The Devil in the Craft Store
There are pitfalls in any creative endeavor, those things that you know you shouldn’t do but they’re just so . . . seductive. Excessively long guitar solos in music. The amnesia story in fiction. Purple in the sunset in painting. And when it comes to yarn, it’s the variegated stuff.
I’m not talking about handpainted yarn, that’s a fiber of an entirely different color. I’m talking about the cheap-ass machine-made variegated yarn that crowds the shelves of craft stores everywhere. It calls to me. I yearn for it. And it makes up into the ugliest fabric you’ve ever seen.
It’s just so pretty in the skein, all those colors calling to you. And every time I think, “This time will be different.” [Next week, a post on my love life.] “This time, things will work out, this time . . .”
It never does.
It’s like that time I thought, “What if a woman overheard a guy making a bet he could get her into bed and decided to pay him back?” It called to me, I thought of all the things the woman could do, it was was colorful, it was exciting, it was gaudy but appealing. But I couldn’t get it to work (or anybody to buy it). Then, ten years after I wrote the first version of it, I looked at it and thought, “What kind of a dickhead makes a bet he can get a woman into bed?” Yes, it only took me ten years to remember that my hero had to be a decent human being. And then I had to tap dance around that premise for the rest of the book. “He didn’t make the bet, okay? She just thinks he made the bet, HE DIDN’T MAKE THE BET.”
Same thing happens when I crochet with variegated yarn.
First of all, I keep missing the big picture: machine-made variegated colors are regular (made by machine) and so will work up with regulaly spaced splotches of color instead of blending subtly. There is nothing you can do about this. And yet I kept working with it. Like these hats:
If those aren’t the Ferd and Louise of hats, I don’t what is. And this is after I fixed them. Before the brims went on, the hats were pretty much a lump of this:
The dog’s breakfast of yarn. Like the amnesiac story which I yearn to write–she doesn’t know who she is! she has to find herself literally and metaphorically!–no matter what you do with this yarn, you’re always going back to be dragged back to the same point: It doesn’t work.
Unless you embrace it totally, open your arms to the absurdity of the thing, and just run with it. Amnesia stories aren’t believable? Yeah, so? What’s your point? Believability is overrated. The same thing happens with a color pattern like this: it’s so over the top ugly that you just have to embrace it with the same trailer park sassiness of the yarn itself: beauty is overrated, I’m in this for the thrill. I made two hats with this stuff before I realized there was going to be no way to make it beautiful, so it was going to have to be Fun. The capital “F” fun, as in Fun Fur and Fun Ribbon and Oh-My-God-I-Can’t-Believe-You’re-Wearing-That-Hat Fun. Thus the green fun fur on Lousie. Still not great, so I did a mix of a purple slub yarn and purple fun fur on Ferd. That’s a beautiful hat brim, I’m here to tell you. Hat’s still ugly though. Even the ribbon can’t save the basic fabric of that variegated yarn.
So with the rest of it–never say die–I paired it with a finer cotton yarn (Senso) in the turquoise color in the vari and got a fabric I think it getting close to good (it’s the hat to the right of Ferd; I’m thinking of calling it Sally):
I think it’s because there’s one color uniting it, one theme pulling it together. Reminds me of the variegated plot threads in Don’t Look Down, where we started with the bridge, the emotionally stunted director, the randy Green Beret, the Russian Mob, Finnegan, the endangered sister, the lonely little girl, and then looked at each other and said, “Oh, hell.” Lotta bobcats in that bag. So we found or added the same thematic thread to all of the plots and subplots to weave them together, one theme attached to everything–committing to others leads to fulfillment–and the different threads of the story blended. Same thing with the turquoise Senso crochet cotton, it softened all those colors into one color family. And then I did the hat brim with a thin furry yarn that blended with the vari and softened the garishness there, too. I like Sally. She’s a quiet little hat, but she has an understated sass about her, a little “I don’t think so” under that pale turquoise hum. She works.
