10 days at the cabin and I’m feeling rested, relaxed and ready to knit~
watching weather at the cabin is the best!
Fun with Fair Isle Color Knitting
I have a great collection of mitten and sock pattern books that I love to page through and look at the designs. Sometimes I crave a small knitting project in color work but I don’t want to spend the time it takes to knit a pair of mittens or socks. . . so I came up with a great idea.
Fulled coasters in Fair Isle knitting!!
Thinking that the fulling would prevent the dreaded stockinette roll I was sadly mistaken. Taking a different approach, I knit the second one starting with 3 stitches, increasing each side to approx 30 stitches wide, then decreasing each side down to three stitches. I ended up with a square coaster that didn’t roll. For some reason working the color pattern on the diagonal resulted in flat coasters! COOL!
I had odd amounts of 100% wool yarn from Gale Woods Farm that worked out great; the worsted weight worked up really fast, the wool fulled easily and I could use up my odd amounts. I knit these on size 9 needles and fulled them in the washing machine.
It was a little tricky changing the orientation of the designs. If the design was set in a diamond already it was easy to knit the Fair Isle and work the increases and decreases without worry. But a few of these I had to rechart to keep my place while knitting and shaping.
It was also a fun way to see how the pattern looks when different colors became the foreground or background.
These coasters are the same design but the colors are reversed.
I’m going to remember this. Next time I knit a big project using color work, I will first knit a few coasters while experimenting with the color.
Still looking for a name!
After much consideration and reading lots of replies. . . I’ve decided it to call it. . .
Hannah’s Lace Shawl
I’ve gotten many wonderful responses to my request for naming help – 23 to be exact – which led me on the great google search: are any of them being used or seem inappropriate?
Most of them came up with either the name of a business, web site, pattern name or person. oh what to do what to do!?!?
I’ll just keep experimenting and one morning I will wake up and have the perfect name!
keep those suggestions coming!
Where does the time go! and I need a name for my shawl!
After much consideration and reading lots of replies. . . I’ve decided it to call it. . .
Hannah’s Lace Shawl
It has already been a week since Yarnover, and Hop, Stitch, and Jump! I planned on blogging right away about the fabulous time I had and the new friends I made but I find that an entire week has lapsed.
I spend last Friday taking class with Cookie A. and Lucy Neatby. 3 Kittens Needle Arts and Steven Be’s collaborated on 2 days of great workshops and lots of fun evening events! I can’t thank them enough for a fun filled weekend.
But today’s message is really about needing a name for a new pattern I’ve written.
It is a lovely lace shawl, 10 stitch pattern repeats around. (read, easy to remember). And the bottom is scalloped with a 24 stitch repeat pattern. (also not too hard to get finger memory going on)
Here are photos of my niece, Hannah, modelling the three that I knit. I used 3 different fibers, the White one knit from a cone of weaver’s linen. . .the natural white one is knit in 3 ply super merino from Wool2dye4. . . and the blue one is Bamboo from South West Trading Company..
Send me a name suggestion and I’ll send you a free pdf of the pattern as soon as it is completed!
I’m really really going to blog more this week and show all my samples from the 18 (yes 18) hours of knitting classes I took last weekend.
Look what I found in my closet!
I was rooting around in my yarn boxes the other day and found this sweater that I knit TEN years ago! The poor thing needed one sleeve sewn in and the collar knit. Lucikly there was a partial skein of each of the yarns left in the box with the sweater so I could knit the collar.
I must have been planning for the future when designing this because it fits me now. This would look so great on the slopes . . . if only I were a skier!
I have a book of charts titled “Charted Peasant Designs from Saxon Transylvania” and spend many an hour looking through the charts in awe. These birds always attracted me and now I find I’ve knit them into a sweater! I totally forgot about this sweater. . . hard to believe.
The sweater is knit in the round and armholes are steeked. The yarn is Plymouth Galway.
I also love that curly cue “S” design. The shoulders have two stripes of this “S”design on the front and the back.
It also runs up the sides of the body and the sides of the sleeves. I knit the sleeves in the round and worked the increases on each side of the stripe. Makes a good looking sleeve!
