Author Archives: Heather

A fun(ny) hat

2 Replies

I have just finished a very quick and fun knit. I cast on on Friday, and sewed the ends in this morning. This is the Maltese Fisherman’s hat by Elizabeth Zimmerman from her Knitter’s Almanac: Projects for Each Month of the Year. It was also in the Summer 2008 Interweave Knits, and is available to download til the end of July.

I love this hat. It was enjoyable to knit, and makes me smile to wear it 馃檪 I am wearing my Mr Happy T-shirt today which I think suits the mood well. With a hat like this, cold weather seems positively inviting, though I think I would quite like to have summer first please.

Five Things Meme

3 Replies

Rosie has tagged me so I am going to play.

The Rules Each player answers the questions about themselves. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they芒鈧劉ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know when you芒鈧劉ve posted your answer.

1. What I was doing 10 years ago:

In May 1998 I was sitting my first lot of finals for my first degree. I did a 4 year course, so we were examined on our work from second and third year at the end of third year, and then sat another set of finals at the end of our fourth year on the work learnt that year. I really enjoyed my course and made some great friends at college, and had a wonderful time!

2. What 5 things are on on my to-do list for today (not in any particular order):

  • Tidy up the post that arrived while my parents were visiting, and which I have just put in a pile and not read yet.
  • Tackle the mammoth pile of washing.
  • Chart my first attempt for my City and Guilds cardigan
  • Sort out my iTunes library
  • Collect together my bits and pieces to take the the conference I am going to tomorrow

3. Snacks I enjoy:

Where do I start? and possibly more importantly how do I stop? I love biscuits, dried apricots, milk chocolate, twiglets, hazelnuts, though not all together.

4. Things I would do if I was a billionaire:

All the usual: Buy a nice house, fill it with nice yarn 馃檪 Invite all my friends over and have a knitting commune 馃檪

5. Places I have lived:

  • Litlington, Hertfordshire (a very small village)
  • Hutton Rudby, North Yorkshire (a slightly larger village)
  • Oxford (I don’t think I need to tell you this is a city)
  • Ashtead, Surrey (a medium sized village – do you see a pattern forming?)

I will tag Mary, Anne, Katy, Sarena, Fiona, and Jo, and of course any one else who feels like it.

And now I had better actually do some of the things on my to-do list!

Catching up

6 Replies

Thank you to all of those who left such lovely comments about my Teal Top. I have worn it several times now, and it is washing and wearing well, and very comfortable. I am very pleased with it 馃檪

Shortly after my last blog entry we went to east Kent for a little holiday, over my birthday. We had a lovely time, very relaxing, and visited several castles and Roman remains, we are definitely getting our money’s worth out of English Heritage 馃檪 This is the view from the bedroom of the cottage we were staying in.

On the knitting front I have been catching up with my homework for the City & Guilds course. I started to get behind in about October, and have been struggling to catch up since. I have now caught up with all my samples (apart from the homework we just got from the class yesterday), and once I have done the latest set of samples I will concentrate on my coursework projects. Hooray!

One of the things I love most about the City and Guilds course is the encouragement and opportunity to try things I wouldn’t otherwise have a go at. I am not really a big fan of how bobbles look, I don’t think I would wear anything with bobbles on, though they might be fun on a tea cosy, or an accessory. So without the course it is unlikely I would ever actually knit any. The theme for the homework for the month before last was raised and embossed stitches, and this included bobbles and popcorns (mini bobbles). To my own surprise I actually quite enjoyed knitting them, although they were a little fiddly. They were especially fun in multi-coloured sock yarn.

So here are my popcorns.

And here are some bobbles.

To show a bit of variety for my other raised and embossed patterns here is Cocoon Stitch from Barbara Walker’s A Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns.

and Embossed Twining Vine Leaf from Nicky Epstein’s Knitting on the Edge: The Essential Collection of Decorative Borders.

and the beautiful Candle Tree by Barbara Walker available in her A Treasury of Knitting Patterns.

This one is so lovely that I think we all have had to knit one 馃檪 Certainly Jo has a lovely picture of her sample on her blog.

Moving on from the raised stitches, the homework for the last class was pockets.

First up we have a bag pocket.

I love the subtlety of this one. You work up until the point of the opening of the pocket, then work a purl turning row on just the pocket stitches. Then work back and forth on just the pocket stitches until your pocket is the size you are after, then fold your pocket up and work across all your stitches again. Afterwards you sew the sides of the bag up, but you don’t sew the bag to the main knitting so that it will hang freely inside your garment – so hopefully wont distort the garment if you put heavy things in the pocket. You do have to be careful that the bag wont hang out the bottom of your garment though!

