Tag: pattern

Knitting

Oh, I’ve Started Another One

Iris Rose

I usually have a topic in mind when I sit down to write my blog post but today, not so much.  It is raining and starting to really look like fall which is really not my favourite time of the year.  I know, I know, it is a great time to be crafting.  All of those great yarns calling your name and all of those lovely patterns just begging to be made or at least bought and saved or printed and placed in the pile.  Sound familiar?  See you are just like the rest of us!

I have ventured into a couple of new projects and thought you might like to see them.  I went yarn looking (okay really yarn shopping, that road to hell is paved with I won’t buy any more yarn) on Saturday of last weekend with DD1 and came across this new, at least to me, lovely gradient yarn in a worsted weight, 200g, 500m cake.  Oh, I thought, that will make a gorgeous poncho.  But wait, 500m won’t be enough to knit a poncho in the round and to start a second cake part way through will spoil the beauty of the gradient colour changes.  I am now knitting a poncho in two pieces front and back and will seam it.  I am making notes as I go of course so, if it looks as good as I think it will, there is a new pattern in the works.

The yarn is a product of Germany called Gala.  I have seen a few free patterns on Ravelry this week so I am assuming that it a new to North America yarn.  It is, as I said, a generous 500m in a 200g cake.  It comes in six colour ranges, is composed of eighty percent wool and twenty percent nylon, and is a very nice yarn to work with.  It looks fragile but is surprisingly strong.  I can’t wait to finish my poncho; I have been neglecting my other projects in favour of this one.

I did pick up a couple of other skeins to try and will fill you in on what I thought of those when I start to work with them.  I also stepped into Michaels, that centre of temptation, and found a no name bag of fine boucle with long colour changes.  A project for that one is cooking but not quite done and ready to come to life.

I have finished the vest that I started some time ago with another clearance no name yarn that I still haven’t identified.  I thought that it was Bernat Maker but, after seeing that yarn close up, I am now sure that it is not.  In any case the vest turned out better than expected and is awaiting a zipper to finish it.

If you are in the Calgary/Okotoks area on Saturday, stop by the Etsy Made in Canada sale at the Crescent Point Regional Field House in Okotoks at 125 Field House Dr East.  I’d love to say hello in person.  I will be selling from my Etsy store, Iris Rose Crafts.

Knitting

End of Summer, Bulky Yarns!

Iris Rose

Where I live it is the end of summer, not my favourite time of year.  Lots of folks love this time of the fall with the cooler days and cooler nights, colourful leaves changing from green to gold before they fall.  It can be bright and sunny and tease you into thinking that the warm days are not over and that winter is far, far away.  Ha!

It is not that I really dislike winter but more that I really hate the long dark of winter days.  Once we reach the middle of January and the daylight starts to increase, I am all good even though this is the coldest part of the winter and often the snowiest.  Give me a snowfall over rain any day but just not the darkness of November and December.

Now that I have had a little rant, I am looking forward to all of the lovely bulky yarns that show up this time of the year and hope to have a few patterns ready over the next month or so that take advantage of these quickly knit yarns.  Most of them don’t need anything complicated as far as stitching goes to become stars, in fact, the more simple the pattern, the better to showcase the colours and textures of these lovelies.

I have a few patterns that I have written to make gift knitting, and yes it is time to start, an easy and speedy process.  Here is the first, a simple cowl that I hope that you enjoy!

Cowl or Infinity Scarf:

Tools: 12 to 15mm single point pair of needles or a circular needle of the same diameter.  The needle size is not crucial but will affect the depth of the garter stitch.  Use what you have; if the largest that you have is 6mm, work the cowl in dropped garter stitch with one yarn over wrap to make the stitch size close to what a larger needle produces.  There are great videos online that show how to make this easy stitch.

Materials: 90m chunky yarn or use two ends of worsted weight in the same or contrasting colours to make your own chunky weight.  I have mixed a textured and smooth yarn in the same colour or close to make a fabulous look.  Use up those this is too beautiful to resist sequin, loopy or what have you yarns that are hiding in your stash. Consult your great imagination and have fun!

