Knitting time already?

It can’t be, surely? I haven’t finished knitting the socks from last month’s Simply Knitting, and Issue 44 has just dropped through my door!

Actually it didn’t so much drop through the door as fight with the postman to be wrestled through the letterbox, as the free gift this issue was a set of butterfly clips. (The down side of subscribing? You don’t get a choice of gift colour. I’d have chosen the pink ones!) You’re supposed to use them for holding the seams of your knitting together as you sew it up. Of course, the first thing I did was try one out in my hair!

There are two patterns this month which immediately make me want to rush out and buy yarn.

The first is a child’s cardigan, called “Just Peachy”.

The pattern goes up to age 11-12, but it has quite a lot of design ease (see how the cardigan is quite loose in the picture?), so the age 7-8 years is actually a perfectly snug fit for me! I’m very short-waisted so the back is already the ideal length, and all I’d have to do is lengthen the sleeves by about four inches. A single sparkly button or a silky ribbon at the top, and you’ve got a pretty summer cardi. I wonder whether John Lewis has any Kidsilk Night left in the sale…?

I also fell in love with the cardigan on the cover, and was wondering whether I might have just enough of my poor neglected Debbie Bliss Cathay to make this in light pink.

My favourite thing about this pattern? Right there on the picture – “Pattern in sizes 8-32!” The smallest size fits a 32″ chest, and the largest is 54″. I know that a few of the American knitting magazines include larger sizes, but their patterns often look like an enormous woolly sack. It’s so nice to see a pretty knitting pattern in such a wide range of sizes.

Mind you, it isn’t half complicated!

I received a survey last week, regarding a potential new knitting magazine aimed at intermediate or experienced knitters. I enthusiastically answered all of the questions saying, “yes! I would love to knit more complicated and adventurous things!”.

Then I looked at this cardigan, and my brain fell out of my ear.

The front panels are a twelve-row pattern, featuring twisted stitches for which I didn’t even recognise the abbreviations! Thankfully there is a helpful key to explain how you work “tw2, P4, tw2, twF, P1, twF, P5, tw2, P4, tw2”, which is the first row!

 

Perhaps I’ll start with the children’s cardigan. A four-row lace pattern I can probably manage, if I sit down and concentrate on it properly. (Lace is not my strong point.)

Maybe I ought to finish my socks first. Or my summer jumper.

I might even get around to sewing the zip into my green cardigan, taking a photo and actually publishing the pattern for you, one of these days…

Read Full Post »

Silk socks and a passionflower.

I have a confession to make.

I am in love with my new socks. And they’re not even socks yet!

I honestly thought I’d be bored by the monotony of knitting every single row, but the self-striping yarn is absolutely fascinating to watch. How wide will my stripes be? Which colour’s coming next? I also thought I’d get cross with faffing about half way through every row, but I’m so relieved not to be wrestling with a set of double-pointed needles that Magic Loop is wondrous by comparison! The yarn is beautiful, the little needles don’t hurt my hands, and I believe I may have found my new vocation. Sock knitting is brilliant.

 

My knitting friends are turning out to be such a bad influence. Who’d have thought it?

We’ve been talking about socks, and hyperbolic crochet, and lace patterns knitted in aran weight wool, and teasing one another with links to the most beautiful yarns you’ve ever seen.

I have a comparatively small yarn stash, thanks to a comparatively small yarn budget, but I am now fighting a desperate urge to buy ALL THE SOCK YARN. You know, in case there’s a shortage, or something.

And, of course, you don’t have to use sock yarn just for knitting socks! I went to have a look through the pattern archives at Knitty, and stumbled across this amazingly beautiful pattern that I hadn’t spotted before.  Reversible lacy cables. Knitted in sock yarn. Wow.

I might need some help to decipher the chart, but that one’s definitely going in my Ravelry queue.

I knitted on my sock yesterday while I was waiting at the hospital to have some scans and x-rays done. When I sat down I realised that I’d forgotten my cable needle, and my next row was full of cables! Being a resourceful type of person, I pulled out the toothpick from my Swiss Army Card, and cabled with that.

