Solarita

I was thinking of the sun, margaritas, and very warm, autumnal shawls when I designed this crescent wrap. I'm even cold in the summer sometimes. Especially after dark, or in late August when the weather starts to shift. Thinking of the summer sun setting as I sit outside with friends, chatting and watching the sky change color - this is when I start to shiver and look for something warm like the sun.

So I drew up a shawl like the setting sun in my sketchbook. It has a bold border with triangles and finger-like fringe. I found another use for my crazy stripe stitches that did not need color changes to show up. 

Surprisingly, the finished shawl looks almost exactly like the drawing, That rarely works out so well.

The yarn is Brooklyn Tweed Loft, a very springy yarn with bright flecks of orange and green undertones.

The best part is that it matches my favorite (only?) formal dress. No more cheap ugly cardigans or cold arms.

If you are interested in this pattern, you can check it out on Ravelry or buy it here.

Fingerscarves Finally

Did you ever wonder what would happen if a pair of gloves and a scarf had a child? What would happen if you just reached into your scarf every time your fingers were cold?
Well this is the answer to those questions that you never actually asked.

It took only 2 years to put aside time to actually edit and publish this pattern, does anyone even remember it?

How could you forget a scarf that has fingers.

Superfine

I ordered a pound of 64 count merino top from Paradise Fibers with the intention of spinning the yarn for a sweater. It is extremely soft, white, clean, and easy to spin. The only problem is that I'm not good enough yet to spin it thicker than this.

This is the single ply.

And this is the ribbed swatch knit from the 3 plied yarn on #2 needles.

With about 1.25 oz spun, it isn't looking like the best thing for a sweater. Maybe in the future when I can get it up to a fingering weight.

For now, a scarf seems like a good little project.

you.knit.lamps

Eight months ago, I posted a few pictures of a lamp that I made out of felt. There was a pretty big response from people who wanted to make lamps too, but there were also a lot of questions about fires and electrical wiring.

It took a bit of work, but with motivation from a really ugly bedside lampshade, help from the ravelry free testers group, and photography and some proofreading from my mother, there is now a way for others to knit similar lumpy lampshades.

All of the danger and live wires have been excised and replaced with safety and standardization. It may sound much less exciting, but it allows me to publish a pattern that fits the needs of all sorts of people with all sizes of lamp without an overbearing fear of fires and lawsuits.

The  pattern is for a textured felt lamp shade in multiple sizes and matching pillows in two sizes, the pillows do not light up.The lamp shade can be sewn over a preexisting shade or a handmade frame. DIY instructions for a metal lamp shade frame are included in the pattern as well as a lesson in lamp anatomy and safety.

The pillows are 10" x 16" and 16" x 16".
The shade fits a 6"-18" diameter drum shade with a height of 11". The height is adjustable.
Patons Classic Wool in color Aran is shown in all pictures.

Some of the skills needed for this pattern are non knitting related. It just wouldn't be fair to keep them secret, so I'm posting them here so that everyone can decide whether they want to put in the extra effort to make the lampshade themselves. The following images show the skills and materials needed to make a lampshade from scratch. These images are also included in the pattern PDF.

If you aren't into this sort of crafting , keep in mind that using a store bought lamp shade and making a pillow do not require any of these extra steps.

You've now seen everything but the actual knitting instructions so there are no unwanted surprises (I'm very OK with people using these lampshade frame instructions to come up with their own projects as long as I get credit for creating the files).  It's a fun project for the adventurous crafter and is very rewarding. You have to actually feel the texture to know how rewarding it really is.

The pillow is perfect for petting.

You can find the pattern on ravelry for $8.00 or get it right here.


If you are not a knitter but are interested in this product: I am able to produce a limited number of pillows and lampshades depending on my schedule. Contact me with your needs for pricing info.

Leap Year Tote Bag

It's a good thing that there's an extra day in February because I just finished my final red and white wool project today. It's a tote bag with a textured gradient of red 3D dots.