Cowl Instructions: Cast on 22 stitches with 12mm needles or 18 stitches with 15mm needles.

Knitting all rows, work 36 ridges (72 rows) with the 12mm needles and 30 ridges (60 rows) with the 15mm needles.

Join with cast off by picking up a loop at each live stitch (as you work the last row) from your cast on and three needle bind off with your live stitches.  If you don’t want to do this, cast off and neatly sew the two ends together to form a tube.  Lightly Block with steam to stretch your new lovely cowl out slightly and to soften the yarn a little.

If you want a longer cowl, and don’t forget you will need more yarn, keep knitting until you get to the length that you like when wrapped around your neck then finish here.

Knitting

Seahawks Socks

Iris Rose

I know that a lot of you regularly knit socks.  I have knit a few pairs and never enjoyed the process until I am almost finished the second one, then I love sock knitting!

I found a self striping yarn in the team colours of the Seattle Seahawks and just had to knit a pair for my DH, the ultimate Hawks fan.  The yarn is Cascade Heritage Prints in the colourway, Seattle.  I bought three skeins as I wanted to make sure that I had enough for size XXL socks which was a mistake (100g skeins, what was I thinking) as I used about a skein and a quarter but I am sure to make good use of the leftover skein and a bit.

To make the larger than standard socks, I used an old Patons’ pattern book of socks that I found in a tub of craft supplies that I inherited from my Mum.  This book actually has a couple of options for sizing men’s socks which was very helpful.  It was lovely and nostalgic reading notes that my mother wrote out to keep track of the pattern; I used the same pattern that she had used.

I started these puppies in mid-May and finally grafted the toes at the end of August, can you say procrastination?  DH was very happy with the finished socks that fit perfectly and will be well used in the coming football season!

 

It was so much fun to see how happy he was with the socks that I may just purpose the left over yarn into another pair!

#GoHawks!

Knitting

Knitting Machine Rehab

Iris Rose

I have spent the last couple of weekends rehabbing two of my knitting machines.  I have been machine knitting along with hand knitting and crocheting since the late 1980’s (yes, I really am that old) and had put my machines away in 2004 when we moved and spent the next few years living in a fifth wheel trailer and travelling, which is a story for another post.

I have four Singer knitting machines, two acquired recently.  Three are standard gauge and one is bulky gauge.  When we eventually settled here in Calgary and I set up my craft space, I had room for only one machine and chose the standard gauge Singer 560 to leave out permanently.  It seemed the best choice as it knits a finer yarn than I would normally choose to hand knit and has a lace carriage and ribber as well.

As I said, I set it up with my craft space but, with the ordinary busyness of life, it languished under a sheet, unused and lonely.  I joined a facebook group for machine knitters and found my mojo again this spring.

My very pretty wrap made on a standard gauge machine, Singer SK560

Like any piece of machinery, being idle is not good for a knitting machine.  The needle retaining sponge was flat as a pancake and the needles, which I had reused from another machine after straightening them all out which is never a good idea, really needed to be replaced.  The cheapskate in me is the one who straightened them out; I had no part in them being bent in the first place.  I bit the bullet, after a frustrating and stitch dropping trial at making a wrap that I found posted in a YouTube video, and bought a new sponge strip and needles.  The wrap turned out lovely by the way.  The stitches were all picked up and spaced correctly, whew!

Machine knit earflap hats!

Anyway, back to the rehab, all of the needles came out and I thoroughly cleaned the bed and rail and installed new needles.  We scraped out the old sponge and replaced it with new and the machine now knits beautifully.  It is amazing how much lint was trapped in all of the nooks and crannies!

While I was on a roll, I thought about my bulky machine and how much I liked using it in the past for big areas of plain stocking stitch.  I pulled it out and cleaned it this last weekend.  The needles were all in excellent shape and only needed to be cleaned with a good alcohol soak and a wipe down.  My fingers are now grey with old grease.  I guess I should have hauled it out sooner!  I replaced the sponge on the needle retainer bar and the machine looks like new.

