Pretty Ribbons: aka Putting Stuff in Shows

In January, yet again Eleanor stood in front of us begging and pleading for us to enter some of the shows around Sydney. So this year I took pity on her pleading self and asked if she would like one of the Kate machine knit shawls I've made - yes she would, so I gave her the shawl and some money to spend on entries. The idea is to promote machine knitting, a cabinet filler, and Wildhoney's (Natalia from Russia) Kate Machine Knit shawl is lovely, it's what all the girls in the family got for Christmas.

Anyways, Eleanor entered it in, along with her stuff - some shows it did what I though - made a nice display and in two of them I got pretty ribbons, a FIRST in the Castle Hill Show and a SECOND (and $3.00 - yes that's correct three dollars) from Hawkesbury Show, now isn't that nice?

It's next excursion is to the Sydney Craft and Quilt Show Macknit display- however I'm not going to hold my breath for pretty ribbons in that one - we get a lot of entries and the general public votes for their favourite item. A nice filler it will be too, I'm pretty sure they won't let me put the pretty ribbons on it! No.

Time to knit another lace shawl

I've looked till I've burned shawls into my eyes and have decided to make

Zetor Scarf Pattern

in my October 08 prize from Daphne's the Knittery.

I have pictures, but it is cold and raining and will have to wait to show it all blocked and lovely, however, here are some unblocked photos.

Crescent Moon/Japanese Feather and Fan Shawl

I'm doing a bit happy dance. I. Have. Finished. it. Thank God! Over 1000m of it - AND some idiot felt the need to put beads on the edge rows.

I put extra repeats in, ending with 404 stitches - but who's counting?? And then one of my Canadian friends, Marlene, told me how to put beads on with a crochet hook. soooooooo on the knit row I had 67 beads (on 11 rows) and on the purl (5) rows, 131 beads .. the very next time I feel the need to put beads on someone please redirect me to this post.

I've washed and blocked it.

I'm very happy with it, a day after the horror that was putting beads on has passed. Blocked well. This photo shows the bead detail. The photo showing them shinny didn't turn out well, unfortunately, but I put it on the end.

Daughters, Dentists, Fabric and Fiddling with knitting.

This week's knitting efforts were put on the back burner for visiting daughters. My darling Anth visited early in the week, bringing fabric for Bush Fire Brigade display tablecloths. We cut 'em out, got 'em hemmed and put some elastic in some. I did manage to put the beaded edge on the tuck lace shawl. 100 beads later... but I could do this while chatting, no harm for a truly tiresome task. We found some really nice green Cleckheaton Bamboo to make her a Berrocco top.

Anth departed for home and a couple of hours later.. the revolving door which is my home, brought in Loz. This time she has fabric for a fancy dress costume. Next morning, she goes off to do some shopping we get time to do a bit of drafting before Dentist appointment. Luckily for us, we found our excellent dentist who makes the necessary adjustment to her, wasn't really ill and was able to go home. Inbetween time we looked through the Bendi samples and bought her some 2 ply Plum to make her her very own tuck stitch shawl and some yarn for her Shalom. And I did manage to chat and get the OTHER beaded end of the shawl cast off.

I undid a couple of rows on my Crescent Moon Shawl and redid them, I was a bit miffed, but it didn't take long to rip it back and redo. I think I did one too many rows of the pattern, which is why is wasn't turning out right! Dah! Next thing was to do the excel spreadsheet for the extra rows it needs (done).

I did a couple of trial AX pattern for my Henley style half and half jumper, and I've settled on Passap book 11, No 1682. Photos soon.

Guitmerozis Shawl/Scarf

I decided to do a straight (as in no shaping just knit back and forth - straight) piece to acclimatise myself with AX patterns. I want to make Henley Perfected from my Interweave Knits mag, but I'm fairly certain to do it all on the machine is just a little beyond my reach. So... what else to do but an easier version with an AX auto or semi auto pattern. As a preproject I decided to make Jana Trent's Passap DM80 Tuck Lace Shawl/Scarf as a practice piece.

Working Notes:

Caston: I tried several methods, firstly in main yarn; 1:1 rib, transferred stitches, adding various weights as per the original instructions. Well I think my main problem with this is I don't have a cast on comb and couldn't come up with any way to add weight without pulling the whole thing to blahhdom. Next was scrap yarn, again 1:1 rib, transferred (then got sick of that and just dropped them) started with lace yarn and problems again with weights. Next idea, set up needles for pattern, using waste yarn again, and not worrying about the quality of the caston, T5, N/N, 1R; rack 1 nd to left, 1R; rack 1 nd to right; keep knitting and eventually knits all sts and long enough to attach weights. Success (and a really rotten first couple of cast on rows).

Weights: Problem: no cast on comb. After successfully casting on with waste yarn, and before I finished knitting with it, I attached my weights. Using silver crochet hook, picked up paperclip with lock attached and evenly spaced them across the work, until work is exposed and then can be hooked into fabric. I did manage to hook the heel grips at the end. Padlocks work remarkably well.