In the course of two waiting rooms I overheard at least six older ladies talking about how on earth I was knitting a sock on such a peculiar needle, yet not one person came over to ask me about it. Usually people are keen to chat about knitting, especially when they see a strange woman with pink hair doing it. Perhaps it was the look of intense concentration and the toothpick that put them off…

Read Full Post »

Summer jumper

I’m in the process of knitting a variation on Colinette’s Madelene pattern. It’s in the Parisienne book, but I’m knitting it with Banyan instead. I succumbed to a bargain lot of Banyan on Ebay, and I quite fancied a loosely-knitted cotton jumper for the summer. The colourway is Neptune.

 

This is the back, and it feels as though it’s taken forever to knit. It’s actually worked up quite quickly, as every fourth row is knitted on a 10mm needle, but it’s garter stitch so it’s incredibly boring to work on. It’s also hurting my hands quite a bit, so I’m not spending as much time on it as I’d like to.

I don’t know why this particular project should be hurting my hands so much. Perhaps because the yarn doesn’t stretch and give. Perhaps because it’s heavy. Perhaps using the different sized needles is awkward – that certainly makes for slower knitting. Perhaps it’s because all I’m doing is knit, knit, knit, without the variation for my hands of purling every alternate row.

It’s a shame, as I really like the way this fabric is knitting up, and I’m really looking forward to wearing the jumper. I had been thinking of making some more, perhaps in some of the Cadenza colourways, but I don’t think that’s going to be a very clever idea.

Perhaps I’ll go back to my 1980s Patons “Odpins” book. All of the patterns in there are knitted with various combinations of large and small needles. I must be able to work out something similar which isn’t going to be so hard on my hands.

Read Full Post »

Get Knitted!

I would like to take a moment to sing the praises of Get Knitted. I ordered some yarn and needles from them on Friday, and they’ve arrived today. (Tuesday.) Their postage rates were extremely reasonable, and they threw in a free pen and a sweetie!

I ordered from Get knitted because they’re a UK supplier of Addi Turbo knitting needles, something impossible to find in any of my local yarn shops. I needed a 2.5mm needle with a 100cm cable, and Addi are the only brand I’m aware of who make this size. I needed the needle to knit a pair of socks.

Yes, that’s the yarn for the socks!
The toes and heels are cabled in the plain red, and the rest is self-striping in the bright colours.

The pattern is in the current issue of Simply Knitting magazine (Issue 43), and thanks to the generosity of a friend I am actually using the exact yarn specified in the pattern. This is something of a rarity for me, as I usually like to make things up as I go along.

This will be the first time I’ve used the Magic Loop technique (although I did spend Friday evening learning it with a spare ball of cheap acrylic and a big needle), and the first time I’ve knitted anything in 4-ply yarn, I think. If I can properly get the hang of Magic Loop and it doesn’t drive me as crazy as DPNs, I’ll be thrilled to bits. Bring on the socks!

I also treated myself to a little something:

The colours aren’t the greatest in this picture, but the ball of yarn that I’m holding is Rowan Cashsoft DK. 57% merino, 33% microfibre, 10% cashmere. Mmmmmm, soft. What I’m planning to do is unravel these Fetching mittens (also in Cashsoft), and combine these two colours to make something soft and stripey. Probably gloves or arm-warmers of some description, so I’ll probably save that project for a bit later in the year.

Now, do I wait until I’ve finished my Colinette Madelene jumper in Neptune Banyan, or start on the socks straight away…

Read Full Post »

Knitting and photography.

I’ve just been updating my projects on Ravelry, and apparently I have completed 40 projects since I started knitting in 2005. Does that seem like a lot? And that doesn’t even include all the things I’ve unravelled, or the things I’m knitting right now!

Here are my two most recent knitting photographs:

The jacket on the left is Murmur, from Rowan’s The Next Big Thing book. Sadly it’s another one of those unfortunate incidents you often find when knitting or sewing – you spend lots of time, money and effort making a thing, only to discover when it’s finished that you don’t like it, or it doesn’t suit you.

So, it fits chest 36-40″, and it’s for sale! £40, or I’ll happily trade for 6 balls of Colinette Point 5. Any colourway, I’m not fussy. ;)

The purple scarf on the right is The Yarn Harlot’s One Row Handspun Scarf. It will shortly be going up on Etsy for $30/£15, unless anyone really wants to grab it first?

