Tag: holiday gifts

Posted in knitting

Some Christmas Knitting Revealed

Posted on by Laura Kate

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.

Posted in knitting

Summer’s Yarn Bounty

Posted on by Laura Kate

I finally got around to taking photos of the yarn purchased during this year’s KnitPicks summer yarn sale. It includes yarns I have used in the past and a few new ones. With an eye toward knitting socks as holiday gifts, I have focused on fingering weight yarns.

This is a new offering from KnitPicks. Static is a fingering weight blend of superwash wool and nylon – the same fiber content as their Stroll line. I guess what makes this yarn different is the self-striping color sequence. This colorway is called Paradise. I thought the bright colors would be nice for children’s socks.

Gloss is a luxury blend of 70% merino wool and 30% silk. I have used it in the worsted weight to make vests and shawls. The fingering weight has all the attributes of its larger sister – softness and a light sheen. I bought it to find out if silk helps the socks wear longer in the heel and ball of foot areas. I also plan to use it as the solid color contrast in 2-color shawls. Colorways shown are clarity, blackberry and navy.

Hawthorne has become a new favorite for me in the fingering weight group. I like its plumpness and high twist. It is made from superwash highland wool, which pills less than merino wool does. The kettle-dyed line (Poseiden is shown here) give nice color variation to items knitted in basic stitches. I also purchased two painted yarns: Burlingame is the top one, Vancouver shown in the bottom of the photo.

This month I will be teaching a short course on knitting shawls. I plan to use these yarns to demonstrate how they can bring pizzazz to a simple garter ridge pattern.

Beyond that, I have no clue of what these yarns want to become. But I will enjoy discovering it.

Posted in knitting

F.O. Friday – Adult Booties

Posted on by Laura Kate

I got started on this project because of a problem I encountered during the recent SuperSnow event. It was SO cold for SO long I found myself wearing my hand knitted wool socks night and day. Don’t get me wrong, I love wearing cozy hand-knitted wool socks. But at the end of the cold snap, I examined both pair and noticed that the soles were thinning out. Unless I got busy with repairs, I would be down at least one pair for the duration. So I decided that I needed warm cozy wool footwear that would hold up to walking many miles on our cold hard tile floors. Hence the dorm boots.

This pattern is offered on Kriskrafter’s blog.

Kriskrafter: Better Dorm Boots – Lace Edition – Free Knitting Pattern! (auntekristy.blogspot.com)

It has all the characteristics I needed: Thick soles, fast to knit and used a miniscule amount of yarn. I rummaged through my stash and found some nasty beige acrylic-wool blend in a heavy worsted. The pattern calls for holding yarns double, so I worked from two skeins for the sole. My stash rummage also yielded a sturdy pink wool harvested from a too-itchy scarf and a tweedy, wine-colored Italian wool orphan ball given to me by knitting friend Kathy. I held these two double to work the upper and the cuff.

It was magical how quickly the first boot came together. You could knit the pair in two evenings if you concentrated on your work. I took a more leisurely pace and did this pair over four evenings, including a sit and knit session on Tuesday.

Sadly, I lost track of my rows during the sit and knit. So my booties don’t match.

No matter. They are purposeful items. Good looks come second.

If I were in need of a last minute Christmas gift, this pattern could come to the rescue. Just think, with a bit of focus, I could fancy them up with different colors, stitches and possibly a pompom or two. Wouldn’t that cheer up a loved one, popping out of a Christmas stocking, on a cold and snowy Christmas morning?

Posted in knitting, weaving

December Holiday in Review

Posted on by Laura Kate

First of all, I want to say that the Christmas To-Do list posted on the wall was a big hit with family members who visited us this year.

Of the twenty items on the list, all but four were completed – with great enthusiasm, for the most part. We made a few changes: no one was interested in making wreaths, but the fly fishermen among us wanted to tie some flies. So there was that substitution. And since the cars took up the whole driveway, we played sports in the backyard. Many times. The weather was remarkably warm and sunny, hence No Fire in the Fireplace.

I received two fibery gifts. The first was a pair of sock yarns, originating in Wisconsin.

I have worked with Ewetopia sock yarn once before and found it very pleasant – it is round, tightly twisted and produces a sturdy fabric. The swatch of the dark plum gave a deep tonal, slightly shaded fabric. The yellow green color, named Caterpillar, gave a stripey fabric characterized by short repeats.

My second gift was a handful of woven linen swatches, made decades ago by my son in law’s grandmother.

After studying them for a while, I was able to work out which direction were warps and which were wefts. Some of these brocades must have been devilishly difficult to construct. I want to preserve them, but I also want to use them in some way. At the moment, I am considering working the swatches into a stretched canvas piece.

It was a busy and tiring week at chez LauraKate. While I intend to write about my body of work made in 2020, that discourse must wait for tomorrow. Today will be dedicated to tidying the craft room, folding the laundry and roasting a chicken.

Posted in quilting

Back to the Scrap Heap

Posted on by Laura Kate

I’m taking a break from knitting and painting to do a little sewing.  Some may recall my brief panic the day I realized what happens to my studio as a consequence of quilting.

Crazy Out-of-Control Scrap Heap

After spending time perusing other quilt blogs to find out how other quilters deal with this situation, I found part of the solution in the form of quilted buckets.  This lesson comes to us from Christina Cameli and Bluprint.com.

https://shop.mybluprint.com/quilting/classes/free-motion-quilted-gifts/673670

So yesterday I started on my first of three fabric buckets that (I hope) will contain my fabric-waiting-to-be-used.  This project is also an opportunity for me to practice free motion quilting while adding color and style to my studio. Her are my fabric choices for the first bucket.

120619a
Pink for the outside and gray for the lining.

I’m quilting dimensional triangles for this bucket.  Here is the first step done.

120619b
I had to use a chalk pencil to keep my row straight.

The next few hours were spent happily quilting.  Eventually the first basket was finished.

120619c
Some inch-wide grosgrain ribbon I found became the basket handles.

I have to admit that I sewed up the wrong sides of the baskets, so my basket is actually two inches longer than the one in the lesson. This turned out to be fortunate. The revised dimension held lots of fabric and fit nicely into the allotted space on my shelves.

120619d

I used the Kon-Marie method of folding the fabric and filled the bucket with the folded fabric pieces inserted on edge. It was amazing to see how much fabric this little bucket holds.  Each fabric piece remains clearly visible and easy to grab.

So my plan now is to make three more buckets to use in storing 1 yard and fat quarter size pieces, and to make some smaller baskets for the various colors of scraps.

I highly recommend Christina Cameli’s class. She is delightful instructor.  Each of her projects can be made in an afternoon and would make wonderful gifts.