Next is a lined pocket.

For this one you knit the inside of the pocket first, and leave the stitches on a holder. Then knit the garment up to the point where you want the pocket. Put the garment stitches which correspond to the pocket placement on a holder, and as you work across the row, knit the pocket stitches instead. Then carry on up the rest of the garment. Afterwards, come back and knit the rib (or whatever) on the top of the pocket, and then carefully sew the pocket down onto the back of the garment. This one is quite a commonly used pocket and can easily be put into a patterned garment. It is also better for thicker yarns than the bag pocket because you only have one extra layer of fabric.

Lastly is the patch pocket.

With this one, you knit the garment first. Then knit the pocket (which can be any shape), then sew the pocket onto the garment. With this sample I actually knitted the pocket onto the sample which I think is probably neater than my sewing. The advantage of this style of pocket is that you can easily make it any shape or size you would like. You also don’t have to think ahead, and can add the pocket as an afterthought. You can try the garment on and experiment with pinning your pocket in different locations to see which you like best. The main disadvantage is that it can interrupt a pattern on the front of the garment, and that you have to sew it down neatly.

If you have got this far you probably deserve a long service medal for reading my rambling 馃檪 I’m afraid I don’t have any medals, but I do have someone I would like you to meet.

This is Framboise and she came all the way from France as a birthday present from Paul’s parents. We seem to have gone from winter to summer back to winter again in the last week or so, but Framboise’s bright smile will cheer even the dullest day 馃檪

More fun with the sewing machine

Leave a Reply

I have been playing with the sewing machine again, and finished a needle roll for the three sets of bamboo circulars I have. I bought these from the Bamboo Knitting and Crochet Centre, and I have the 50cm set, the 80cm set, and the 100cm set. I thought these would cover most eventualities 馃檪

I have used the same idea as I did with the roll for the dpns. There is a pocket for each size of circular, then a flap which folds over and press-studs down to hold all the needles in their pockets, and the whole lot rolls up and fastens into a roll with another press-stud.

I am very pleased with it and it seems to do the job well. I am slowly becoming more organised!

The other excitement of this week was the arrival of my books from Iva Rose.

I have been having a very fun time reading through these, and am planning which things to knit first 馃檪 I am particularly taken with a couple of circular designs from the 1890s. They are designed as doilies I think, but would be great as a shawl if worked in thicker yarn with larger needles. I think I am gearing up for a lace phase.

Teal Top Finished!

6 Replies

I finished the Teal Top on Saturday but it has taken until today before the weather has been decent enough for a photograph.

Apologies that it looks a little wrinkly, I had just sat in the car for an hour on the way back from knitting group.

For a quick re-cap:

The yarn used is Paton’s Washed Haze DK, 50% cotton, 50% acrylic, bought from the Interknit Cafe in Farnham. I used 3.75mm needles. The pattern is called Go Vertical by Classic Elite, but I re-calculated the whole pattern, due to achieving a different tension with my yarn to that called for in the pattern, and me being a different shape and proportion to any of the pattern sizes.

All in all, I am very pleased with how it has come out. The yarn was pleasant to knit with and feels nice and soft once knitted up. The only problem I had with it was a slight tendency for the yarn to un-spin while I was trying to sew the seams. I am pleased with the fit, and it has been a good opportunity to test drive the set-in sleeve calculations that we have been learning in City and Guilds class. After all the worrying about whether I would have enough yarn, in the end I only used about 8 1/2 balls, so I have one full ball left over and once partial ball. I have been wearing the top all today and it is very comfy so far!

Knitting needle storage

5 Replies

A few weeks ago I bought a bargain set of bamboo dpns from the Bamboo Knitting & Crochet Centre (thank you Jo for letting me know about them). Ever since they arrived I have been meaning to make a case to keep them in, and yesterday I finally got round to it.

The material is some bargain furnishing velvet I have had kicking around for ages. It came as a pack of 5 different colours, I think for something like 脗拢5, the only disadvantage being that you only got about 0.5m of each colour. I originally got it thinking I would make some cushion covers, but there is plenty enough for a needle roll and several big cushion covers too.

There are 15 sets of 5 needles (I got the longer length of dpn, which are 8 inches long, they sell a 5 inch set as well), and they range in size from 2mm to 10mm. The whole lot rolls up and fastens with a press-stud.