I appreciate that it’s not really scarf weather, which is why I also took some photos of my most recent little felted bag. It’s in the same colourway as the jacket above, but I could not for the life of me get a good photograph of it.

Paul’s gone off to America with work, and he didn’t want to take his SLR with him, so I’ve lent him my little compact camera for the week. To begin with I was quite excited about playing around with Paul’s Canon EOS 350D. And then I tried to use it. Ugh, what a pain!

For a start off, it weighs a ton, which is not very useful when you’ve got a sore wrist. Then I discovered that Paul had left the 70 mm macro lens attached, which is no use at all when you’re trying to take a picture of a whole jumper! I managed to change the lens to a 55-200 mm one, and discovered that I still had to stand approximately eighty-seven miles away from the jumper if I wanted it to be in focus. I also have a headache from squinting through the viewfinder.

I think the only thing I liked about using this camera was the short depth of field you get from these particular lenses. I can only achieve that with my camera when it’s on the macro or super-macro settings, and then it won’t focus if you’re more than 20-100 mm away from the subject.

Obviously my little Pentax Optio A30 has its limitations. It’s fiddly to focus it manually, you can’t change the lens, and it doesn’t shoot in RAW format if you want to fiddle with your photos in an artistic manner after you’ve taken them. But I love the large screen instead of a viewfinder, I love that you can choose to use all of the settings manually if you want to, and the super-macro setting is very good. (The “face recognition” software is rubbish though.)

Paul and I went for another walk round the lake yesterday, and Paul took some more lovely photos of birds. I was feeling quite envious of his camera and photography skills, and went back through some of my old pictures to find ones that I’d taken with the film SLR. There were some lovely ones in there, but I think I’ve taken some much nicer photos with my little Optio than I ever did with my old SLR.

In fact, my old Olympus OM10 (Quartz) has been sitting under the bed, mostly unused in the last ten years. Perhaps it’s time to dig it out and sell it on.

Read Full Post »

Bitten by the Sock Bug.

I’ve been knitting since 2005, and it seems as though I’ve spent the whole of that time avoiding knitting socks. I like big, chunky jumpers, made from big, chunky yarns. You can’t really knit a wearable sock on 10mm needles! They’re small, they’re fiddly, the Magic Loop technique is incomprehensible to me, and knitting with a set of four double-pointed needles is like wrestling with a large wooden tarantula.

And then, as I mentioned the other day, I knitted the Sox on 2 Stix.

I’ve been wearing them as house-socks until now, as I was a bit afraid of rubbing away the fragile yarn inside a pair of shoes. Today though, I wore them out of the house.

I only went to the Post Office and back, to see off my last Ebay parcels. But all the way there I wanted to do a little dance of joy, about my lovely socks! Every person I passed, I wanted to say, “Hey! Are you looking at my socks? Look at my socks! I made those! I knitted them myself! Look at my socks!!”

I’ve never really subscribed to the school of thought that wearing “special” underwear can make you feel better. In my experience, wearing fancy underwear guarantees only that I’m going to be uncomfortable and cross. But, I do like socks, and my delicate little feet dictate that I can’t wear shoes without them, so I may as well wear socks that I like. I have socks with stripes and strawberries and bees, and even a pair with glow-in-the-dark aliens on them! None of these, however, can compete with the joy of wearing your very first pair of handmade socks.

Wearing handmade socks is so awesome that I now have no choice other than to buy a set of wooden double-pointed needles, and learn to knit them “properly”.

I am being aided and abetted in this by , who has very kindly sent me three balls of the most luxurious Regia sock yarn with silk. It feels so soft and scrumptious that I can’t wait to wear it on my feet – even if I do have to wrestle with a large wooden tarantula to make that happen!

Read Full Post »

The green cardigan’s almost finished!

I’ve been trying to knit a cardigan with this green Rowanspun Chunky for ages. It started out last year as the Nicky Epstein Cardigan with Cabled Points, but the pattern made me so cross that I unravelled the whole thing in a fit of pique. I’d made it all the way through the back, both sleeves and half of the left front, so it wasn’t a decision to be taken lightly. That was a heck of a lot of knitting to undo!