I'm not a big fan of a lot of the bags on the market, they're all very similar and traditional. There are also a lot of great, fresh looking styles, but they demand a higher price. When you have the skills to do it yourself, you should. The result will always represent you better than a store bought product.

It is lined with blue twill fabric to keep the felt exterior from stretching and deforming with use. When I get a job, I'll be using this to replace my current work bag, so it has to be sturdy enough to hold 20 lbs of papers and computer. The straps are just cotton webbing, the same as on a factory made bag

The hardest part was figuring out how to do colorwork with a texture of shortrows. I treated each red lump ad if it was just a normal fairisle color shift. The strands were carried in back as I worked my way across the row. You can see that the red yarn does not continue across the row because, if it were, the dots would be connected with a thin line.

These two pictures to the left show the knit part of the project before and after felting.  I left blank spots in the textured areas so that there was a place for the straps. As usual, most of the shrinkage was vertical. I made a ridge along the bottom of the bag to add shape to the squared off bottom panel. This attempt to shape the felt did not really work and the ridge kind of blended into the felted fabric. Next time, I would add more purl rows.

Currently there is no written pattern available. It's very similar to some other lumpy patterns I'm working on, so it wouldn't be hard to write out, but I'm not sure if it really appeals to many people . If there's a response (via comments) I would consider doing the work of writing it up for the ravelry pattern store.

Wool Chukka Slippers

The goal of this project was to make myself a pair of (red and white) wool slippers that could be worn around the house and sometimes outside. They would be pretty close to a shoe construction, having a sewn upper with laces and all, but would not require lasting before soling. It was important to use materials and tools from around the house in order to avoid spending a lot of money.

The other goal was to provide some good instructions on how to make a unisex looking house shoe with a real leather or rubber sole.

So here you can see me modeling my new shoes. I thought it would be really funny to make my shadow look like a windsock man but keep my feet really still. The resulting GIF hangs over my layout on the left and looks bizarrely 3D because of the slight shifting of the camera, but it makes me very happy.

I'm showing you this second GIF so that you forget about that whole instructions thing for now. When I went to put all the images together, there turned out to be a lot more steps than I could edit,explain, and post tonight. Because of the 20 or so small simple steps to make these slippers (compared to the 120+ for a pair of handmade pumps) instructions will follow in a series of installations over the next few weeks starting with pattern making.

Beyond Dead

The term for ironing the texture, stretch, and loft out of acrylic fiber is killing. Killed acrylic had good drape and feels smooth and almost silky. A few months ago, I started to experiment with the idea of heat setting acrylic swatches into more interesting textures than their usual flat form.

This pink swatch is in a fold pattern called a Miura-Ori. It was ironed into folds in the compact position on top. when you open it up, the crease pattern is visible. Because of the shininess of the yarn after ironing, the folds really shine in the sunlight.

This second piece in aquamarine yarn has an unstructured texture. It was crumpled and baked to get this unusual, almost organic topography. It almost looks like the mountains on a map. I hit one side with green Montana Gold  spray paint to create a different effect on the back. The shine of the yarn is really nice with this texture, and the crumpled effect creates an elasticity in the fabric.

The goal of these swatches was to take a fiber which is not generally considered desirable and to transform it into something where the artificiality and cheapness become positive attributes. These two effects can only be achieved with a synthetic fiber  and are quite beautiful. I'm thinking up some patterns that might use this sort of textile, so if you like the look and have some ideas, please comment.

These techniques are going to be the topic of a tutorial which shows how to heat your acrylic safely and with style. Hope you all liked the examples.

TV Gameshow Sweater

There is someone out there who read my moodboard-like post about some sweaters being time machines and is waiting to see what came out of it. The time machine sweater was finished about 3 weeks ago, but didn't have any photographs that did it justice until a few days ago. Taking inspiration from the cheesy photography in vintage pattern books, I put together a little scene with period furniture. The color combo reminds me of some of the game show sets from the past.

I don't usually like to model for my own knitting photos. This case was no exception and I think you can see it on my face. I may not appear so, but I'm very happy with how this turned out. There aren't many concepts that are begging to be realized in red heart super cheap synthetic, but this one needs the artificiality to look right. The colors are so retro and they seemed to fit with the mustard chaise lounge (who doesn't love a mustard chaise lounge?). You can read about the history of the lounge on the MoMA website if you're interested.

This is a close up showing some of the fitting and the color. When this gets sized up, I'll have to learn how to chart the colored section.

The raw numbers for the full range of sizes have been worked out, so the testing phase will start soon. The pattern will be available by fall, so keep a look out if you want to knit your time machine sweater.

I heard you like pills

Yo dawg, I heard you like pills* so I put your pills in this pill so you can take them where you take it. 

See, this is a big felt pill. It looks like that little pill.

And inside of the big pill is a container with little pills. It's good for traveling because you can take your pills with you wherever you go.

I'm in the habit of carrying a prescription bottle and a baggie with Advil and Benadryl with me when I go on overnight trips. As part of my celebration of finding bright red Patons Classic Wool at the store, I made this little holder for my pills.  It fits a small prescription bottle and a few bags of other stuff for traveling.

You will need one or two colors of Patons Classic Wool - I didn't measure yardage, but it isn't much.
You will also need  size 8 double pointed needles.

Gauge before felting is 5 stitches by 8 rows per square inch.

Capsule top
Cast on 36 stitches and divide equally amongst 4 needles.
Knit 30 rounds.
Knit 7, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 32 stitches.
Knit 1 round
Knit 6, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 28 stitches.
Knit 1 roundKnit 5, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 24 stitches.
Knit 1 roundKnit 4, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 20 stitches.
Knit 3, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 16 stitches.
Knit 2, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 12 stitches.
Knit 1, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 8 stitches.
break yarn and pull it through the remaining stitches.

Capsule bottom
Cast on 32 stitches and divide equally amongst 4 needles.
Knit 52 rounds.
Knit 6, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 28 stitches.
Knit 1 round Knit 5, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 24 stitches.
Knit 1 round Knit 4, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 20 stitches.
Knit 1 round
Knit 3, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 16 stitches.
Knit 2, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 12 stitches.
Knit 1, k2tog. Repeat this sequence another 3 times, you will have 8 stitches.
break yarn and pull it through the remaining stitches.

Felt these pieces in the washing machine or by hand. I did mine by hand and it took very little time.

Now you have a pill shaped pill case.

Make 20 of these in 3 colors and you can play real life Dr. Mario.

*The number of Americans that take a prescription hovers between 40 and 50%. It is reasonable to assume that an even larger number of people take over the counter pills somewhat regularly. I'm also going to assume that this means most people "like pills."

Nouvelle

Another knitting pattern (can you guess what I do all day?) is finished and ready for the masses.

It started at the local yarn store, where I fell in love with a Berrocco baby alpaca blend called Flicker. It's first impression is as a luxury yarn. Camel/Caramel colored and incredibly soft, it has just the right amount of gold sparkle. I had to get it, even though I'm not a gold and tan person. It looked like the type of thing a fashionable lady of the past would have loved and was therefore irresistible.

I went home and took a look through the family photos. My great aunt was a very fashionable woman, she was a buyer for Saks, and always wore great clothes. There was a picture of my great aunts and my great-great grandmother walking on the boardwalk. It would be a much more interesting world if people still wore hats every day.

So I took the yarn and made a hybrid of two vintage styles: the cloche and the turban. They're not in the picture, but they were popular in the first half of the 20th century and would have looked fitting with these coats and furs.

This is Nouvelle with the gathering on the sides. Unfortunately in these pictures it is hard to see the gold filament shining, but the yarn looks great knit up. I made versatile sizing a priority, the pattern covers a range from 14" - 22" head measurements. The smallest size is really cute, and knit in two tones of pink, the style can be really cute and playful for a little girl.