Have I learned my variegated lesson? Of course not. I bought this after that blue/purple/green debacle:
I look at the yarn now and think, “What was I thinking?” The light must have been different at Hobby Lobby. On this one, all I could do was bury the awful fabric under a really wide brim and a bigass pompom with a ruffle. It’s the “Look over there, it’s Haley’s Comet” theory of redirective design. I’ve tried to save books like this. You Again is this hat. No matter how many times I try to fix it, the basic form is still butt-ugly. I’m going to have to unravel that story and start over, that’s all there is to it.
I have many more varis in my yarn stash. I can’t seem to help it, it’s like making a romance hero a professional murderer, or deciding to make a heroine a professor of Ancient Mesopotamia History when you don’t know anything about Mesopotamia, ancient or otherwise except that we should get the hell out of there now, or setting a book in a theme park even though you haven’t been to a theme park in ten years and hated it then. Some of us never learn.
Thank God I don’t play guitar.
There are times where I have to physically slap myself from picking up the variegated. There are some color combinations that call to me more (brown with pink, especially) than others, but it doesn’t stop me from reaching.
I made a huge mistake when a JoAnn’s was going out of business. The second-to-last day saw me practically whoring myself for any (what I thought was) useable skein of yarn. It was 90% off! How could I not buy everything I picked it up?
I purchased roughly $300 worth of yarn for $30 and it felt SO GOOD. Even if I am left with variegated ribbon yarns (which I don’t mind so much) and extremely thick-n-thin wool yarn that is a severe pain to crochet with. I’ve re-sold some of the cheaper stuff, but mostly I am trying to figure out what to do with the rest. If I can get a hold of a felting needle, I will probably try that with the thick-n-thin wool.
Anyway, I have little control when it comes to yarn. I think it’s the reason I stay away from local yarn stores where the delicious fibers live.
You make me wish I could knit. *sigh*
You make me feel better about my absurd(ist) plots.
**deeper sigh**
It’s possible to pull absurdity off, so long as you don’t take it too seriously. (Well, it worked for Crispin anyway.)
You know, I was actually given a hat very similar to that shortly after my daughter was born. It was pretty - in a very Gumnut Fairy kind of a way but not very practical. The fluffy yarn always got in her eyes.
Amazing post, amazing hats.
You know, it’s true, when you look at the variegated up-close, it does look like vomit. But from a distance, you see these cool little waves, and all the colors are so restful, yet have the energy of the waves.
And yes, that skein of yarn at the bottom is HORRIBLE. That ugly green — yet, when you did what you did, it’s a very cute and perky hat. I had to look twice to believe it was made out of that skein.
I’m not really a yarn person — my weakness is fabrics. I buy these GREAT fabrics, then can’t figure out a pattern that will make them look as good on ME as they look on the shelf. So, maybe I’m going to use the fabric instead of wall paper, or something. Or look harder at how to use them — see if there are some sub-plots, er, trim I can attach or ways to de-emphasize the busy-ness, and emphasize the quiet parts. Or vice-versa.
Thank you for a thought-provoking post. (-: Right before I have to do some sewing, too! Timing of the universe . . . .
I think Sally is a great hat! And, variegated yarn or no, you make the others beautifully, with lots of care and inspiration. I admit, I wouldn’t WEAR any of them, except Sally. Well, maybe the bottom one, though there’d have to be pretty amazing lighting to make me pick up that skein of yarn.
I bought a sweet pink and white variegated yarn that looked like cotton candy in the skein. Subtle and fluffy (well, as subtle and pink shading into white can be). But knitted up into a sweater - no. Sorta blotchy. And I’m not the stylist you are, so its shape isn’t as nice as it could be, either (it needs to be more fitted and the neckline doesn’t lie flat, as the pattern had it go from reverse stockinette with a v-cable to rib, which reduces the gauge. I know the problem, but not the solution! I’ve tried to fix it a couple of times, but there’s a limit to how often one can pull out and re-knit before the yarn gets icky).