In the middle of March I decided to embrace the ways of Ann Budd, and write my own pattern.

I feel as though I’ve been working on this forever, probably because I’ve been knitting with this yarn since September, but it’s actually taken about ten weeks from writing the pattern to finishing the cardigan. I’ve also had a good few weeks where I didn’t knit at all because of my wonky wrist.

As this is the first pattern I’ve written myself (except for the pink scarf, which wasn’t quite as complicated!), I really wasn’t certain how it would come out. Thankfully, I’m really pleased with it!

Here you can see me wondering whether the edges will actually meet, so I can put the zip in.
(The answer’s yes, it’s very stretchy!)

The only thing I would change is the fit of the armscye. Ann Budd’s measurements are quite generous in this area and I prefer a more fitted style, so I’ll be making the sleeve head a bit smaller in my next pattern. Otherwise, the waist shaping is in the right place, the measurements are spot on, and I’m really pleased!

Read Full Post »

My First Socks!

After knitting six gloves over Christmas (two pairs and two half-pairs), I decided the time was right for me to make my first foray into socks.

I still hate loathe and detest wrangling with a handful of double-pointed needles, so I decided to find a pattern that I could knit using just two knitting needles, like a normal person. ;P

Sox on 2 Stix, from Knitty turned out to be the solution.

had given me two balls of Louisa Harding Kimono Angora for Christmas, so that seemed perfect for making a pair of really luxurious first socks.

The pattern is begun at the heel. You work short rows to make the heel cup, knit down to the toes, work the short rows again, and then knit your way back up the instep. Then you knit your way around the ankle, until the leg of the socks is as long as you want it to be. Seam the sides, et voila! Socks!

I decided to make tiny little short socks, as they’re the kind that I wear most often, and they go nicely inside my summer shoes. I had a few issues along the way, mostly with the short row shaping leaving enormous great holes in the toes and heels! It didn’t seem to matter how I wrapped and turned, the holes still appeared, so I fixed this in the time-honoured fashion of darning the toes as I was sewing up the seams. I left the holes in the heels, as they actually look quite pretty, and they aren’t uncomfortable to wear.

I also discovered that after I’d cast off the first sock, I couldn’t get my foot inside it! I have a high instep and I tend to cast off very tight, which turned out to be a bad combination. Fortunately I was able to undo the cast off and try again, but this did leave the socks quite loose around the ankle. Next time I think I might try 1×1 ribbing for the cuff instead of 2×2, and matters would definitely be improved by using a yarn with a bit more natural stretch to it.

So far I’ve only worn these socks for padding around the house. Kimono Angora isn’t really an appropriate sock yarn, and I know that as soon as I put these inside a pair of shoes I’ll wear straight through the toes. They’re amazingly soft and fluffy and comforting though, so these are definitely for those rainy weekends when you’re curling up on the sofa with a weepy film and a big bar of chocolate.

I also discovered the hard way that, thankfully, Kimono Angora doesn’t felt! I’d managed to scoop the socks into the machine with the rest of the laundry, and I gave a little shriek when they fell out, all wet and sorry for themselves. They had shrunk a little bit, but I put them on my feet immediately and padded around squelchily in the kitchen for a few minutes, and thank goodness they’re fine.

I’d like to knit some more of these, to go with all of my summer skirts, so what I need now is some recommendations for DK weight sock yarn. I like self-patterning or variegated colours the best, but I really would prefer DK to 4-ply for this pattern.

Any suggestions?

Read Full Post »

Moss-stitch trim zip-up cardigan.

The Dreaded Lurgy keeps striking me down in sudden and annoying ways, so I have mostly spent the weekend quietly knitting.

The first part of the weekend was spent unravelling, when I realised that I couldn’t bear to knit another stitch on the Cardigan with Cabled Points, and I was no longer certain that I actually wanted to wear it even if I did force myself to get it finished. So, I made the executive decision to unravel the whole thing.

I still wanted to knit a zip-fronted cardigan, but I decided to go for something a lot simpler. No pointy bits, no cabling on rows that didn’t line up, just a simple fitted cardigan.

