Tuck Stitch Baby Blankets from the Harmony Guide

Last year in the last days of the Olympics, I punched out some new cards from the Harmony Guide to Machine Stitches from Chapter III Tuck stitch patterns to use in blankets. The book is out of print and after many, many attempts at finding out WHO know owns the copyright - nope. Noone knows. As I'm taking liberties with one chapter of the OP book, all is well.

I didn't realise I didn't finish the blog post, still in draft - trying to track down the copyright, it was, but I did remember that I didn't put up the numbers for my newly punched cards. Which is why it wasn't on the blog when I went looking for it. Promise I will press Publish this time!

The Harmony ones have the two row tuck so I made a 30 row one for both ends. The added bonus is that it can be moved over the tuck pattern to line up the start line in the middle of the design. More on that latter, when I get to it.




The first two are the Anne Alexander and Gladys Goodie's patterns with the small Card 1**. I line it up and put it at both ends, making sure the tucks line up.

** For both these pattern cards, I punched out a 24row version of Card 1 (a 1x1 tuck). I clip it onto one end, making sure the tuck panels line up with the tuck strip, Cast on and keep knitting until I can unclip the mini card 1, join the card as normal, then do the rows I want - somewhere between 559-600 usually - then still making sure the end of the card lines up- clip on the mini card till it's finish, then cast off.

The Harmony ones are two row tucks so I punched a 2 row alt tuck, 30 rows in all. It snaps onto both ends, but can also be place on a different point in the card to alter the start and finish point.

I will point out that by the time I finished punching out all of these, I was wanting a Brother electronic machine, and said so to my friend Beverley who said: Did I really want one or was I just punch drunk. Funny lady. Of course she was right, but now instead of two patterns to choose from for the baby blankets I knit, I have 10. Very happy I spent the Ravellenics on punching out new cards.

brother KA7668 Needle Selector for KX machines

Beverley has this little brother plastic KA7668 needle selector. I'd never seen or heard of it but, she assured me it existed AND it was for the KX395 convertible 4.5 and 9mm machine. AND would it work on the KX350 7mm machine?

It only goes from RIGHT to LEFT.

So it's in my hands for a whole month - but that's besides the point. What Beverley was wanting to know was:

Does it work in the KX350 7mm machine?

So first thing I did was turn it over and measure it's undercarriage.


The instructions say for the 9mm, 8 needles must be hand selected into B postition and 16 ndls for the 4.5mm setting.. interesting thought me.. why not 10? or 20? making the working mechanism 9mm, but no 9mm x 8 is 7.2cm - so I'm thinking maybe it will work on 10 preselected on the 7mm. I was able to test out the why later..

Now for the photos to show how it all works.

First I tried on a small selection, testing out the 10 needle pattern

Next, I tried the whole bed, still with the first 10 preselected, needles must be in B and D

 in two setting, one was 1x1 rib and the other a varied rib

And neither worked on all needles in work.

But putting the very first needle out of work did, but not with the 3x1 rib

It was not necessary to ONLY choose the first 8, 16 or 10, repeat of the pattern for 1x1 rib, a ruler's worth of preselected worked just as well, the only time you'd need to do this is for when you wanted the pattern to repeat differently. Getting a 4, 8 12 etc pattern wouldn't work on the 7mm machine, it works in multiples of 10. But it makes sense of the 72mm measurement for 8 or 16 needles on the other machine, and this one would have to have the long plastic tongue measure 56 mm. And no I'm not going to have at Bev's doodad!

I can't say if the very first needle would have to be out of work on the KX395 convertible, but it works a treat on the KX350 with one less needle on the right.

And so now I can say.. YES Beverley, it works perfectly on the KX350 as well for 1x1 and 3x2 rib and any other 5 pattern repeats only. Thank you for the lenda and an interesting morning..

Smocking from Knits for Joy 101 Experiments

This is from 101 Knits for Joy. These pamphlets are all well out of print and so I can cite the source, not me, not my work, I can share the document with you.

Here is a scan of the whole pamphlet, a resource no longer available and I know I certainly haven’t seen a live one of any of the Purls of Joy, never knew they existed.

And here are my experiments on my SK280 and intarsia AG20 carriage.

The instructions are fairly simple – although I did come unstuck in the beginning. Oops.

Start with waste yarn, ravel thread

6 rows Col 1 (red) and then 4 rows Col 2 (white)

That’s the start only.

Next bit is the repeat:

6 rows Col 1 (red)

2 TWO rows Col 2 (white)

Then pick up the loops on the previous white on needle 2, then 8, 14, 20, 26 and so on –

2 TWO rows Col 2 (white)

6 rows Col 1 (red)

2 TWO rows Col 2 (white)

Then pick up the loops on the previous white on needle 5, then 11, 17, 23, 29 and so on –

2 TWO rows Col 2 (white

I did two ruler’s worth, that’s easiest for me.

I used a thinner red and slightly thicker white. I used the main carriage with the white, T6.1 and the intarsia carriage for the red, T4.1. Starts with 6 R red, 4R white, then begin the repeats 6R red, but only 2 TWO rows white.

Per the Purls of Joy pamphlet, start on the right hand side on needle 2, then every 6th. I used the 7 prong tool to make it easy to mark out every 6^th.

I liked the top two white only ones, you might like a different set, but only one loop

Here are the two loops I mean.

Knit two more rows.

Then repeat with start on the RH side on needle 5 then every 6^th.

 And here are some using the intaria carriage notes

I moved all the needles out to hold them pushed them back so the latches are near the gate pages, make sure all the latches are open then do the 6 rows of red. It was easier to have the white on the main carriage, however if the fluffy yarn is going to be used, then the intarsia will have to be used and it's a bit more work to set up the needles for the smock threads.

And here's what the other side looks like: