I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year! This year has been a fiber adventure for myself to say the least. I spun 20+ new breeds of wool this year, bought over 300 pounds of raw fleece from various farms all over the United States, & knitted, spun, and wove more […]
Merry Christmas (and Happy New Year) — Diary of a Yarnophile
This image was too cute. I had to re-blog it! Thanks for sharing, Emily!
Laura
I’ve been busy knitting up some Christmas gifts for my family and friends. Since some of the intended recipients follow this blog, I’ve kept my progress reports to myself.
Now I can begin to reveal these projects, starting with a necklace I made for good friend and knitting buddy Kathy.
Earlier this year, I made a Ruth Bader Ginsberg-style collar necklace using a very soft Shibui yarn. The pattern came from this book.
This book is no longer in print. I was fortunate to find it at an on-line used bookstore. The pattern I used is called Beads and Baubles Necklace.
This photograph is in the book and shows the “bobbles” in the light gray section, spaced out evenly between the beads. Since I truly dislike knitting bobbles, I simply worked a yarn-over every time the pattern called for a bobble.
My collar looks like this:
Since Kathy is allergic to wool, I chose two colors of synthetic yarn for her gift.
It’s hard to tell from the photograph, but the teal color yarn has tiny reflective bits that glitter in the light – sort of silvery.
The necklace came together quickly, with very little effort. Attaching the jewelry findings took a while and gave me some frustrating moments.
No doubt I was lacking in correct tools and techniques. (sigh.)
More Christmas knits will be revealed later in the week.
Despite my efforts to apply my best knitting skills, I frequently end up with saggy socks. They droop around the ankles, and scrunch around the in-step. It annoys me to no end when they are on my feet.
All you knitters out there are probably thinking, she didn’t get gauge, or made the wrong size. She just needs to adjust the number of stitches cast on. Well, that might be in some cases. Most of the time, it is because I forget how much superwash wool yarns can lengthen after the finished socks are washed. Even when I make a meticulous swatch AND block it.
So, I decided to try something new. Why not use a slip stitch pattern on the areas of the sock giving me the most sag?
I turned to one of my stitch dictionaries ………
……..and selected a pattern called Woven Stitch.
In essence, it is a stockinette pattern with a bar of yarn across every other stitch, every other row. The result is a firmer fabric with a little more lateral pull. If made with sock yarn that includes a bit of nylon, the fabric is stretchy enough but returns quickly to its former position. In other words, it ‘hugs” the foot.
I like it!
After working one inch of 1 x 1 ribbing, I knitted the ankle in the Woven stitch. I kept the instep in pattern while I continued along the heel and foot. Upon reaching the toe shaping, I switched to solid stockinette stitch.
When worked in a tonal yarn, the slipped stitches break up the color transitions slightly. This results in a sort of pebbly look.
Looks and feels like a perfect fit. I will be interested to see how well these socks perform over time.
I’m pleased to unveil this cardigan which I started back in May. In March of this year, I had visited Ewetopia Yarn store in Veroqua, WI. Noticing this yarn on sale, I picked up enough to make a sweater. In fact, I purchased all skeins available in this colorway.
Roslyn is a blend of 65% wool and 35% silk. It is so soft that I posed for this photo shoot wearing the sweater next to my skin – in other words, no shirt! The finished fabric is very drapey. It almost lacks enough structure to be used in a cardigan.
This pattern came from Vogue Knitting: a retrospective on seventy years of the magazine’s history. Forestry originally appeared in the 2008 Fall edition but it strikes me as having a vintage vibe.
I had some trouble with errors and vague instructions in the pattern. Even though I researched it in Ravelry’s database, I don’t think that all the errata had been discovered and corrected.
…….specifically, the shawl collar did not come out right. It was after I had finished my knitting and scrutinized the photograph closely that I realized I had placed the stitch markers for shaping the collar in the wrong location. By then I had lost all interest in ripping the collar out and starting over again.
I made adjustments in the best way that I could. I added a loop closure near the collar’s beginning so that the neckline wouldn’t gap open.
Despite its imperfections, this cardigan will be a nice addition to my sweater wardrobe. I have a vintage wool A-line skirt in a darker moss green color that will work nicely. Adding a chunky necklace like the one worn by the model and my brown leather boots and I’ll be good to go.
I had great plans on revealing this new shawl with a few last comments on its constructions. But my plans changed last Friday when we got on a plane.
My husband and two good friends and I are in Belize for a week of sun and fun. I took the shawl along and Bill did a photo shoot with me and the shawl on an actual Caribbean beach.
So in this post, I’ll just give some narration to accompany these lovely photos.
As you see here I added a lace border in a very pale yarn. This is Knit Picks Gloss in colorway Clarity, fingering weight. The lace pattern is from my stitch dictionary, called Spiral and Eyelet Panel. The only adaption I made was to insert a six-stitch panel of spiral eyelets between each 24 stitch panel. It worked pretty well with my ultimate stitch count of 320. The bind-off I used is the same as in the Water shawl pattern I knit earlier this year. You can read about that here:
https://wordpress.com/post/dailyfiberfun.wordpress.com/3400
I’m happy with the curviness created by the 24 stitch center panel. An element of waviness came along with the lace border. It reminds me of the foamy waves as they roll onto the sandy shore.
Now that I am actually standing on the beach, I find the colors on the shawl are a fine representation of those found in the warm waters of the lagoon inside Belize reef.
Sand and Sea Shawl final dimensions: 23″ high by 59″ wide. It took eleven different colors of fingering weight yarn (roughly 50 yards each color) plus slightly more than half the ball of Gloss for the border. If all goes well, I plan to publish the pattern, once I get home and have time to write it up.
Daily Fiber 