Perhaps this post will give me the strength to withstand the gorgeous, tweedy, variegated yarn I’ve been thinking of making into a throw…
Micki - I’m completely with you! It’s so discouraging when you see a great fabric made into a non-descript garment. Best of luck!
wow! those are some hats!! who gets to be the lucky wearer of these one of a kind creations?
varigated knits aren’t my downfall but yarn in general. i’ve only been knitting again for a couple of years and i’ll buy anything. $1 skein or $9 - it doesn’t matter. we have a lovely yarn store around the corner from my house but i can’t even go in to say hi unless i take the kids because that way i won’t have a chance in anything to browse.
that said, any handwork is good for the brain to ruminate. i’m avoiding/ ruminating over a chapter now and have knitted up 2 take-a-long baby blankets. i hope the hats have provided some good ruminating!!
The only thing I knit is kids’ mittens (to donate at Christmas time), and variegated works for them. Probably b/c they’re so small that there’s not a whole lot of “fabric” to them, and they just end up bright and cheerful.
Another trick to make the mittens work, and might be good in other settings — use the variegated in stripes. Pick one of the colors in the variegated yarn as a background, and then alternate 3-4 rows of variegated and 3-4 rows of background. The stripes kinda’ soften along the edges, b/c the lines blur into the variegated in places.
Lorna’s Laces.
Have I got a yarn for you! Marble by James C. Brett. It knits up with longer strands of color and softly shifts shades. There are about 10 different colors to choose from. I’ve made some wonderful shawls with this.
I have the same addiction to variegateds; my stash attests to it. I have yet to meet one I didn’t like. (Red Heart Baby Amore has a really great one, white with dots of pastels. It mixes well with their solids in a ripple afghan.)
Here’s a simple solution to putting those ugly yarns to use: Project Linus. Never once have they returned an afghan and said, “Nope, sorry, too ugly for us.” They’re more than happy to take whatever you make them. Needless to say, they get a lot from me. My local AC Moore also gives 10%-off-yarn coupons for every afghan donated, so it’s not just charitable, it’s a way of replacing all those homely variegateds with solids.
(Byrdloves, I’ve been lusting after that Marble for ages but I swear I have to finish my UFO’s before I can justify getting it. If I can’t die before I finish my UFO’s, I may live forever.)
http://www.ProjectLinus.org
Dedicated Blanketeer
And the problem is …. Look at the yarn in the last pic. You see lengths of the same color, with colors stacked, a lovely chevron look by the winding of the yarn. And there’s the seduction. The skein is so beautiful. Those lovely lengths of the same color get turned into much shorter lengths, and the chevron look goes away.
So…. duplicate the ball of yarn look by using separate skeins of yarn of those colors. Do a chevron pattern. You didn’t want to know this, huh?
Ii do like Sally. I’d buy Sally any day.
I also yearn for You Again. I think it must be my long lost true love. It’ll probably get published the day before I die.
For the record, I totally would wear the first two hats. And the middle two. Not that last one though. I do have standards.
On the risk of being ostracized forever: these hats remind me of a typical German invention, the toilet paper roll cover for middle-class cars. What you do is crochet a hat like that and combine it with what looks like the upper half of a Barbie doll so that it gives the impression of a baroque lady with a wide skirt. I’ve actually seen women exchange patterns for those. And you can actually see cars driving around with these toilet roll ladies waving gracefully from the rear window. Argh.
One way of dealing with the urge to knit or crochet in variegated yarns (yes, it afflicts me, too), is to make it into garments for babies and young children. Young children generally have natural, instinctive bad taste, so they like the garish effect, and babies don’t care (or at any rate, can’t say).
The mothers may roll their eyes, but they are not going to be so rude as to fling a lovingly hand-knitted garment back at the donor. Or they haven’t so far.
Oh my. My grandma used to knit things for us. Hats. Afghans. Slippers. Those varigated yarns make very nice slippers and if the pattern of the colors isn’t great who’s gonna notice? They’re way down there on your feet! On your head–well, that’s a whole different story! The hats are interesting–quite a work of art, actually. Sally is quite cute, but I’m gonna have to pass on the last one. I have never liked that particular color combination… But you get definite points for trying! Too bad you don’t have a mother-in-law to foist it off on as a gift… *grin*
I like Sally.
