Sunday, June 21, 2009

2009 - International Year of Natural Fibres




FAO resolution
International Year of Natural Fibres

THE CONFERENCE,

Recalling that, following consideration by the Joint Meeting of the Thirty-third Session of the Intergovernmental Group on Hard Fibres and the Thirty-fifth Session of the Intergovernmental Group on Jute, Kenaf and Allied Fibres, and by the Sixty-fifth Session of the Committee on Commodity Problems, the Hundred and Twenty-eighth Session of the FAO Council in June 2005 had endorsed the proposal for an International Year of Natural Fibres;

Noting that natural fibres play an important part in clothing the world's population as well as having traditional and promising new industrial uses;

Recalling that much of the world's natural fibre was produced as a source of cash income by small farmers in low-income and developing countries;

Desiring to focus world attention on the role that income derived from the sale and export of natural fibres plays in contributing to food security and poverty alleviation of the population;

Believing that while the production and consumption of natural fibres offer significant environmental benefits, concerted efforts should be made to ensure that these benefits are not compromised by unsound practices;

Recognizing that there were important potential partnerships among participants in the various natural fibre industries;

Affirming the need to heighten public awareness of the economic and environmental attributes of natural fibres:

1. Requests the Director-General to transmit this Resolution to the Secretary-General of the United Nations with a view to having the United Nations declare the Year 2009 as the International Year of Natural Fibres;
2. Further requests the Director-General to inform future sessions of Conference and the Secretary-General of the United Nations of progress in making arrangements, including in securing funding, for the International Year of Natural Fibres and, subsequently, of the results of the Year once concluded.

25 November 2005

Source: http://www.naturalfibres2009.org/en/iynf/background.html

Wednesday, June 03, 2009

London

Last month A really long while ago, I was in London. I was excited, because it was my first time to tread British soil beside the times when I was transfering to another flight at Heathrow airport. It's kind of funny that it took me so long to ever get there.

LondonGetting around using public transportation:
Here's the website that will tell you how to get from A to B. You can use the tube or buses within London, but I only used the bus twice. Once from my friend's house to get to Camden Market - I had a nice view sitting on the upper deck - and then to get back to the airport.

That day I didn't have One Day Travel Card, so I used an Oyster Card. It's a card that you can recharge online or at automats. They want to encourage the use of paperless tickets, so if you use an Oyster Card you get cheaper fares.

If you want to travel outside of London with the train you can get an extension for your Oyster Card. There is also something called Oyster Card Travelcard.

I feel like a complete failure and loser for not being able to figure out the real difference between Oyster Card and One Day Travelcard. *sniff* (Screw them, really... I researched it on the internet, but I don't get it and nobody I asked seems to understand it either.) . Anyway, I think if you want information about Oyster Card and Travelcard it seems the Wikipedia page still explains it best. Too bad that I didn't see it before I went on vacation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oyster_card

I arrived in the afternoon and as my friend doesn't live in London, but in a small village a bit outside - a deadly boring place according to her - I wanted to see a bit of London first before going to her place. The first question was then, where couldI leave my bag? I don't know why I assumed that all tube stations would have lockers, but I learned I was wrong. The lady who sat next to me in the plane told me that they had lockers at Victoria station and she doubted they had them elsewhere. Anyway, if you arrive from Heathrow, Victora Station, a tube and railway station, is probably the next place where you can leave your luggage. They don't have lockers, but they have a service where you can leave your luggage. It costs a shocking 8 pounds. *gulp* It's a 24 hour service, but if you only want to leave your stuff for a couple of hours you still have to pay 8 pounds.

If you walk out of Victoria Station you then have the choice between Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey. I decided that it was a bit late already and that I would leave Buckingham Palace for another day (that never came...). On my way to Westminster Abbey I noticed that a) a lot of Londoners are dressed in suit and b) they all walk quite fast. Someone I know complains about the Gemütlichkeit of people here, now I know what he means. In general, I find people in London to dress better than here. And a lot of cute guys are running around. :D And a lot of Spanish people. And a lot of the people in suits are foreigners. I've noticed that in other countries like the States and now Great Britain foreigners seem to be better integrated into society and are less confined to low paid jobs. One of my friends, who is British, said that in England people are more open and willing to give you a chance to prove yourself, while in Germany without the right degree you don't get far.

