Christmas Tea Cosy
This is officially Number Four, folks! This pattern is actually called “Delphie” (no idea why) and it’s from Patons Craft Book No. C.18. The book actually belongs to Ma Snook, who purchased it way back in the 1950’s, I believe. I’m still using up oddments of 8ply yarn on 4mm needles. This cosy was mostly knit while watching the TV movie of Pratchett’s Hogfather; hence the Christmas colours.
Tag: knitting
Ribbed Tea Cosy
Ribbed Tea Cosy
Well, the Great Tea Cosy Challenge was on shaky ground there for a while, as it looked like Auntie Linda might not do the stall after all. Happily, I’ve just found out we’re back on… and I’ve just finished my third cosy! This is another one I found on Ravelry, and it’s a free pattern from Bernat (though you do have to register on their site). I used less than two balls of Cleckheaton Country 8ply on 4mm needles, and the only significant change I made in the pattern was to knit the top shaping bit in the round (rather than sewing it up). I also used i-cord to make the loop at the top rather than crocheting one. Onwards and upwards!
Irish Tea Cosy
Irish Tea Cosy
I’ve just finished my second tea cosy for the aforementioned Great Tea Cosy Challenge. I also found this one on Ravelry, and the pattern is available online. (There are two mistakes though; I’ll list them after the jump.) It was kinda fun knitting something without a picture to refer to. I wasn’t quite sure what it was going to look like! I also had my first go at making pompoms. This cosy features an open top with a drawstring, which is nice if you’ve got a particularly odd-shaped lid or a handle on top. Even using 4mm needles and 8ply yarn, this is still a fairly large cosy. We only have small teapots, so I fudged the photo by propping our little pot up on a dishtowel. In terms of yarn, I again used some random cheap acrylic that I found in the bottom of my stash. (I’d never purposefully buy acrylic now that I’m a yarn-store-workin’ fiber snob!) Anyway, that’s two down!Pattern Errata (as posted on Ravelry:
In the Popcorn Panel, row 1 should read:
Row 1: P2, P3, turn, K3, turn, P3 tog, P1, P3, turn, K3, turn, P3tog, P2.
In the Diamond Panel, row 11 should read:
Row 11: P1, slip next stitch to cable needle, hold in back of work, K1, P stitch from cable needle, (K1, P1) 4 times, slip next stitch to cable needle, K1, K stitch from cable needle, P1.
Strawberry Tea Cosy
Strawberry Tea Cosy
Ma Snook called up the other night to confirm that Rodd’s Auntie is indeed having a booth at this year’s Fifties Fair, and would I mind making some knitted pieces for it? I decided to turn it into a challenge: Just how many tea cosies can one woman knit in two weeks? I polished off the first one in two days. I found the pattern through Ravelry and it’s available online. I used some leftover Gryffindor scarf yarn for the red and yellow, and some cheap Kmart acrylic for the green. I think the effect is definitely kitschy and cute. On to the next one!
Violet’s Cardy and GVH Socks
Finished Objects Report!
As I mentioned before, my friend Brigita had a baby (named Violet!) and I wanted to make her something. So last week I cracked open Debbie Bliss’s Baby Cashmerino 2 and cast on for the “Cardigan with Moss Stitch Edging.” It’s a very quick little knit, especially when you modify it to the knit the body on a circular up to the armholes. I had three balls of Baby Cashmerino in colour #340010, but when I finished I found I had at least half a ball left over. That means booties! These are from a pattern I had in my Ravelry queue called “Saartje’s Bootees.” (It’s a free download on that site.) Again, very quick to knit. And aren’t the little wooden buttons just perfect? We actually had them at the shop and I couldn’t resist. I’ll be sending this off to Brigita today… I hope Violet likes it!