Having turned to Ann Budd for help, I managed to get this far:

I’ve typed the pattern out below, for a size 36″ chest. Once the cardigan’s finished, I’ll write out the pattern in more sizes and make it available, probably as a PDF file. It should work with any chunky weight wool.

I haven’t checked the pattern for any glaring errors yet, mostly because I haven’t finished knitting it! I’ll make edits as I go along, if I find anything that’s difficult to follow.

If you decide to follow the pattern and find anything odd about it, please let me know!

Moss Stitch Trim Zip-Up Cardigan

Wool used – RowanSpun Chunky, approximately 525 metres.
Any chunky weight yarn should work out fine, as long as the gauge is correct.
7.5mm straight needles.
12 stitches and 18 rows to 4 inches.

The pattern below is for a finished chest measurement of 36″.

Back
Cast on 54 sts
Moss stitch for 10 rows
St st until piece measures 6″
Dec 1 st at each end of next and foll alt row*
Work 5 rows even
Inc 1 st at each end of next and foll alt row
Work even until piece measures 13″
Armhole Shaping
Cast off 3 sts at beg of next 2 rows
Cast off 2 sts at beg of next 2 rows
Dec 1 st at each end of next and foll alt row
Work even on 40 sts until armhole measures 8½”
Shoulder Shaping
Cast off 5 sts at beg of next 4 rows
Cast off rem 20 sts for back neck

Left Front
Cast on 27 sts
Moss stitch for 10 rows
Change to st st, keeping 6 sts in moss stitch at end of all rows. (This creates self band.)
St st until piece measures 6″
Dec 1 st at beg of next and foll alt row*
Work 5 rows even
Inc 1 st at beg of next and foll alt row
Work even until piece measures 13″, ending on ws row.
Armhole Shaping
Cast off 3 sts at beg of next row
Cast off 2 sts at beg of foll rs row
Dec 1 st at beg of each rs row, 2 times
Work even on 20 sts until armhole measures 7″, ending with ws row
Neck Shaping
Slip 6 edge sts onto stitch holder
Join new yarn, and work to end of row
At beg of next ws row, cast off 5 sts
Cast off 1 st at beg of next rs row (neck edge), 2 times
Then dec 1 st at neck edge every rs row, 3 times
Cont even on 4 sts until piece measures same as back, ending with ws row.
Shoulder Shaping
Cast off 4 sts.

Right Front
Cast on 27 sts
Moss stitch for 10 rows
Change to st st, keeping 6 sts in moss stitch at beginning of all rows. (This creates self band.)
St st until piece measures 6″
Dec 1 st at end of next and foll alt row*
Work 5 rows even
Inc 1 st at end of next and foll alt row
Work even until piece measures 13″, ending on rs row.
Armhole Shaping
Cast off 3 sts at beg of next row
Cast off 2 sts at beg of foll ws row
Dec 1 st at beg of each ws row, 2 times
Work even on 20 sts until armhole measures 7″, ending on rs row
Neck Shaping
Work to last 6 sts.
Slip 6 edge sts on to stitch holder.
At beg of next rs row, cast off 5 sts
Cast off 1 st at beg of next ws row (neck edge), 2 times
Then dec 1 st at neck edge every ws row, 3 times
Cont even on 4 sts until piece measures same as back, ending with ws row.
Shoulder Shaping
Cast off 4 sts.

Neck Band
Sew fronts to back at shoulder seams
Mark centre back
Work on 6 sts of each front band in moss stitch until they are long enough to meet at centre back
Cast off and sew bands together at centre back, or graft bands together
Sew bands to fronts and back neck.

Sleeves
Cast on 28 sts
Moss stitch for 10 rows
Change to st st
Inc 1 st at each end of every 6 rows, 9 times
Work even on 46 sts until piece measures 16″ (or desired length to armhole)
Shape Cap
Cast off 3 sts at beg of next 2 rows
Cast off 2 sts at beg of next 2 rows
Dec 1 st at each end of every rs row, 2 times (32 sts)
Dec 1 st at each end every 4 rows
Dec 1 st at each end of every rs row, 6 times
Cast off 4 sts at beg of next 2 rows
Cast off rem 10 sts

Finishing
Block all pieces, if necessary
Sew fronts to back at side seams
Sew sleeve seams
Set sleeves into armholes
Insert zip at centre front.

