January 20, 2012
Sometimes the urge to knit lots and lots of things immediately and simultaneously becomes overwhelming, especially when one WIP is about to be consigned to the rip-bin (of which more later) and several other things have been finished.
So, on the needles as of the last couple of days we have:
One sweater:
One mens’ sock:
One womens’ sock:
One doll’s beret (finished, actually, but I felt just as guilty about casting it on):
One doll’s bobble hat:
And a baby blanket:
Can’t talk. Knitting.
January 14, 2012
I have been Very, Very Good about not buying new yarn. As I’m now self-employed I have a wildly unpredictable income (and even when it is predictable it’s unlikely to be predictable for very long). So apart from buying some sockyarn at the Knitting & Stitching show and some more when I visited friends in Henley (it’s positively rude to be near a lovely shop like Black Hills Yarn and not buy something) I haven’t bought any yarn all year. Not that I needed to in any case as I had about seven sweaters-worth in my stash, not to mention two blankets-worth, four shawls-worth and six socks-worth. And other bits and pieces that can be used for toys, dolls’ clothes and so on. So I wasn’t really short of anything to knit.
Then my mother sent me a link to the Black Sheep‘s yarn sale and there was Rowan Wool Tweed reduced to less than £2 a ball and so I held my breath and just went ahead and ordered enough for a plain sweater for the Bear. I had to drop everything else and knit it at top speed to hide the evidence and so that it could never count as stash. It’s a pathetic fiction, obviously, but I worry that there are things in the stash that have been there for a year or two or more and there might be jealousy issues.
Anyway, it’s a splendidly simple pattern – a Debbie Bliss freebie. Child’s Denim Sweater. It’s the same front and back, which is handy when your toddler is learning to dress themselves. The yarn is cosy and the fleck is pretty. But don’t tell my stash I did it.
January 12, 2012
Attentive readers may have noticed a plethora of Finished Objects in the last week or two. This is partly because I’d been too lazy/busy to blog since August so there’s some catchup to be done, but also because sometimes the habit of knitting several things at once pays off and you have one FO per day for about a week. It’s great, and almost makes up for not having finished anything at all in the previous four months.
So, in the interests of balance, here’s one of the Unfinished Objects currently lounging around the living room being occasionally marauded by babies.
This is sockyarn I bought at the Knitting & Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace in October. It was interesting but a bit of a bunfight, and crowds aren’t really my thing so I’m not sure if I’ll go again, but I did come away with this slow-colour-change pink-and-purple from Regia (Regia Design Line Hand Dye Effect by Kaffe Fassett in Balloon). Nice enough, but not a patch on Violet Green‘s sockyarns. The socks are going to be fraternal rather than identical because the pattern repeat on the colour change is about eight inches and I couldn’t tell where I was in the repeat when I started the second sock. I don’t really like that, and there’s a stripe across the front of the ankle after I join up from the heel again, so I don’t think these are going to become Favourite Socks. But – socks are socks are socks.
January 11, 2012
I started this last Easter, as my reward for dutifully working on One Project Only during Lent (I am generally no good at project-monogamy). I’d been wanting a cricket sweater for ages but couldn’t find any patterns I liked. Patterns for men were all too wide – generously proportioned for too many cricket teas – and there just didn’t seem to be any for women. So I was delighted to find this one in Debbie Bliss’s Spring/Summer magazine 2010. For once I used the colourway in the design.
Took flipping ages because I got sidetracked into other projects (of course). The yarn was a bit splitty to work with – it’s Debbie Bliss Amalfi, which is cotton, rayon, linen and silk. A really lovely drape and very comfortable – fine and not bulky at all. But, as I say – splitty.
I didn’t bother swatching, because I never do (I’d always been too lazy to and then the Yarn Harlot put me off it for life with some proper reasons) but I’m pretty sure I was close to gauge. It does what all cotton sweaters do though – drop under its own weight. I don’t mind – it’s a summer sweater after all so some ‘hang’ is nice- but it does mean that its low neck makes it unlikely I’ll wear it by itself. Unless I’m trying to get a better price at the butcher.
January 9, 2012
I’ve wanted to try my hand at Fair Isle for a while. I’m always thoroughly awed and intimidated by other people’s colourwork but when my mother passed on a load of Rowan wool-cotton that she’d frogged from a Fair Isle sweater she’d made, it seemed a perfect opportunity to try it myself. No-risk yarn and a person in the house who’s still small enough to make experimental items for (I’ve no doubt that getting him to wear handknits when he’s a teenager will be a rather different kettle of fish). Also in some senses it’s not really colourwork because it’s black, white and grey, which is possibly cheating.
I used a Debbie Bliss pattern as a basis – a tank top, as I didn’t want to bother with sleeves – and some patterns from Alice Starmore’s Fair Isle book. Basically I cast on about 80 stitches and then made it up. I cast on the back and front at the same time and then just knitted until I got to the armholes, decreased a bit, knitted a bit more and made up a neck.
