Sew2Speak » Knitting

Here I go again

Ruth — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 12:29:21 +0000

Sketchbook finished, no studio, grey days – what am I to do with my leisure time? As I have written about before, I enjoy knitting, but I don’t have a high success rate at choosing patterns to knit that I actually like when they are finished and I am wearing them. I think I choose patterns for the challenge of the knitting and not whether it will look ok on me when I’ve finished. Another thing I’ve learnt and am definitely trying to adhere to is not to knit in cotton. Everything I’ve knitted with cotton yarn has ended up shapeless and baggy after a few washes.

So I had this blue jumper hanging around that I very rarely wore for a number of reasons:
1. It had a V-neck that had little depth and did not suit me.
2. I tried a new method of working the ends of balls of yarn into the knitting that I read about on the web and it was a complete disaster.
3. It was in reversed stocking stitch and when looked at from the back it would appear that I knit purl rows at a slightly different tension to the knit row – which is not visible on the right side of stocking stitch.
4. The way I had joined the pieces together just wasn’t working for me on the purl areas.
5. It was too warm to wear most of the time.

As you can tell from the list the jumper wasn’t a big hit in my eyes. This is what I started to do last night:

I did like the cabled hem to the jumper – that was why I chose the pattern. I like knitting cables. I like the colour too. And it is wool yarn. So I’ve decided to knit it up as a cardigan. I hope I’ll get more use out of it that way. I spent a long time searching the web for a pattern I liked without much success. So I decided to join up to Ravelry to see if I would have more success there. And this is what I found – a lace cardigan by Chic Knits called Cerisara. What really made up my mind was this yellow version knitted by Craftivore – doesn’t that look great?

Hope mine is also a success. If not I guess it will be unravelled and reknitted at some point. It wouldn’t be the first time I knit yarn up 3 times before I like the finished product. (To be honest I’m finding the sleeves on this purple one less to my liking over time. They are too wide at the bottom edge. Might be another reknit in the offing!)

Knitting grannies

Ruth — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 12:07:03 +0000

I read this article on the Guardian fashion blog about a group of knitting grannies, who knit articles for Danish designers that are sold in limited numbers in shops in Denmark. I thought it was a wonderful idea. How lovely for these ladies to be able to put their skills to good use. The ladies all belong to a Copenhagen activity and community centre for elderly people and the money that they earn is used by the centre to provide activities and excursions for all members. I’m sure it gives a great boost to the ladies, most of whom have been knitting all their lives, to be able to continue to knit and benefit other members of their community.

When my grandma lived with us after my granddad died, she used to knit handbags and covers for coat hangers that were sold to provide funds for some good cause, although I no longer remember which exactly. I know it gave her a sense of purpose and a good use for her time. My mother was an excellent knitter and knitted many beautiful jumpers and cardigans for my sister and I. Later she knitted school cardigans for her granddaughters too. Hand-knitted garments are so much nicer that shop bought ones. I do knit myself, but I’m the first to admit that I don’t have the same skill as my Mum. My sister is a better knitter than I. When she was at school, she used to knit for her friends to boost her pocket money. Sadly she no longer has time for hand crafts.

The knitting grannies have their own web site called Kaffeslabberas. It is in Danish, but if you use the Chrome browser to view it you can set the browser to automatically translate it, which is a pretty neat feature. They have also brought out a book of specially commissioned knitting projects. Unfortunately it only appears to be in Danish.

Wouldn’t it be great if this idea caught on it other countries?

Yarnstorming

Ruth — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 18:32:09 +0000

Do you know what that is? I didn’t until I read about the graffiti knitters in London on the Guardian today. Then I went over to Knit the City and found out what it is all about:

Yarnstorming: the art of enhancing a public place or object with graffiti knitting

Right now we need something light-hearted to make us smile. Otherwise the news worldwide is pretty depressing. I particularly liked the phone box cosy. You wouldn’t see that here in Germany – there aren’t any phone boxes any more.

From the sublime to the ridiculous

Ruth — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 18:22:28 +0000

I discovered the work of Isabelle de Borchgrave by chance today while browsing around the www. Isabelle makes the most amazing costumes from rag paper. They range from the Medici Collection that reproduces the sumptuous garments from the Florentine Renaissance period to Haute Couture including wedding dresses and veils and a paper coat made for Queen Fabiola of Belgium, which drew a lot of attention at the wedding of Prince Felipe of Spain in 2004. She currently has an exhibition of her work at the Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. The exhibition Pulp Fashion runs until the beginning of June. If you are anywhere in the vicinity it certainly looks worth a visit. If you can’t get to see the works in person then do take a look at the galleries on her website.

At the other end of the scale you can knit your own souvenir of the upcoming royal wedding in the UK. This rather bizarre idea was featured on the Daily Mail website today. You can even add your own customized guests to the wedding party. If you feel inspired you can buy the book of patterns here. I can’t say I’m really tempted.