I had this great idea for an amnesia story once, about a spy who didn’t know who she was. Huh. About a year later the movie with Geena Davis came out (which I really liked), then, The Borne Identity, which I really liked too. I think I must have heard the premise mentioned as to one of them being filmed and registered it subliminally.
This is why I’m not allowed to go buy yarn anymore. After he schlepped two of those gigantic plastic storage bins - the “hide two full grown adult bodies in here and they’ll never know you did it” size - full of yarn from my house to my apartment to our new house, Stephen gave me the stink eye about bringing any more yarn into the house. Or leaving in the bag in my truck and acting like it had been there all along. Or hiding it in the closet and blaming the dogs for dragging it in off the street.
I loved the first four hats,but then, well… I think they would make an interesting display on the hall table. Very retro. And at least you only do hats. I used to buy yarn and knit sweaters (all sleeveless shells–I hated doing sleeves). You don’t even want to think what ugly variegateds do on something THAT size. You can’t pawn them off on your enemies without feeling guilty.
What a mood you’re in this morning! It would have been fun to sit across from you at the breakfast table.
Bet Me is my favorite of your books, though, so don’t you go sniping at it! I loved the absurdity, and the twisted end.
Ever tried constructing a moving collage for YOU AGAIN on an early (aka used) version of Adobe After Effects? AE can be used like Curio but animated. You could construct turning points over say a minute - make layers fade in and out or mkae them dissappear, appear - whatever. Might help you see the whole picture of things.
My Aunt Anne would love the purple hat. Just saying.
Jenny ~
Are you making fun of my grandmother?
God love her–and Him did–she would have thought your hats beautiful!
She crocheted clowns (I can send you digital pictures if you like) of varigated yarn, only in primary colors. Their arms and legs were coils and they had these ruffs around their necks. Their heads were crocheted white yarn covers over styrofoam, of course. I have a Rubbermaid tub full of them in my closet and cannot part with them, even though members of my family are clamoring for them.
I admit that I thought them guady and ugly while she still lived. In constrast, her afghans were as beautiful then as they are now. The moral: Throw them out now or your children and your children’s children will cling to them.
I am enormously cheered by how many of you (and your grandmothers) were and are whores to the lure of the variegated. There must be a twelve step program.
As for You Again, I put it aside to write Always Kiss Me Goodnight which, I have to tell you, is fabulous, and to work on Dogs and Goddesses, where I just put up a new scene that Strop called “a cracker” which I’m sure is a good thing, so I’m gloating.
And sewing white stars on a pale turquoise hat as I figure out how three women are going to break into a temple. Crochet is almost as good as driving for coming up with stuff.
I used to own a yarn shop.
I’ll see you your twelve step program and raise you the thousands of dollars in inventory I can’t seem to part with, even though I will never live long enough to knit the vast majority of it.
Satan, thy name is hand-dyed, hand spun variegated wool. Since I live to enable, be sure and stop by http://www.woolinthewoods.com.
Well.
Hmm.
Well, aren’t those somethin’!
I admire your tenacity.
Sally is quite cute, though.
The GHH of yarn! Sally looks like something ElizabethII on acid would wear (Kinda pill box shaped).
But oh the memories of slippers and hats knitted by mama and grandma. All fuzzy and warm now. Thanks Jenny!
How much do you want for Sally or even Ferd? Maybe you can put them on Shop Cherry. They’re gorgeous. I can’t knit to save my life. Basically anything resembling sewing, I’m out.
And I won’t mention the last book I wrote, about an amnesiac…(hangs head in embarassment)
Ooooh. Yep there’s just something about staring at all that pretty yarn that just makes you yearn to do something with it. Not just the variegated stuff (which, FYI, works better as trim or accent) but all the other fun new yarns they come out with.
But I do like Sally. She’s got a demure shape to her, but there’s a hussy under there waiting to get out.
Um, wow - yeah, I’m close to speechless. You need to meet my Mother-in-law. you two would have a great time. She’s into sweaters.
I used to sew and my poor kids had to wear the matching little outfits I made them. Looking at the pictures my daughter always says, you know mom, that one dress looks like a curtian. My response - well dear, it was your grandmothers old table cloth. What was I thinking?