Notes
*If you do not require waist shaping, simply leave these rows out, and work even until piece measures 13″.

As you knit the fronts, you may find that the moss stitch pulls the work upwards. you can gently stretch the bands out as you go, or you can leave it, and even things out when you block.

When you knit the bands, you may find that you need to knit them longer than you think, in order to stretch them around the curves of the crew neck.

Read Full Post »

The Great Kool Aid experiment.

Recently I bought a sewing pattern from an American Ebay seller. As a little free gift, she included a mini packet of Kool Aid! Having looked at the ingredients and decided that I didn’t want to risk actually drinking it, I thought it might be fun to do a little experiment.

I must admit, I didn’t have very high hopes for this experiment’s success. The instructions on Knitty and in Simply Knitting Magazine (Issue 26, April 2007) both state that you should use only unsweeetened Kool Aid, and that you should allow 1-2 3.9g packets per 50g of wool. I had only one individual serving (smaller – sorry, I didn’t note down the weight) packet of sweetened Kool Aid, so I wasn’t at all sure whether it would have any effect on the wool at all.

I bought a single 50g ball of Sirdar Eco Wool. It’s completely undyed, so I figured that would be perfect. I followed the instructions in Simply Knitting magazine.

First I pre-soaked the ball of wool in warm water. Apparently wool floats! Not to worry – it soon sinks when it gets nice and wet. It helps to press the air out a bit.

I left the ball of wool soaking for about an hour, to let it get nice and wet all the way through. I didn’t bother unwinding the ball into a skein, as I figured that the dye bath would penetrate all the way through, and I didn’t mind if the outside was brighter then the inside. I just wanted to see whether it would work at all! The water is warm, but not too warm.

Here’s the wool, now soaking in the Kool Aid.
I took the ball of wool out of the water, and drained it in a colander. I pressed out most of the water, taking care not to scrunch the wool about too much, in case of felting. In the casserole dish, I poured in the Kool Aid, and then diluted it with warm water, roughly the same temperature as the wet ball of wool. When all of the Kool Aid crystals were dissolved, I popped the ball of wool into the solution, and added more water – enough to cover the whole ball. I then scrunched the wool around carefully, to make sure the dye was going all the way through.

Then it was on with the lid, and onto the hob for a good cooking! Simply Knitting magazine said, “When cooking on the hob, cover and simmer gently for 20-30 minutes”. I left mine cooking for about an hour, because I was watching Funny Girl on tv, and lost track of the time. I don’t think it ever quite reached a simmer either, as I left it on the very lowest setting. During the ad breaks, I carefully turned the ball of wool, to make sure the dye really was going all the way through. I’d recommend using gloves for this part – firstly because it’s hot, and secondly because I ended up with pink fingers for most of the day.

Tipping out the Kool Aid solution, I left the ball of wool until it was cool enough to pick up.

I then transferred it to the shower. I made sure that the water was roughly the same temperature as the ball of wool, and rinsed out the excess dye. I then squeezed out as much water as possible, taking care not to risk accidental felting.

Winding the wool around my clothes airer to dry, I’m really pleased to find that the dye is much more even than I’d hoped for. I think I’d call this experiment a success!

And here’s the final result! Left overnight to dry, and wound into a neat little cake, I have a lovely ball of pale pink wool!

The dyeing made no mess whatsoever (except for my pink fingers, but that was my own silly fault!), took very little supervision, and was extremely easy to do.

You can buy Kool Aid in the UK from D T Crafts or Kool Aid UK for as little as 40-50p per packet. Kool Aid UK also sometimes sell expired packets specifically for dyeing, as they can’t be used for drinking once they’re out of date.

The ball of Sirdar Eco Wool cost £3.99, so the addition of 50p for the dye definitely wouldn’t break the bank. I’m not sure I’d want to try and dye the yarn for a whole jumper, as you’d have to get a bit scientific about the dilution of the Kool Aid to make sure that all of the wool came out pretty much the same colour. But for single-ball projects, I’m definitely going to be doing this again!

Read Full Post »