Next up are my “GVH Conwy Socks.” Conwy is a pattern from Knitting on the Road, and while I still like the look of it, it wasn’t that fun to knit. The little twisting cables just get really, really boring. I used Colinette Jitterbug in the Velvet Damson colourway on 2.75mm needles. And as you will remember, I ran short. I couldn’t bring myself to frog them back though, so I used some leftover Sirdar Town & Country to finish the toes… Hence the “GVH” (i.e. “Graft Versus Host”). They’re a little bit Frankenstein, aren’t they? I still love the Jitterbug colour though, and I’m definitely going to wear them.
Max’s Socks
Max’s Socks
Hooray! I’ve been counting down the minutes til Max got home from his trip and found the birthday package I sent him. I’ve been reading Max’s site for nearly seven years now, from way back when he still had the old “Mr. Plow” domain. (I think this is the first official w-g mention.) Though we’ve never met in person, I’ve come to think of him as a really good friend. He’s always been super supportive of my schemes and ideas, and he’s introduced me to some great dance music. So I decided it was time to thank him! I sent off a secret e-mail to TheRealTimShady and luckily he was a fan of the idea. With his help (surreptitiously getting someone’s shoe size from overseas isn’t easy!), I cracked open Knitting Vintage Socks and whipped up a pair of “Gentleman’s Socks with Lozenge Pattern.” I used two balls of Sirdar Town & Country (with very little left over). Then I packed them into a box with a packet of Tim Tams and a selection of weird Australian candy bars. Unfortunately I was a bit off with my timing; the box made it to Atlanta before Max’s birthday, but he’d already left on a trip to New Mexico! So I had to keep mum about it til he got home. (Which – ask the Snook – isn’t easy. I’m terrible about surprises.) Today brought the happy news that Max is home, he got the package, and the socks fit him perfectly. So hooray! Happy belated birthday, Max.
More Than Meets the Eye
More than meets the eye…
From the front, it’s just a normal grey jumper with a patch of stripes. But from the side… suddenly you’re an autonomous robot life form from Cybertron! (More photos available on Flickr and Ravelry.)
I’m proud to report that this is the first jumper that Snookums actually requested and helped design. Somehow he saw some shadow knitting and asked whether it would be possible to knit the Autobots logo onto the front of a jumper. I pondered this. Most examples of shadow knitting are scarves where you’re looking at the design from the bottom up (like in the Dark Mark Illusion Scarf). The Snook didn’t like the idea of having to do a back-bend for people to see the image, though. So then I toyed with the idea of knitting his jumper sideways from cuff-to-cuff… but that tends to make for a rather shapeless garment, and not something that looks very good on a guy. That left knitting the logo sideways and then rotating it ninety-degrees before incorporating it into the jumper. So that’s what I did. (Read past the jump for a link to download my chart.)
The pattern I settled on was Elizabeth Zimmerman’s “Seamless Hybrid” from Knitting Without Tears, mostly because I’d never done saddle shoulders before. I was also greatly inspired by Brooklyn Tweed‘s gorgeous version. (I nicked his idea for doing contrasting hems.) The yarn is Filatura di Crosa Zara in #1469 (Dark Grey) and #1494 (Light Grey). I used about 12 of the main colour and 2 of the contrast. I experimented with different ways of “mounting” the shadow knitting, and ultimately what worked best was just sewing it in as I went along. (Which meant that I was knitting back and forth and leaving a “window” for the patch, so there was definitely purling involved.)
Okay, so the final verdict. I guess I’d give this about a 9 out of 10 rating. The shadow knitting worked great, and the Zara is a dream to knit with. (It also feels incredibly soft to wear, which is very important for the Snook, who finds most wool prickly.) I’m just not 100% happy with the fit of the shoulders, though. My gauge was off from Elizabeth’s sample so I had to scale it up a little bit, and I’m just not sure her percentages for the saddles work as well this way. I think once it has a wash and a press it’ll look better though. (That’ll also help with the way the patch slightly pulls in a bit.) The Snook is happy and he has a new jumper to wear with a few weeks of winter left, so that’s all that matters!Download my chart: Here’s a PDF file of the chart Snookums made for me. Start in the lower right and follow as you would any other knitting chart. If you’ve never done shadow or illusion knitting before, basically you’re just knitting 2-row stocking stitch stripes. Nothing difficult there, right? Well, occasionally – wherever there’s a dash on that chart – you knit instead of purl on the second rows. (So you’ll have garter stitch in that spot instead of stockinette.) And that’s it!