Several things I’d do differently next time, I think. You’re supposed to work in the round for proper Fair Isle and cut steeks for the sleeves. Because I knitted back and front separately my side seams are a nightmare of woven ends and the patterns don’t match, of course (I have no intention of posting a picture of the seams). Also whether it’s Debbie’s pattern, my abuse of it or my son’s abnormally large arms I don’t know but it’s not going to fit him for long.
Might use a pattern next time! Still, it was a useful way to experiment with the technique, and a low-risk project all round.
January 8, 2012
The Bear has a habit of renaming things depending on her current obsession, so my latest FO has been renamed several times already and will answer to any of them. Originally he was Ysolda Teague’s Otto, and a very nice pattern he is too!
I knitted him in Debbie Bliss’s cashmerino chunky on 5mm needles. You can knit Ysolda’s toys in any weight yarn but obviously the fatter the yarn the bigger the toy!
He took three balls plus about a metre. You need needles slightly smaller than you’d normally use for the yarn so that you get a tight fabric that the stuffing doesn’t leak through. He’s about 18 inches tall and is a very quick knit – half a dozen evenings of knitting time. He’s not a knit-in-front-of-a-DVD item though because you need to read the pattern for pretty much every row. If I’d just sat down and hammered through, I think he could be done in a couple of evenings. So Otto/Polar Bear/ Pooh/ Woody is a very welcome addition to the house! I really want to do another Elijah as well but there are too many other things on the needles…
January 7, 2012
Well, winter’s here and the Husband’s sweater is finally finished. (He didn’t know I was taking this picture, otherwise he wouldn’t be bending over the record player.)
Fortunately, given the amount of knitting time it took, he loves it. It’s a nice pattern but that amount of rib in a dk weight for any size of man was always going to take a long time and be a little tedious to knit. What can I say, he likes plain sweaters. It’s Flint (Ravelry link), by Sublime Yarns in their Organic Merino DK. Which I would never normally be able to afford 15 balls of but I found it on ebay for half price. :happyface:
I didn’t have quite enough yarn for the full height funnel neck so it’s got a slightly abbreviated version – fine in this case because DH doesn’t like high necks but I can’t see how you’d get the whole thing out of the 15 balls of yarn specified. I wasn’t a metre or two short, I was about five cm of ribbing short.
The yarn is delightfully soft, cosy and comfortable, and a little fluffy (you can see a little halo around it). It’s also bobbling like crazy with even a moderate amount of wear. Still, the main thing is he likes it!
August 29, 2011
The height of August is generally when I start getting irritated by summer and want it to be over so I can get back to fires, casseroles, blankets and the other winter comforts. Not to mention being able to have The Big Tidy Up in the garden and chop everything back. I like to clear all the overgrowth and get back to the bones of the garden.
However, this year the weather has beaten me to it. I don’t know what it’s like where you are but here it’s been chilly, rainy, windy and generally autumn-like recently. We’re promised a couple of nice days later this week but I think that’s basically it for summer. Yay!
Either way, it’s definitely time to cast on for winter sweaters. The Other Half is getting a lovely new one this winter – Flint, in Sublime Merino DK. Which I wish I’d given slightly more thought to, as knitting a sweater for medium-to-large man (or probably a man of any size) in DK is clearly going to be a long task. The yarn is gorgeously soft – sadly my hands aren’t and I keep catching it on rough fingers. All those miles of rib are going to take me a while.
The other one that’s still on the needles was supposed to be a summer sweater for me, but I’m telling myself that as it’s got silk in it it’ll be quite warm for the autumn.
The Amalfi creates lovely stitch definition and has a really nice drape.
Not too far to go but I’m pretty certain I’m going to run out of yarn… I’m just hoping to get the rest of the sleeve out of what I’ve got left, then buying one in a different dye lot for the neckband won’t matter too much.
July 18, 2011
Dolly now has a very smart pair of knitted pyjamas.
I think I personally might find them a little warm, but she seems happy enough!
Back to the vintage pattern (proper vintage, by which I mean pre-WW2, not the 1970s which were my childhood and which I therefore do not consider vintage) that I was knitting and gave up on after reading an instruction “cast on 90… increase to 50″ (see Bonnets and bootees). As I’d already run into one set of mad instructions for the hat I decided that whoever wrote the pattern or copytyped it into the paper must have had a brainstorm, and gave up. However, my attempt and the pic thereof have become the official project photos on Ravelry, which is a nice compliment, and has made me think I should re-attempt the dress and coat that go with the vest and knickers (sorry, pilchers).
Cricket sweater is coming along nicely and the Bear’s Debbie Bliss jacket is finished (been waiting for a while for someone to post me a zip) – pics soon!
July 2, 2011
I’m now part of the Mumsnet blogging network and will have a smart logo somewhere as soon as I figure out how to insert the code into the page…
Anyway, as regular visitors will know, this is by and large a knitting blog with occasional forays into house renovation stories when things get particularly hairy around the domicile. So if you fancy reading about knitting and all matters woolly, please do visit again!