London London On my way I saw this church. And this house. It looked so old-
fashioned and cute among all the modern buildings.

LondonOn the left hand side is a picture of Westminster Abbey. Surprisingly unspectacular to me. Not sure what I was expecting. On the other side of the street is this huge building with a flag on top of the tower. I saw a lot of people who looked touristy to me walk inside and come out. I asked one of the official looking people at the entrance what it was and if you could get a tour. She said it was the House of Parliaments and that there was no guided tour, but that you could still walk inside and have a look at the debates inside. I didn't really have any plans, so I walked inside.



London London
LondonThat's the entrance hall inside the House of Parliaments. It's *huge*. Look at the ceiling. I listened to a debate in the House of Commons that was about the dangers of cannabis. A member of the government was arguing that the danger of cannabis was overrated and not more harmful than other legal drugs like alcohol or cigarettes. I noticed that the members of the House of Commons looked like tourists, they all showed up for the vote. At first I was wondering why there were so many tourists as the age range was amazing - really young men and really old women, the grandma type - and also because some of them had the bad dress taste of Robinson Club tourists. Totally not what I expected after I had gotten the impression that half of London was running around in business suits. They also didn't sit down, but were just walking buy. Later one of the guards told me that they were voting in two different rooms. One room was for the "Ayes" and the other one for the "Noes." The noes had it in the end, so I guess, the government guy didn't really convince anybody. The debate in the House of Lords was quite boring, more civilized. The hall here had a richer decoration. The two Houses are also distinguished colorwise. The House of Commons is decorated in green and the House of Lords is mostly red.

Knitting:
First and foremost, I must admit - I was not able to buy any yarn at all! This totally pains me, *booohoooo*. :( The last day, Saturday, came and I had decided that this was going to be the day where I would not oblige myself to be a good tourist, who would visit all these cultural institutions. Instead I wanted to indulge in shopping. I find shopping in general extremely boring, because I usually go shopping when I need something and usually I don't find it. Plus oxygenfree shops, big crowds of people and long lines in front of the changing rooms - soo bad... Anyway, shopping for yarn can be more fun. It's just I first went to Staple-something Market (??) (which I confused with Camden Market). There I managed to meet up with my friend, who came with her boyfriend and who had also arranged to meet with another friend of hers. From there we went to Camden Market. My friend, being Spanish, started speaking Spanish with her Spanish friend and her British boyfriend, knowing some Spanish, but not enough to follow the stream of words that Spanish people produce when they talk, understood only a bit of it. I think he felt a bit frustrated for not being able to join in the conversation. I tried to entertain him a bit, but I think he was also thoroughly bored with the market. It's more a girls thing, I think.

So, after Camden Market we went to this little yarn shop, I knit. It's a nice shop with a lot of Malabrigo and handpainted yarn. Despite the low value of the British pound though, I found the prices for the handpainted stuff to be quite shocking. Even if they had been in Euro, I would have found them expensive. Luckily, handpainted yarn is not a must on my list. Other interesting stuff was yarn from Habu Textiles, like stainless steel yarn, and this blend of merino and possum fur in DK weight - really soft (hm, after reading more about possum fur here, I'm not so sure anymore if I really want to use it. I'm also slightly confused about the use of the term "fur" when you're talking about yarn = just hair, when it's coming from an animal.). I'm just not really the kind of person who buys expensive exotic yarn without having any kind of project in mind. There are questions like, what do you want to knit? How much do you need? Returning leftovers is not easy when you buy the yarn a couple of hundreds kilometeres away from home. And with two guys who were not overly interested in yarn my mind was just not free enough to reach any conclusion... :/ The end of the story is that I didn't buy anything from this shop. By the way, the shop doesn't carry any Rowan. I had assumed that every British yarn shop would carry Rowan yarn.

Afterwards I suggested that we go to a Pub first seeing how bored the guys looked instead of going straight ahead to the John Lewis Department Store on Oxford Street as my friend suggested (I thought after Camden Market and the other yarn shop they needed a break). She was concerned that it would close soon (it was around 6 pm). I said, "Well, that's a big department store, on Oxford Street, and today is Saturday. It's very very unlikely that they will close earlier." Yeah, RIGHT! 7.15 pm we were standing in front of a closed department store and in the window I was able to see balls of Rowan yarn! *sob* (One of my friends later explained to me that the John Lewis Department Store has this social conscience in their business concept included where you treat your staff nicely, meaning nice opening hours, fair salaries, etc. I also read in the newspaper that despite the financial crisis and some minor cuts they had still paid high bonuses to their employees.) And of course, no other department store around Oxford has a haberdashery section... That's how I managed to go to London and come back empty-handed. *sob, sob* I guess, that means I have to go back there again. And there are surely not going to be any bored non-knitters coming with me! :D

LondonOn my list of things to do in London was also going to a knitting group. It so happened that, although the three groups I had discovered had irregular meetings, all three of them had a meeting the Thursday I was in town. Serendipity strikes again! :) I decided to check out the Stitch & Bitch group. They seem to be a quite active group that do fun stuff like knit graffiti. On the left hand side is a picture of a knit graffiti I discovered in London. I confused the addresses though and in the end went to another group. They were nice, but less enthusiastic about knitting than my friends from my Sunday group are.



London London

They have a "controlled drinking zone"! :D
London

Museums:
Ok, I need to go to bed now, but I really want to finish this post. The short version: British Museum is really nice, lots and lots of culture - go there. Didn't see the Natural History Museum, which I regretted, because I got told that there is a huge dinosaur skeleton in the entry hall - go there. Victora and Albert Museum is also interesting - go there. Nice sections about fashion, jewelry, etc. (I just found out they have a knitting section on their website with patterns!)My guidebook said that the museum would close at 5 pm, I think. That's just the half-truth though. At five certain sections close, but many of the interesting sections, the silver jewelry section, for example, continue to be opened. One more thing about this museum: the gift shop is great. I found it somewhat irresistible.
London London London London

Guess what that is. It's an antique comic! Click on the picture to see a larger version.
London London London London London London London

A moai, a stone statue from the Easter Island. He's just awesome. I like big statues.
London
London

That one reminds me of one of the ghosts in Chihiros Reise ins Zauberland (Spirited Away)
London London

I like the frescos.
London London London

The Stone of Rosetta. With the aid of this stone, it was possible for Champollion to decipher the hieroglyphs. I remember this guy's name so well, because when I was an intern in Egypt, there was a street named after him and in this street there was a shop where you could get really good kushari.
London

A tapestry in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
LondonLondon

View from the south bank of the river Thames.
London

London

The Tate Modern Gallery is located here. I find the installation in the Turbine Hall to be really great. I really loved that one. You can join free tours. I joined one that was called vortex and something. I like to get explanations to the pictures, although sometimes afterwards I still don't understand what makes them so great. Sometimes the explanation is as weird as the picture.
London
London

I didn't see the big dinosaur skeleton in the Natural History Museum, but I found a really cute smaller one here.
London London London London

I'd say London is worth a visit - go there! :)

Monday, June 01, 2009

Finished: Molly Ringwald in green

Pattern: Molly Ringwald by Michele Rose Orne in Knitscene, Fall 2006
Yarn: Flora (Linea Pura) by Lana Grossa; cotton-soy blend (60 % organic cotton, 40 % organic soy), 140 m/50 g, recommended needle size: 3.5 - 4 mm
Color: green
Price:€ 5.65? € 4.50
Amount: 5 balls
Needles: 3 mm and 2.75 mm (for casting off), a small crochet hook
Gauge: 26 stitches x 36 rows = 10 cm
Dimensions: I cast on the same number of stitches as for the smallest size. Remember though that my gauge is different. The gauge for the original design is 22 stitches 28 rows.
Modifications: I wanted to wear this in summer without anything underneat, so I made this a quite figure-hugging top. Also many knitters said that it was better to go down at least one size with that design. When I look at my back, which is gaping a bit, I'm not surprised.

