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Knitting

Need To Make A Last Minute Gift?

Iris Rose

Are you panicked yet? No? Good for you, that means that you are organized and well self managed. Yes? Welcome to the real world of crafting!

If you desperately need a hand knit gift and only have an evening to pull it off, here are a couple of my free patterns that can be made in that time.

 

First off is my Simple Shawl. Knit on big needles with bulky yarn, you can whip this one up in four hours or less. It only uses 150m of a fancy yarn to create a shawl that highlights the yarn and is soft and squishy. It is an ideal way to use up a special, I only have two skeins, of something pretty.  Block it aggressively when you are done.

 

My next suggestion, if you have even less time, is my Quick and Easy Garter Stitch Cowl. Again, relying on big needles and big or fancy yarn, this is an easy two hour project. I have doubled or tripled contrasting colours and textures to create my own bulky yarn for this one many times making a special, one of a kind, piece to keep your neck warm.

 

 

Okay, I have given you a couple of ideas, now dig through that stash and get busy, time is a wasting!

I wish you all the best for the holiday season no matter who and how you celebrate. Kindness is the greatest gift of all so please give freely

Knitting

Custom Knitting

Iris Rose

I have been machine knitting again. I really enjoy the creative process of designing and making custom garments for kids and had someone ask for a pair of Christmas dresses for her grandchildren. One of the girls is harder to fit and I also really like a challenge.

I have a dressmaking background, so I have a very good understanding of how garments are constructed and how to make them fit properly. I sat down with the measurements provided to me along with my calculator and knit swatches and went to town.

I normally just wing it when I am creating something new, relying on that experience in sewing to see me through to generic sizing. It was a bit of a challenge and a great deal of fun to produce something that is a custom fit.

This is what I came up with. The flower bit is meant to look like a sash. It done in fairisle with a lining to hide the floats and to prevent any catches when dressing.  There are also buttons on the right shoulder to open the neck up for ease in dressing.

I am pretty proud of these two little dresses and plan to use the design to create a multisized pattern to publish.

Thanks for reading and have a lovely week ahead. Remember that the cranky person that you run across may have a huge heap of problems weighting them down so be kind.

Knitting

What’s Next?

Iris Rose

The climate for business in Alberta is really bad right now and, as a result, I have been laid off. Upside? I get to craft a whole lot more. Downside? Less money for crafting. I am trying to find the lemonade recipe if I can only remember where I filed it.

I will be spending more time polishing up and testing the bazillion patterns that I have created and are filed away as notes only due to lack of time. I really want to dye gradient yarn as well.  There’s the recipe, right there, I knew it would turn up.

Well, the craft sale is done and the resulting orders as well. What do I do now?

I have fallen into machine knitting again to the detriment of my other crafting. I made a resolution to knit or crochet at least two toys every week but I am failing miserably at that! I have one to show for the last two weeks, but, and this is important I guess, I was working on a couple of custom kids’ dresses. All done now except for the final finishing and I am back to the usual.

Stay tuned for new releases and, in the meantime, here are a couple of relatively new creations.

Have a terrific week ahead and, for your health’s sake, give someone a hug and a kind word.

Knitting

Another Save

Iris Rose

I wrote last week about a cardigan that I started in the spring and finally finished in September. It was one of those projects that just couldn’t keep a fire going under me for some reason. I am guessing it was the miles of stocking stitch that I was fine with until I got to the part where you divide the sleeves and body (top down construction) and then it was just too very tedious.

Long story short, I finished it, blocked it, washed it and tried it on. It fit great, nice and big and baggy as I was aiming for except, wait for it, the cursed neckline was too wide. Because the yarn is heavy, I was constantly readjusting the neck back up over my shoulders. GAH!!! What a big disappointment my new favourite cardigan turned out to be.

 

Time for a time out for you naughty, badly fitting cardigan of my dreams. After I calmed down, although this took several weeks, I had a second look at the problem and came up with a fairly easy fix.

The cardigan is knitted in two colours, grey and black and, of course, I was almost out of grey. I picked up the stitches from the cable cast on (top down remember) and knit a garter neck band up from that. I decreased every eight stitches every four rows to bring the neckline in and added a buttonhole at the appropriate spot. I should let you know that I am well known for forgetting about the buttonholes until a project is done so I am very, very proud of myself for remembering this one and thankfully avoided more tantrums on my part.

 

On another note, our craft sale at the beginning of the month was a success; here are some photos of our setup before the sale began. Most of the toys and a number of pieces of clothing are gone. That pretty shawl was tried on by every almost teen girl that walked by. It was fun to see the delight when they saw the colours and the softness of the yarn.

 

 

Have a great week ahead and share a little kindness every day.

Knitting

Your UFO Is How Old???

Iris Rose

I have been catching up on a bunch of things that I had planned for the fall and now have time for. One is to clean out the dresser that I have all of my sewing stuff stashed away in. It had become somewhat of a mess (huge understatement here) to the point that I couldn’t extract a reel of thread without pulling out a dozen more that were tangled with it.

While I was cleaning and sorting and tossing out, I came across a bag of lace collars that I had crocheted when I had to spend a lot time with a little one in hospital way back in 1980. Among them was one lonely knit collar, my first knitted lace attempt. As you will see in the photos, I made a mistake of some sort in the pattern. Being new to reading lace patterns and under a great deal of stress at the time, I didn’t do anything about it but just carried on.

I hadn’t yet mastered a loose cast off either and when I finished, the cast off edge was too tight, and the collar didn’t curve as it should. I put it away and saved it to repair at some point in the future which happened to be this week.

I started by undoing the cast off and picking up the stitches as I went. The collar curved really well once the tight row was removed. I didn’t do anything about the lace pattern. I consider the mistake to be part of my history and, along with the associated memory, deserves to be preserved.

The cast off was so tight that I didn’t have enough of the original thread to redo it and I certainly didn’t have the same crochet cotton languishing still in my stash. I decided that a contrast colour border might do it so found a soft sage green bamboo that is a good match in size and finish. I worked four rows of garter stitch and tried a million different types of knitted cast off (okay not a million but it felt like it when I was frogging) before finally settling with a crocheted one.

 

Blocking and a button and this is a thirty-nine year old project finally done. Next week will feature another rescued project but one that is much younger!

Have a safe and happy week filled with craft goodness!