Knitting soars at the Olympics
One of my indulgences in life is to get and read the Sunday NY times newspaper.
The magazine section on Feb 7th featured a photo portfolio of Olympian hieghts by RyanMcGinley that was awesome.
Photos of skiers, snowboarders and skaters as they are airborn AND wearing knits.
Check it out.
New lace shawl
I’ve been working on this lace shawl for a while. Here is the first one I knit in linen. I used size 9 needles and it is very airy and light!
I’m trying to decide if I should dye it or not. I’m thinking of maybe dying it a dark indigo blue.
Increases on the front are generous and allow for a very nice fit! it won’t fall of your shoulders. In this view you get a sense of the gentle ruffle around the bottom. (in the other photos I pulled out the ruffles so you could see the pattern)
The pattern repeat across the back is only 10 stitches and very easy to follow!
Here are a couple close up views of the lace work.
I knit this shawl from notes and scratches and bits and pieces of graphs. I was lucky to figure out what I did so I could re-write it.
I re-worked some of my charts and created pages ins Illustrator. After all that computer work I knit another shawl. This one is in Bamboo. However it is still in the unblocked stage and not ready for public view.
I found some errors and some things to change to make it more symmetrical. So now I’ve fixed the charts and started writing the directions. (I like to include charts and written directions in my patterns).
During the my Olympics viewing this weekend I started a third one to triple check my pattern before publicizing. I am knitting this one in a 4 ply superwash merino that is supplied by Wool2Dye4. I love knitting with this yarn! It is so soft and comfortable, yet firm and holding the lace patterning very well! Can’t wait to finish it. This one is a “natural white” and I might look around to see if an indie dyer has some of this in a blue colorway. (For some reason I’m into blues this year)
So stay tuned for my first lace knitting pattern!
Garter Stitch Borealis Wrap
I wanted something fun and easy and colorful to knit. I worked up this wrap using two strands of silk. I also did a few rows in Glace from Berrocco and then some novelty yarns that I had in my stash. Unfortunately the labels were lost long ago. The dark blue stripe(s) near the bottom were knit in a novelty yarn I bought in France in 1992. . . finally used up the last of it here.
I knit it from the top down using garter stitch.
The fronts are increased like EZ’s pi shawl and the back is increased along a center 10 stitches, similar to faroese shape.
This shawl definitely cured my itch.
Finally a new knit scarf for me!
I found this pattern on Ravelry and just had to knit it!
The pattern is written in German and, not being fluent in German, I had to follow the charts. Luckily I knew enough crafting terms to realize there is some crocheting to this scarf/shawl as well.
I had a bit of a time trying to photograph this project because the colors are so bright. . .red and purple are difficult to photograph without making them look like the colors are vibrating across the computer monitor.
I love the lace and the way this is put together. Short rows create the first shape that goes around your neck, then you crochet cast off. Then the beautiful leaf pattern begins and every other row you pick up at the crochet edge. When the leaf pattern has been knit from point to point, you pick up 400 or so stitches across the edge of the leaf pattern and knit the final lace pattern. To cast off you crochet again, chains in between crocheted off stitches. This pattern was really fun and kept my interest throughout.
It was also fun to see how the color repeats worked up. I bought this yarn ages ago from Blackberry Hills booth at Yarn Over about 5 years ago. It is a lovely 100% wool, sock weight yarn. I was waiting for just the right project to knit with it. It is so soft and light and warm. You know how some of the yarn in your stash gets put away in a box and you sort of forget about it? Well not this yarn. I kept it out on a shelf for 5 years. . . I kept looking at it and knitting swatches until finally I decided to knit this scarf with it.
If I were a few inches smaller (okay quite a few inches smaller) around, I could wear this as a shawl/vest.
Even as a scarf there are lots of ways to wear it!
Tree Hugger on Patternfish
I am so excited I can hardly stand it! I have another pattern posted on Patternfish. . .now available in downloadable .pdf format!
This is my treehugger neck cuff or cowl or neck warmer, whatever you want to call it. If you like a bit of a challenge try this pattern
It is warm and toasty! Great for wearing in a chilly indoor environment, there are no scarf ends to get in your way!