The piece with the ruffles is as long as in the original design. Since the whole thing had less width though, I didn't have straps anymore where I could attach the sleeves. I find my armholes are a tad small. It's not bad, but surely they could be a bit bigger.

Since the yarn is thinner, I thought I could do what Muhv did and make the ruffles more, uh, ruffly - k, ktbl, m1 out of strand inbetween. By the way, I must add that I like ruffles, but I hate knitting them. I used an Addi bamboo needle and after the ruffles, bits of one needle tip had been chipped away.

Added short-rows. That website was helpful: http://www.thedietdiary.com/knittingfiend/OrderForms/BustDarts.html

And that oneexplains well how to do short-rows without any wraps, pins (Japanese short rows), etc:
http://kaityvr.wordpress.com/2007/05/28/the-easiest-way-to-do-a-short-row-heel/

I was a bit concerned that it would be too tight. In the end, I think the short rows were good, because they also added length to the front part of the top and kept the neckline somewhat straight and not have it hanging. Lengthwise I could have needed a couple of rows more. If I keep the neckline straight, the hem rides up a bit.

Left out the crab stitch. It’s true though, you should do a tight single crochet round with a small hook around the neckline. Doing the single crochet round improved the fit of the top. Doing the crab stitches even more. That makes the neckline less floppy.

Comments: I think it's a good thing I made this top smaller. Cotton is heavy and I can't imagine a loose fitting top made of cotton to look good. It probably would look like a bag. Apart from the ruffles, the whole top is knit in rib, which stretches somewhat, when you fill it out. I've only worn it once and I still think it had grown a bit. My neckline at the end of the day was a bit lower.

Confession: I didn't wash my swatch. I should have done it, but I didn't... I wanted to start knitting and when you wash your swatch you have wait at least a day in most cases. And after I had started knitting I didn't want bad news from the washed swatch. This is the ostrich-head-in-the-sand-method. Sometimes it works well. More often it doesn't. You've been warned...

The top was a big PITA to knit, because of all the modifications, but overall, I'm pretty content with how it turned out. I actually like it better than the original design. I just hope it won't grow too much with wearing.

The yarn feels ok. I have the same yarn in white and that one is quite soft and feels nice though.

The color is more accurate in the first picture.

Molly Ringwald Top in Green Molly Ringwald Top in Green

Finished: Ogee Lace Skirt

Pattern: Ogee Lace Skirt by Gryphon Perkins
Interweave Knits, Summer 2007
Yarn: Rowan Bamboo Tape
Color: white
Price: don't know anymore...
Amount: Less than 4 I think
Needles: When I started with the recommended needle size it was too loose. A year later, when I had to rip back a bit and redo the edge, it seems that my knitting has become tighter, because now I have to use a bigger needle size. Very strange…
Gauge: doesn't really matter, I guess, with warp skirt
Dimensions: ?
Modifications: Made it shorter and turned it upside down, because I didn't like the edge. It seemed to be kind of wavy. The leaves are pointing downwards now. I think I don't really like leaf patterns anyway where the leaves point upwards. That's against gravity and nature.
Comments: I washed it by mistake at 40 °C. After it came out it was a bit stiff and had shrunk quite. I pulled it apart and actually, now I like it better than before, because it has lost somewhat of the drape (it was too much for me before).
I don't really have much information about this project available, because I finished it such a long time ago. Before I made the modifications I didn't really like the skirt, so the it was just lying around.


Ogee Lace Skirt
Ogee Lace Skirt


Ravelry

Italian knitting group on Ravelry

French knitting group on Ravelry

Mystery Stole 3 KAL

Rockin Guy Blogger Award

dangerous intersection blog