starting this one and i'll be casting it on on the 22nd of september which is the autumn equinox and i'm going to be knitting this with my mum and she sent me this beautiful card la vienna me and she said la bien amie which i think is lovely um sharing this helix and mohair silk with you thought it would be fun to knit matching shawls love mum so she then sent me the most fabulous la vie enemy yarn which i want to show you so look at this it's just absolutely glorious it gleams it looks almost unreal so this is their mohair silk in um rust and my mom also has a matching skein of this and then we both have this yarn and this is um let me show you the band helix from la vie enemy which is uh again it's a light fingering at 650 meters a per 100 grams and it's 75 falkland merino and 25 gotland and mum got three skeins of it and then wound um half a skein for herself and half a skin for me sorry there we go try and show you the the colors that she got there we go so we have kitsune which is this lovely red we have rust and we have golden rod aren't they glorious so that let me hold these with that it's just going to be the most stunning autumn shawl a beautiful way to welcome in this season and i love that i get to knit it with my mum who is an incredibly keen knitter also and who shares my my passion for all things yarn so we often speak uh on the on the phone and through facetime she lives over in france and so we quite often get to to share what we're what we're currently knitting on so it's going to be a really lovely opportunity to knit on these and on this shared project together uh we are currently thinking that we're going to do a birds for feather shawl which is by andrea murray i'll show you a photograph of that it's this um interesting shape of shawl it's almost like a kite shape i always think and and it contrasts um lace and garter with um the i think she uses a single ply merino animal hair silk and but we're going to be using this this yarn instead and however we're not sharing at the moment how we're going to order our colors or what our plan is for that and so that we end up with shawl switch match but uh but we'll may end up slightly different so we'll need to wait and see how that how that works out but i'm i'm really excited by that and uh and yes i'll need to wait and see what we end up with so my loves that is what i'm wearing what i'm knitting and what's coming up next um thank you so much for joining me for this first for this first podcast and i think the first one of anything is always a particularly difficult thing to to step up and do but i wanted to finish up with a blessing and it's from a book that i have here by jonah donohue which is called benedict's a book of blessings and if you don't know john o'donoghue he was this wonderful man who wrote beautiful poems uh from he was he was from ireland he died a few years ago now and his most famous book is called anam kara which means soul friend which i which i really love but he wrote so many beautiful blessings and this particular book um has blessings uh for all kinds of things so for thresholds such as for birthdays for callings for states of heart uh for desires all kinds of things for endings and he says that i just wanted to read you this little excerpt before i from the introduction before i read you the blessing but he says in a dead wall a new window opens in dense darkness a path starts to glimmer and into a broken heart healing falls like morning dew it is ironic that so often we continue to live like paupers though our inheritance of spirit is so vast the quiet eternal that dwells in our souls is silent and subtle in the activity of blessing it emerges to embrace and nurture us let us begin to learn how to bless each other whenever you give a blessing a blessing returns to enfold you so i want to share this blessing with you so that i can experience the same blessing unfolding me and it's a blessing for a new beginning in out of the way places of the heart where your thoughts never think to wonder this beginning has been quietly forming waiting until you were ready to emerge for a long time it has watched your desire feeling the emptiness growing inside you noticing how you willed yourself on still unable to leave what you had outgrown it watched you play with the seduction of safety and the grey promises that sameness whispered heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent wondered would you always live like this then the delight when your courage kindled and out you stepped onto new ground your eyes young again with energy and dream a path of plentitude opening before you though your destiny is not yet clear you can trust the promise of this opening unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning that is at one with your life's desire awaken your spirit to adventure hold nothing back learn to find ease and risk soon you will be home in a new rhythm for your soul senses the world that awaits you thank you my loves and thank you for joining me and yeah may we all feel blessed until the next time

Channel: Amy Palko

Views: 28,440

Keywords: knitting, knitters, yarn, craft, crafter, crafting, knitting podcast, sacred practice, making, makers, slow fashion

Id: Dm7zyP5ruzg

Length: 37min 51sec (2271 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 28 2020