Summer cardigan finished

Ruth — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 12:17:40 +0000

I first saw the pattern for this cardigan linked from Kristin’s blog. You can find the pattern at Knitty. Here is a photo of my finished cardy.

All three look completely different. Mine turned out slightly baggier than the original. The problem being that I couldn’t get yarn to match exactly the tension requirements of the pattern. I’m not very good at dealing with that. The answer appeared to me to knit one size larger on the pattern. According to my theory that should have taken into account the thinner yarn. It worked out quite well but not perfect. Still I’m not going to start again. I know that I usually do knit up yarn 3 times before I’m finished, but in this case I’m just going to live with it. It’s not so off in my opinion that it needs to go back to the drawing board.

The yarn I used was a mixture of cotton and linen. It knitted up well. I have a bit of an aversion to cotton yarn though. I think it can end up being quite shapeless. It doesn’t have that springiness of wool that allows the garment to retain it’s shape. Still this one doesn’t need a lot of shape. If I was to knit it again I would use thinner needles to knit the rib section at the empire line. The pattern used one size needles throughout and the combination of cotton yarn and not using thinner needle does rather beg the question of having the rib insert.

As I never seem to find the correct yarn for the patterns I start knitting I guess I should take more trouble to learn about adapting patterns. Anyone got a recommendation for a good book that would cover that kind of thing?

Third time lucky

Ruth — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 18:58:09 +0000

Regular readers may recognise this wool. I have knitted it up 3 times now. It seems to becoming a habit with me to knit something and then not like it and unravel it all and start again. Even the number 3 seems to be recurring as it is not the first time that I have had 3 attempts at knitting something. But this time I’m happy, so I think it will be another case of third time lucky.

This is the first time that I’ve knitted anything with short rows. The sleeves are shaped with short rows by knitting out from the armhole. The internet is a wonderful thing though. I found good instructions with lots of photos for how to knit them.

I thought I would have enough wool but I ran out before I had done the sleeves. Another wonderful aspect of the internet. I was able to find someone on eBay selling off remaining stock, which was pretty amazing as I first bought the wool in January 2007. I liked the shrug I knitted the second time round but it was a little too flouncy for my taste and got even flouncier with wear. The pattern I was using was really for chunkier wool with fewer stitches and the increased number of stitches led to the increase in flounce.

The wool is Lana Grossa Soffice which is 62% Extrafine Merino/28% Acrylic/10% Cashmere. It is beautifully light and wonderfully warm. The nice thing with the new pattern is that it keeps the shoulders and the top of the arms warm. I tend to feel the cold there these days

Unravelled

Ruth — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 18:36:47 +0000

After I finished the cushion at Christmas I needed something else to keep my hands occupied. So I unravelled this pullover and knitted it up again in a different pattern. This is nothing unusual for me. I don’t know why I always seem to choose the wrong designs the first time round. I liked the old pattern and loved the wool but it wasn’t really me.

I decided to knit a shrug. I didn’t realise how easy and fast they are. This was finished a couple of weeks ago but today I was wearing some suitable clothes for the modelling so I got the photographer to take these photos. It is based on the free pattern for a reversible lace rib shrug from elann. My wool was a little thinner than suggested so I had to adjust the number of stitches.

I didn’t have enough wool to knit the swing edge as long as the pattern said, but I think the length is fine for me. The best thing as far as I am concerned was there is no sewing together when you’re finished knitting. That is my least favourite part of knitting. I like the finished effect so I think the wool may stay knitted longer this time round

Lilac pullover finished

Ruth — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 12:33:53 +0000

The front was finished before we even got to England. I knitted most of the back in Brighton over Christmas. So when we got home I just had to sew the seams and knit the neck and armhole welts. All done now.

Here is a photo of the finished model:

And here is the model wearing it on the night it was finshed

P.S. Yesterday I took the two balls of yarn that were surplus to requirements back to the shop to get a refund, which I promptly spent (plus some more) on new wool for another pullover. This time with sleeves. Should keep me busy a bit longer.

Knitting progress

Ruth — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 13:46:21 +0000

Well I finally managed to persuade the photographer to take a photo of my knitting. This is the progress to date:

Things were going well until I came to the armholes. I have knitted the shaping for the armholes at least twice now. It was tricky getting the correct number of stitches and keeping the pattern going correctly.
But I usually knit everything about twice so things are progressing nicely. In fact Sqeze keeps telling me to slow down or I’ll be finished before Christmas – the plan was to knit while back in the UK. There’s plenty more wool out there in the shops though!

Sometimes the knitting twice is on purpose – I often unravel something I don’t wear any more and reknit it as something else. One lot of wool is onto its third reincarnation currently as a sloppy, comfy pullover