Jenny~
I acutally think I’ve got it worse than you. Not only do I buy huge quantity of yarn but when I can’t find exactly the yarn I’ve pictured in my mind, I have to spin it myself. I walk into a Knitting store and have yarngasms…it’s downright embarrassing.
My one and only knitting project did indeed involve variegated yarn. But I was a kid when I did it, so it doesn’t count, right?
As for romance heroes who are professional murderers, have you ever read Hunters Moon, by Cathy Clamp and CT Adams? The hero is a mafia hitman werewolf! Never say never! (And I keep reminding myself of this every time I start to stress over my September book, which has a killer hero. Literally.)
A mafia hitman werewolf? Okay, that I’ve got to see.
I love a good killer hero.
Yeah, still in wow mode. Nope. I don’t knit. I tried, I’m too impatient and suffer from I can’t sit that long. So, you all ask, how do you write? I move from one room to the next taking lots of breaks. I started this morning in my office, I’m now back in bed, later I head the lake and sit in the dark by the water. I know, I’m weird.
Oh - my son made me a scarf once. It’s intereting, to say the least.
Those acrylic varigateds make *awesome* afghans. With maybe a G-H hook in a chevron/ripple pattern. The sheer size of an afghan usually takes care of pooling–blurring it out of existance or turining into a neat “shadow”-like pattern.
I love your knitting.
It looks like crochet.
You haven’t used the really awful stuff: the chrome yellow with the red, blue, and green chunks.
My grandmother made me a vest out of that when I was in college. I was a size 12 or 14, and the vest was tunic length, so there was a LOT of it. I’m blond, too. Did I wear it? You bet I did. I loved it, even though it was not purple/blue/green paisley. Wore it with a black turtleneck and pants, though. There were 15,000 students at my school, and it was the sixties. One more bad outfit was not going to make news. And, let me tell you, I still miss my grandmother. I think that vest is in my cedar chest even now.
You know, maybe that’s why I’m drawn to variegated yarn. I’m subconsciously reaching back to the tie-dye of my youth. Hmmmm.
I still have some of the stuff my grandmother and aunt did. Argyle socks, shawls, a sweater that would fit a fullback.
You missed a stitch in tha purple & blue stuff.
Jenny said…
Strop said…
Yeah, Jenny, you snuck that in there and thought we wouldn’t notice. No chance.
I’ve never like variegated yarns. I’ve always been of the “looks like barf” school of thought. Eerie, in fact, to have you echo my thoughts. The handpainted stuff should be illegal. They make it in such gorgeous color combinations, that it’s almost irresistible. I did break down and buy some wool and silk, though, to make a couple scarves for gifts. I’ll see how they look if I ever do them.
That last hat, I like it a lot. It’s got a cute, flapperish cloche look to it. Miss Molly could carry it off, although maybe not in those colors. Well, she could carry it off anyway, but those colors are not really her. But you’re her mother, so why am I blathering on? Hmmm. Why don’t you make a pattern for it, or have someone do one? You could sell the pattern for fundraisers. Still rambling.
If you haven’t seen the blog youknitwhat, go look at the lovely variegated garment.
Ack. I meant Mollie. Sorry.
It has never occurred to me to make something entirely out of varigated yarn. I originally started with using it for embroidery such as a huge butterfly or flower on the back of a sweater. Later I took to making stripes around the wrists and shoulders of a monochrome sweater, but the best result came from making black sleeves and body, then gather all the parts on a circle needle and knit the shoulders in varigated. These sweathers looked like those garments from ancient Egypt with the huge collars.
Variegated yarn is strictly for socks. That said, I love amnesia plots. That said, I keep buying wool when I know deep down I am probably allergic to it. I am a sucker for bad yarn and hackneyed plots. There must be the original brilliant amnesia book out there somewhere, that inspired everyone else to write theirs. Where is it?
Hey, what’s wrong with a little amnesia? Worked for The Bourne Identity. Love the hats!