Specifications for proper color division are in the pattern. The yarn used for this 14" baby hat is cascade 220 on a size 8 needle.

And this is the hat turned 90 degrees so that the gathering is in the front and back. Someday I will have friends and will thus get someone else to model for me. You can see how this is halfway between the categories of turban and cloche when the gathering is in the front. It pleases me that you can get two different looks out of this hat if you want.

The pattern page can be found on ravelry,

or you can buy it here.

Silly Earhat Family

The holidays are coming and it is gift/winter hat season. The best thing to do is (obviously) to knit somewhat embarrassing to wear, brightly colored hats for everyone. But not just any silly hat is good enough. If you want people to wear your silly hat it has to have a certain level of cuteness, which means it should probably look like an animal.

Three years ago when I began to contemplate the balance between animal cuteness and abstraction, I came up with this hat. It shows no species bias in its representation of animal characteristics, and it still has cute fluffy ears.

The pattern has taken a while for me to remember, write down, and size. But finally it is all here.

Silly Earhat Family

You will need:

Size 8 double pointed needles, and optionally a pair or circular 16" #8s

100-200 yards of Patons Classic Wool, Cascade 220 wool, or another worsted weight yarn.

A hand full of poly-fill

Gauge is 20 stitches and 26 rows for a 4" square

Stripes shown in the picture are improvised and varied, but can be added to the pattern. It is a great way to use up some scraps of yarn.

Instructions will make a hat to fit a 21-23" adult L, 19-21" adult S/M, 17-19" kids or adult XS, 15-17" toddler.  

Hat Body:

cast on 90 (80, 70, 60)stitches

Knit 7 (6, 5, 4)  rounds

Purl 1 round

Knit 7 (6, 5, 4) rounds

Knit 1 round picking up cast on edge to form the hem. If you have trouble with hems, this article will help.

K9 (8, 7, 6), M1 x 10, you will have 100 (90, 80, 70)

Knit 22 (20, 18, 15) rounds

K18 (16, 14, 12),  k2tog x 5

Knit 1  round

K28 (25, 22, 19) K9 (8,7,6) with waste yarn, then slip the provisional stitches back to the first needle,  K30 (27, 24, 21)  K9 (8,7,6) with waste yarn, slip the provisional stitches back to the first needle, K37 (33, 29, 25)

K17 (15,13,11) k2tog x 5

Knit 1 round

K16 (14, 12, 10) k2tog x 5

Knit 1 round

K15 (13, 11, 9) k2tog x 5

Knit 1 round

K14 (12, 10, 8)  k2tog

Knit 1 round

K13 (11, 9, 7)  k2tog

K12 (10, 8, 6)  k2tog

Continue to decrease 5 per row every row in the established pattern until 10 stitches remain. Break yarn and pull through.

Ears - there are two of them:

Remove waste yarn, picking up 18, 16, 14, 12 stitches plus an extra 2 in each corner distributing the stitches equally between 3 needles

knit 14, 12, 11, 9 rounds

K4, 3, 3, 2 k2tog, K3, 3, 2, 2, k2tog, K4, 3, 3, 2, K2tog, K3, 3, 2, 2, k2tog

Knit 1 round

K3, 2, 2, 1, k2tog, K2, 2, 1, 1, k2tog, K3, 2, 2, 1,  k2tog, K2, 2, 1, 1 k2tog

break yarn and pull through for smallest 2 sizes.

K2,1,  k2tog  K 1,1 k2tog, k 2, 1, k2tog, k1,1, k2tog

break yarn and pull through.

Put some poly-fill in the ears so that they are round and squishy. It will stay in on its own, you do not need to sew or line anything.

Good luck with your new hats. If you like this pattern, visit me on ravelry to post your finished object or to look at my other patterns.

Loom Wrestler Part I

I have wrestled with the loom.