I am quite pleased with it 馃檪 I also got three sets of their circular needles (in different lengths) and am contemplating the best way to make a holder for them too. I have some nice dark browny-red velvet earmarked for that.

The difficulty I am now contemplating is the best method of storage for all my needle sets, and other assorted loose needles. So far they have been stored in a tool bag from B&Q, but it isn’t nearly big enough, so the overflow is stacked on the top. Also in order to get at a particular needle, I need to unpack the whole bag, and then re-pack it, not exactly convenient. So I have been trying to think of a better method of organisation. I have a lot of needle sets, two packets of Knit Picks (one for the interchangeable set, one for fixed circulars), 2 Denise sets, a Boye set, a small set of crochet hooks, a small set of long straight needles, a bag with assorted circulars in, a bag of assorted straight needles, the new sets I just mentioned, and a few odd bits which don’t seem to fit in anywhere. So, how to store them so that they are all easily accessible and reasonably tidy? Also since I do most of my knitting in the lounge, and it would be handy to store my needles there so they are easily to hand, it would be nice if the storage is moderately attractive. If anyone has any ideas I would very much like to hear them!

Ravelry pattern shop

1 Reply

I now have a Ravelry pattern shop! You do need to be a Ravelry member at the moment to access this, although you can buy patterns using the direct links in the blog even if you aren’t a member. I have become totally addicted to the download statistics of the shop, and not just because it is in a shockingly bright shade of orange and green 馃檪

Talking of Ravelry, Sunday was the meet-up of the Surrey and Hampshire Ravelry group in Guildford. There were 6 of us altogether and we had a lovely time. There was much knitting, chatting, and admiring of projects, and a moderate amount of drinking, although I am still not convinced by the carrot and apple juice I had. It was an interesting idea but tasted rather of soil and vegetation, a little too organic for me 馃檪 It was a fantastic shade of bright orange though so that nearly made up for the taste.

Apologies that the photo is a bit blurry, I think it was a little dark for my camera.

One near-catastrophe of the meeting though was that I ran out of knitting after only 2 hours. Usually I am the person who has at least 2 back-up projects where-ever I go just in case of such eventualities, but on Sunday I looked at my sleeve and thought there was no way I would ever finish the other half of the sleeve cap. What I had failed to realise was that due to the inherent shape of a set-in sleeve, if you knit from the elbow up to the shoulder then the rows will get shorter, so the second half of the sleeve cap (this is half the number of rows, not half the area 馃檪 ) will be considerably quicker than the first half. If I had a brain, I could possibly be dangerous. Luckily I was saved from my own stupidity by Melanie. She had spent the previous couple of days sorting her stash, and had catalogued it beautifully in a notebook. So I spent a very happy hour examining it all, and drooling over her new Jordana Paige bag (very nice, lots of good pockets, I may have to drop some birthday hints to the other half).

It was great to see other people’s knitting – I am so nosy, and I think it was the first time I have been recognised by the jumper I was wearing 馃檪 Good fun all round, we will have to have another one soon.

A result of all this gadding about to knitting groups at the weekend is that I have finished the knitting part of both sleeves of the Teal Top. I have sewn in one of the sleeves, and had a quick try-on. It fits well, which is a relief! I still have the neckline to pick up and knit, but I think I will do a bit more of the sewing up first.

Emerald Beaded Bracelet Pattern

10 Replies

This pattern was originally published in the March 2007 edition of MagKnits.

This easy and fun bracelet is quick to knit up in an evening or two. It would make a great last minute surprise gift for a friend, or make one to go with each of your outfits for parties.
I love knitting with teeny little needles and fine thread, and experimenting with the different shapes you can create by adding beads to basic garter stitch. The beads are all prestrung before the knitting starts, and all rows are knitted, with the same number of stitches in each row. The shaping is produced by varying the number of beads in a row. This bracelet makes a great introduction to the fun that is knitting with beads.

Skills needed

脗路 Cast on

脗路 Cast off (bind off)

脗路 Knit

脗路 Place a bead between knit stitches (instructions included in pattern)

Materials

脗路 1 x 10g (82m / 91 yds) ball Anchor Pearl Cotton No. 8 (also called Coton Perl脙漏) in colour 100 (purple) (One 10g ball will make several bracelets)

脗路 1314 (approx. 15g) x size 11 seed beads in colour silver lined emerald rainbow

脗路 Two 1.25mm (US Size 0000) knitting needles

脗路 9mm (3/8 in) press-stud (snap fastener)

脗路 1 beading needle and length of sewing thread to aid threading of beads

脗路 Tapestry needle

Yarn substitutions

Any other crochet cotton of a similar thickness would be appropriate. A non-stretchy yarn works best for this design since otherwise the weight of the beads would distort the bracelet.

Finished size

The finished bracelet measures 17cm (6.75 in) long, and is 3cm (1.25 in) wide at the widest point.

Tension (gauge)

Approximately 60 stitches and 120 rows to 10cm (4 in) in garter stitch (knit every row) without beads using 1.25mm needles.

The tension (gauge) for this pattern is not critical since plain knit rows can easily be added in. Add more rows immediately after the cast on before the pattern begins, and add a similar number of rows immediately before the cast off. If the bracelet is coming out too long, simply omit 2 rows (or 4 if it is going to be really long) from each section of the pattern.

This pattern is available free as an electronic file in PDF format. File size is 754 KB. The pattern has 5 pages.

Download pattern now (This is a link to Ravelry but you don’t need to be a member to download the pattern)

Copyright Notice

All rights reserved. This pattern is for personal use only. This pattern, items made from this pattern or any portion of pattern or item may not be resold, or otherwise used for profit without express permission from the designer. This pattern may also not be distributed for free by any individual or shop without permission.

Bizarre Weather

1 Reply

We seem to have had all the seasons in the last week. Last Friday was beautiful, and warm enough that I didn’t need a jumper. Saturday was windy and later wet. We went to Knole and then down to Pevensey, I did take a couple of pictures but they were awful and dark so I wont subject you to them. Then on Sunday morning we woke up to a light dusting of snow! It is the first time this winter we have had snow that settled, admittedly only about an inch though, and it was gone by the evening. This week has been cold but clear so far. In a fit of pique last week I turned the heating off but on Sunday I had to give in and put it back on again.

This is also a week full of knitting things. On Tuesday morning I went down to Farnham for a talk by Joyce Meader on Commercially Printed Knitting Patterns from 1840 which she gave to the West Surrey Guild of Spinners Weavers and Dyers. The talk was fascinating and hilarious. The men’s string vest and matching pants (that is underpants for those across the pond) had to be seen to be believed! Joyce is a great speaker, and she kindly brought along some of her collection of historic knitting patterns, and also garments she has knitted from them. As well as original knitting patterns, Joyce also brought some facsimile editions produced by Iva Rose Vintage Reproductions. Amazing patterns, and a lot of them are surprisingly wearable today. I love old patterns, particularly those from the 30s and the 50s. 6 books from Iva Rose are already winging their way over the sea to me 馃檪 Including two from the 1890s.

Talking of vintage patterns, I have recently got a bee in my bonnet about knitting at the Great Exhibition (Crystal Palace) of 1851. I know that there was knitting exhibited since I have seen it mentioned (I think in the V&A – which incidentally was set up with items from the Great Exhibition). Iva Rose Reproductions don’t go back that early, but according to Joyce commercially published knitting patterns exist from as far back as 1817. I would love to know more both about the knitting that was actually exhibited in 1851 and also what was going on in the craft at the time. If anyone has any pointers I would love to hear from you.

To continue my busy knitting week, the Reading group has its April meeting on Saturday, and then on Sunday, the Surrey and Hampshire Ravelry group are meeting in Guildford. This is all shockingly sociable 馃檪

Progress is being made on the Teal Top too. I have now finished the front! and the shoulders are connected with a 3-needle cast off.

Teal Top Body

I am cautiously optimistic about the yarn quantity situation. I am now on the first sleeve and am on ball 8 (out of 10) but things are looking quite good.

Once I completed the 3-needle cast off to join the shoulders, I pinned the sides together and had a quick try-on. I think it is going to be good, although it is hard to tell properly without the seams sewn and the sleeves in. I have been using the instructions Fiona gave us in City and Guilds class for calculating a set in sleeve garment, and it has been useful to be able to give it a dry run before I try it out on my assessed project. So far so good.

Apologies that the Emerald Beaded Bracelet Pattern isn’t up yet. I have been having some computer difficulties. I’ve lost track of how many times I have rebooted over the last couple of days! After many rude words and several cups of tea I have now managed to upload photos to the blog again (oh the delights of upgrading), and literally as I am typing this I seem to have cracked my pdf upload problems (although I’m not sure how, I wont argue though). So the pattern will be available in just a minute.