I have a matching ribber for this machine and thought about setting the two up together on another table to use.  I pulled out the ribber and, much to my dismay, found it had been broken during one of the moves that we made.  Both of the plastic end caps are snapped and the bracket for the pitch leaver is smashed.  I have looked on line and cannot find any parts available as these machines were manufactured in the 80’s and 90’s.  I really don’t know what I can do to replace the plastic pieces, maybe 3D printing?  The ribber is usable but I don’t know for how long.  If I took a picture of myself when I found the damage you would have seen me crying.

I am going to start up again with machine knitting and will show you some of my work and post some patterns here as they are developed. 

I am also working on a crocheted shawl pattern that I have been designing in my head for a while.  It is time to actually make it and develop the pattern for you.

Knitting

Northern Rose Shawl Part One

Iris Rose

 

I have been working on this shawl pattern for a while now.  It is a hybrid of Shetland and Faroese styling with only garter lace and plain garter stitch parts (no purls here!). 

It has been one of those projects where if anything is going to go wrong it will.  If you look closely at the photo you will see what I mean.  Even the yarn was spun with more mohair in some parts than in others which was fine in the natural but not so fine in the rose.  Alternating skeins seemed to make no difference.

I had some random skeins of a mohair, silk and wool blend that the ebay monster made me buy and did not have anything already developed that I thought the yarn wanted to be.  I had three colours, 100g of natural, 100g of deep rose, and 200g of dark green.  I ended up with just 50g of the green which I have no idea what I will do with but, you know, never throw away good yarn.  That explains the thirty year old skeins in my stash!

Anyway, back to the shawl, I have written the pattern and am offering it free in parts with written directions only over the next three blog posts.  I will publish it on Ravelry but as a paid pattern with charts as well as written directions.  This first part will give you a sampler of what the whole pattern will be like.  This section could be continued to make the whole shawl if you want a simpler wrap up and it would be a very cozy piece.

 

Materials: Worsted weight yarn: 125m (140 yds) of cream, 170m (185 yds) of rose, 250m (280yds) of green.

Tools: 5.5mm (US 9) 60cm (24”) circular knitting needle, 4 or more stitch markers, tapestry needle to weave in ends.

Gauge: 14 stitches and 16 rows in garter stitch, blocked.  Gauge is not crucial but you should try to achieve a close number to ensure that your shawl is the same size.

Cast on 23 stitches using a cable cast on.  All stitches in this pattern are knit; no purls here!  On every wrong side row throughout the shawl, knit all stitches, slipping markers as you come to them.

Initial Row: K1, YO, (K2tog, YO) repeat to to last two stitches, K2tog.

First Wrong Side Row: Knit all stitches, slipping markers as you come to them.

Garter Stitch Section and Centre Lace Panel:

Row 1: K1, place marker YO, K2, YO, place marker, K6, YO, SSK, K2, YO, SSK, K6, place marker, YO, K2, YO, place marker, K1.

Row 3: K1,slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K4, K2tog, YO, K1, YO, SSK, K2, YO, SSK, K5, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 5: K1, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K3, K2tog, YO, K3, YO, SSK, K2, YO, SSK, K4, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 7: K1, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K2, K2tog, YO, K2, K2tog, YO, K1, YO, SSK, K2, YO, SSK, K3, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 9: K1, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1, K2tog, YO, K2, K2tog, YO, K3, YO, SSK, K2, YO, SSK, K2, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 11: K1, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K3, YO, SSK, K2 YO, SSK, YO, S2K1PSSO, YO, K2, K2tog, YO, K2, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 13: K1, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K4, YO, SSK, K2, YO, S2K1PSSO, YO, K2, K2tog, YO, K3, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 15: K1, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K5, YO, SSK, K2, YO, SSK, K1, K2tog, YO, K4, slip marker, YO, K to next marker, YO, slip marker, K1.

Row 16: K all stitches, slipping markers as you come to them.

Repeat Rows 1 to 16 three more times.  Change to the next colour now if you are making the shawl in three colours.  You should have 64 garter stitches between the first and second markers and the same on the other side of the lace panel.