Knitting Traditions Hold Strong on the Shetland Islands

A story about knitting in the Shetland Islands from NPR’s Weekend Edition popped into my Facebook feed over the weekend. It looks like the story originally aired in July (and that story has lovely pictures to go with it) but I never wrote about it so here it is now.

Some things in the Shetland Islands are changing because of the oil wealth in the area, but local knitters — who knit because it is a way of life passed down through the generations — say their traditions aren’t going to change and the younger generation is still interested in knitting.

Ingrid Eunson spins the local fleece and knits sweaters in her home in Brae and says it’s staggering to think how much a sweater would cost if the producer were paid a fair wage.

“And I’ve thought about how much it would cost at minimum wage,” she told NPR’s Ari Shapiro. “Nobody would afford more than one jumper in their lives if they paid according to the hours that went in.”

But as another local knitter, Wilma Johnson, says, “I just knit because it’s like breathing. I can’t do without it.” She learned when she was three.

This is a great story that really takes you to the islands and should make you proud to be a knitter.

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Using your yarn stash is important to me throughout the year, but as I start to feel the end of the year coming on I get more excited about using things I already have in the house. Maybe that’s because I don’t want to go to a store in the thick of holiday shopping times, or I like the idea of having a little space in my stash when the new year rolls around.

It’s super satisfying to use up all the little odd balls you’ve made over the year (or years), and I have several stash busting blankets I work on when it’s cold and will maybe finish someday.

If you’d like to start a stash busting project that’s perfect for using up odd balls, check out the Soukish pattern from Neisha Abdulla. This pattern is made for fingering weight/sock yarn, and it’s worked in a tube with allover color work.

This is great for a couple of reasons. You don’t really have to weave in your ends when you can hide them in a tube (this is one time you might even get by just tying a knot when you change colors!) and you can change colors whenever you run out of yarn and it will look good.

Of course the pattern is made with blocks where the designer changed colors, but you can change yours more or less often as you need to make it work for your stash. You can use blank charts to design your own color combinations, or even your own stitch patterns if you like. You can also adjust the length of the scarf as needed or turn it into a cowl based on the amount of yarn you have.

This project looks like a lot of fun and would be a great thing to have on hand to stitch up and then to wear during the cold, gloomy months.

You can get a copy of the pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: Neisha Abdulla]

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