Knitting 2ply lace on T7: problem: dropped stitches. Constant weight must be applied at all times. On the first couple of runs, I moved the weight but allowed the live stitches to be weightless, resulting in too many dropped stitches. I tried several types of weights I have on hand and the smooth padlocks, directly hooked in the fabric, worked best, no pulling or overstretching. The heel grips went on the very end, as I could get them higher up inside the machine and that eliminated edge problems.

Dropped stitches: Cause: not keeping weight on live stitches at all times. On the final attempt, I managed to keep pressure on the live stitches as I repositioned the weights over 700 rows, and about halfway through I dropped 2 stitches, which I dropped back and relatched when I finished knitting. (crochet hook v latch tool: use the latch tool). I initially stopped, flipped levers and repositioned weight on row 6, but ... so many dropped stitches later, trialled and thought better, to knit row 1 then stop. I think this helped and if not, no harm done either way.

Undoing rows: Successfully and carefully done, making sure there were no dropped stitches, keeping weight on needles and using red tool where necessary. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, STOP flip levers. NOT keep on knittin' and countin' to 10).

Cast off: no dramas. N/N on scrap.

Finish: All scrap now removed, after - best guess - over 2000 rows to knit a 700 row shawl/scarf. I now know how the AX tuck stitch works! Now to decide whether to put in some glass bead on the ends, (after I finish my cotton top, of course!).

Beaded Cast off, both ends. I used the method in the Swallowtail Shawl, but with beads; make a point with PVA glue, wait till dry; thread about 100 beads; knit first stitch, with a bead in the centre of the new stitch, ie draw the first loop over the bead; *knit one, knit both sts through back of loop, with the bead in the centre, a bit of a fiddle - pass both loops over the bead, drawing it up between the loops * , repeat to end. Took me a while to do.. but worth it.

I'm looking at the pattern books to see which pattern I'll put on the Henley and do a sampler.

Twis the week before Christmas

This week has been a finishing week.

On 16th I knitted the last stitch, wove in ends grafted edge for my Hot socks Nanna rug:

I started in March 08; it is 8 x 15 squares, half square border, 7 x 100g sock wool. 2 x 100g grey socks wool, done in garter stitch with 2.5 needles, and took over 170 hours to knit. And on my legs and feet as I type.

Then later on 16th, I knitted the last couple of rows of my Fetching Mitts: As there are 7695 finished pairs of these on Ravelry (as at 9.00AM Sydney Oz time, 21 Dec) I decided to take an "arty" photo:

Although there is a cool breeze coming through the window and making my feet cold, it aint cold enough for me to wear these.. they are in the drawer waiting for 09.

Having finished both these and doing RnR (rip and redo) of my knitting machine Minty Fresh and building up the strength to go another round with the KM - there was only one thing to do:

Pick up my CPH and knit. I went with the collar and looked on Rav to see how other collar doers did, so, collar first, and bands extending across the collar. That decided, I've done the collar and button band and am onto the buttonhole band. Shelley, my SnB friend gave me a quick lesson on mattress stitch, and I've even sewed up about 10cm of one of the sides.

I did make a positive start on my Crescent Moon scarf, I've redone the "cast on 13 sts" to the same as the Swallowtail shawl, do the K2 garter and pick up the purl bumps, very happy with this, much much better, and have taken it's prelim photo, may rip it back and redo a little section I went back and didn't fix very well, I will do a post just for it sometime next week, after I've had a bit more of a think about it.

It was a cool day yesterday so I asked daughter #1 to help me model my Drops sleeved shawl, here is my "arty" photo, the rest are on flickr or Rav.


So as I'd done some "arty" photos, I got friended on flickr by a photographer... Oh my stars! I shall never whinge about stupid arty photos again! It's my pet hate and proof that it's one anyone can take, but show me the knitted item as it really is: front, back, no hands in the way, no belt pulling in a too big, no arms over the head to cover the lousy sleeve cap contruction.. only showing the side view to hide the fact that it makes a skinny model look frumpy.. (ranty over now). So that will teach me, wont it?

Well, I'd like to wish everyone a wonderful stress free Merry Christmas. (And thank you for reading.) And give you one of my beaded cards:

Cherry Swallowtail Shawl

Swallowtail Shawl pattern is available from the designer Evelyn Clark as a free PDF.

Yep, started what I brought home, 'tis the rule. What a gorgeous knit, lovely pattern and yarn, both, fabulous combo. It's a 6 row repeat pattern, so I should be able to do one 6 row set, for the rest of the week, as I've finished this week's focus project. No More Adding to Stash! Work on finishing a different project every week. So far so good.

Finished 15 Oct.

The Knittery yarn is 650m, and the Swallowtail, as written uses 400m, lots of extra to put into mine. When I finished the 14 repeats, I measured out about 4m and it knitted just over 1.5 rows of repeat 15, so 16 m would do for repeat 15; then I allowed 1 metre more for the each of the following repeats; doing 20 repeats would take an extra 120 ish metres, leaving plenty for the borders.

For the Lily of the Valley borders, one more repeat of each, four in all.

Peaked edge: did extra one extra repeat on the last 2 rows of the chart, then followed Evelyn's PDF instructions for the last two rows and cast off.

I really enjoyed making my first ever shawl. I had it on my shoulders last night, it was quite warm too. Now if the weather if kind, I will block it and put up it's final picture.