Hooded Striped Top
Hooded Striped Top
This quick little knit is something I whipped up for my nephew Penn. The design is from Debbie Bliss’s Baby Cashmerino Book but I adapted it to be knit in Sirdar Snuggly DK instead. (I used about 1.5 balls of each colour.) I also decided that I couldn’t be bothered with knitting lots of little bits and sewing them all together, so I modified the pattern to be as seamless as possible. The body was knitted on circular needles as a tube up to the shoulders, then armholes were machine-sewed and cut. The shoulders were then joined via a three-needle cast-off. I also knit the sleeves on circulars and added a few rows of reverse stocking stitch at the top of each to be sewn down as an interfacing inside the cut armholes. The neck stitches were left live and then knitted up into the hood, which was seamed again with a three-needle cast-off. A couple buttons at the neck completed the project. I hope it fits him!
Productive Day
It was a very productive Saturday!
First up was the Snook’s cotton jumper, which you may recall I finished over a year ago. Yeah, it’s taken me that long to put buttons on the thing. I just forgot! They’re lovely round carved horn from the button shop. Doesn’t it look nice?
Next is the Snook’s offering for dinner tonight: Seafood Gumbo. The recipe came from Herbie’s Spices and we picked up the seafood at the Fish Markets this morning. It has scallops, prawns, and crab meat. It was delicious! Just the thing for a cold winter night.
And lastly, those are some socks I just finished for my Secret Pal. The pattern is “Uptown Boot Socks” from Interweave’s Favorite Socks. Yes, this is the third pattern I’ve knit from this book. It has a subtle cable twist down the leg and the top of the foot that this photo really doesn’t do justice. (You can see it better here.) The yarn is Heirloom Jigsaw colour 37. (One ball was more than enough.) I hope my Secret Pal likes them!
Oh, and what’s that you say? One of those socks appears… blockier than the other? That would be because Snookums has completed the prototype of my very own Sock Blocking Forms. This is basically a flat wooden foot in profile that you use to stretch the sock into the correct shape. I’ve wanted some for ages but I’ve never seen them in Australia, and I can’t be bothered paying to get them shipped from overseas. Instead I traced my own in Illustrator and made a resizable template. The Snook cut this one for me out of plywood. He still has to drill holes in it to allow the sock to dry faster, and then give it a coat of varnish so it doesn’t get moldy. I’ll be sure to show you the finished product though!
Waving Lace Socks
Waving Lace Socks
Well, these took a while! I started these socks not long after I arrived back in Sydney last month. The pattern is called “Waving Lace” and it’s the second one I’ve done from Interweave’s Favorite Socks book. (In fact, it’s the one on the cover.) The yarn is, of course, the Koigu KPM that I got at Wildfiber in Santa Monica. (I scoured yarn shops in three states to find this stuff.) It was interesting to finally knit with this much-hyped yarn. It’s very tightly spun, and it didn’t seem to fuzz up at all even when I had to frog a few inches. I really think it was the perfect yarn for this pattern, as the depth of colour and crispness of the stitches really show off the details. (Here’s a close-up.) Knitting nerds may be interested to learn that these are the first socks I’ve knitted using the Addi Turbo 12″ circs I picked up in the States. These tiny, tiny circulars are actually short enough to knit a sock, courtesy of an almost 90° bend in each tip. They did take some getting used to though, and I think I went much slower than I would have using the two circulars method. I just couldn’t resist the novelty of the needles. Next on my list: a pair of “Uptown Boot Socks” from the same book for my Secret Pal…