Hey Jenny, I’m raising a 3rd generation crocheter, and she’s seriously into varigated yarns. She’s got the exact same ones you’ve used, plus the neon colors and the primaries, and the pastels. Just this weekend, we bought the brown and pink.
You’ve done a great job with those “characters” and I bet you’d find someone who’d pay money for them.
Okay, this is really off topic, but I just read that Janet Evanovich is writing a book with Stephen J Cannell, well already wrote it I guess as there are excerpts on her website. Other people may already have brought this to your attention, I’m not especially “plugged in” to the goings on in the publishing world.
Anyway, it looks like you and Bob may have started a trend! I’ll be interested to see how their effort compares to yours.
I love the hats…well with the exception of the yellow one. Ugh! I love varigated wool too. I knitted several teddy bears with varigated yarn and on them it looked great but I had plain colours as the pads of their paws and their muzzles so that contrast made it acceptable and little kids just loved them. They could drag the bears around by their ears, arms or legs. Those bears are all over the place. Some even got sent to the U.S.
I am waiting for You Again.
BTW in my youth I heard men making bets about getting a young woman into bed. The rotters!
Well, exactly. They’re rotters, not Our Guy.
I’d heard about the Evanovich/Cannell book, Bithalynn, but I still don’t have a grasp on what they’re doing. I think she’s writing a supporting character, but I’m not sure.
Wow! I just stumbled over the picture of somebody who got REALLY carried away with the crocheting and I just need to share that someplace:
http://gofugyourself.typepad.com/go_fug_yourself/random_fug/index.html
I can’t really tell whether it’s variegated or plain, because I was blind as soon as I saw it.
Jenny, you are such a bad influence on me. I’m nearly done with my wedding gift afghan (and only 2 weeks late, so I’m quite proud of myself) but rather than resting on my laurels (and where did that phrase come from?) I downloaded a pattern yesterday and hit my local Michaels last night. But I avoided the variegated.
What is it? McB, the “knitted” dress on that page looks like Crochet, too.
And, the woman in it is gorgeous. I don’t think it’s very high quality yarn, though.
Every time I pick up my hook, DH & DD lock gazes and say, “Mom’s going to knit a volkswagen cover.” I don’t knit. I crochet, but they’ve never gotten that right.
Pattern? Pattern? Oh, maniacal laughter here.
Jenny, your hats are very refined and well-behaved, compared to mine. And there’s nothing wrong with the “yellow” one, either. You’ve masked that green very nicely. This would look smashing on a redhead with some spunk.
Yeah, I am convinced that like the skinny mirrors in clothes shops the craft stores have special lights. And amnesia inducing fumes or something. I had this same issue with the Patons SWS, I have learned to embrace it and keep buying more of it. It’s not quite as crazy as this stuff, but that’s just because there are longer bits of color, such that the ball conceals a few of the colors and you get partway in and realize they stuck all this brown and green into your pink yarn.
And there is a yarn pattern for fuzzy dice that may just be calling out to this stuff…
Louisa - it’s a baby afghan in six colors, worked with two strands. In the photo the colors seem to bleed into each other like a rainbow.
The wedding gift afghan is done in denim, royal purple and winter white, using an afghan stitch. I’m very pleased with how it turned out.
The great thing about that kind of variegated yarn is that because of the evenness, it looks very impressive to non-knitters (who find the randomness of hand-painted yarn unappealing). Lavish the love on someone who has no idea and they will be very happy. Sad but true.
Yeah, well…I’ve got the curse of wanting the variegated yarn too. This type of yarn looks different when knitted than it does when crocheted. There are many different kinds of crochet stitches to give this type of yarn a BETTER look. Next time, try the Granite Stitch.
http://www.crochetme.com/issue_1/stitch_dictionary_two.html
Remember…She who dies with the most yarn, wins!
i’m lurker, and an obessive crafter (yay crochet!) and i just had to post a comment! i think the hats are cute! i have the same issues with this yarn the only one i’ve ever been able to make “cool” is the camo one, i make reggae tams for my husband’s band members. anyway, love your books!
peace, love, and glitter,
kathy