My interest in weaving started in kindergarten when I made a bag weaving loom out of a shirt cardboard. We always got to do weaving or needlepoint before nap time. At some point, my parents gave me a little wooden block for the weaving of more precise little bags. In fifth grade, I studied the unicorn tapestries because they were really colorful, big, pieces of cloth. My goal was to make a miniature tapestry for the medieval fair at school. My parents had a loom meant for tapestry weaving which fueled my desire to weave a unicorn.

The Good Karma Loom is a Native American style weaving tool which takes a few hours to set up. It is slightly more sophisticated than my cardboard setup. I made a small square of tangled yarn before deciding to fabricate my unicorn some other way.

A few weeks ago, while browsing images of ikat and pooled weaving, I decided to try the loom one more time. For the warp, I picked a scrap of rainbow Red Heart acrylic yarn. I tried to pool the colors to make something that had a chance at looking cool.

On the floor of my office, for three hours, I wrestled the loom. It sounds silly, but after spending an evening crawling back and forth carrying strings, everything that could ache did.

The weaving part was actually relatively easy. Pictures coming soon in LOOM WRESTLER PART II.

Hot pink

On Monday, I finished my first original sweater, set in sleeves and all. The whole process was pretty easy, getting a true gauge swatch was the most difficult part.

Here it is, a cropped sweater with a high neck and set in sleeves. After correcting the gauge confusion, I realized that only two skeins of red hear were needed, dropping the cost down to $6.00. Very reasonable for a custom fit sweater, and the hot pink color kind of makes the cheapness of the acrylic yarn acceptably synthetic.

So for any of you who fit into a size small (34" bust), I've typed up the pattern. It's nothing special, but it would be cool to see other people make it.  The sweater is 17" long, and ends at the waist. My apologies to anyone of another size, that's the next sweater project.

 

You will need:

Size 6 needles

Size 8 needles straight and double pointed

2 skeins of Red Heart Super Saver in Pretty 'N Pink (or equivalent)

OR

720 yards of worsted weight yarn

Gauge:

4" x 4" in stockinette stitch = 18 stitches and 22 rows

You will need one front, one back, and two sleeves to make a full sweater. I added a one stitch selvedge to the edges of all pattern pieces to facilitate seaming.

Front and Back:

On size 6 needles, cast on 55 stitches.

Work 20 rows of 1 x 1 ribbing.

Switch to size 8 needles.

K6, M1, K6, M1, K6, M1, K6, M1, K7, M1, K6, M1, K6, M1, K6, M1, K6 (63 stitches).

Work 7 rows in stockinette stitch.

K16, M1, K31, M1, K16. Work 7 rows in stockinette stitch.

K16, M1, K33, M1, K16. Work 7 rows in stockinette stitch.

K16, M1, K35, M1, K16. Work 7 rows in stockinette stitch.

K16, M1, K37, M1, K16. Work 7 rows in stockinette stitch.

K16, M1, K39, M1, K16. Work 7 rows in stockinette stitch.

Bind off 3, knit to end. Bind off 3, purl to end.

(Bind off 2, knit to end. Bind off 2, purl to end.) x 2

For Front:

Work 18 rows in stockinette stitch.

K23, bind off 13, K23.

P23.

Bind off 3, K20.

P20.

Bind off 2, K18.

P18.

Bind off 1, K17.

P17.

Bind off 1, K16. Work 3 rows in stockinette stitch.

Bind off 1, K15.

Bind off 5, P10.

K10.

Bind off 5, P5.

K5.

Bind off .

-------------------

With the stitches still on the needle:

Bind off 3, P20.

K20.

Bind off 2, P18.

K18.

Bind off 1, P17.

K17.

Bind off 1, P16. Work 3 rows in stockinette stitch

Bind off 1, P15.

Bind off 5, K10.

P10.

Bind off 5, K5.

P5.

Bind off.

For Back:

Work 30 rows in stockinette stitch.

Bind off 5, K16, Bind off 17, knit to end.

Bind off 5, P16.

Bind off 4, K12.

Bind off 5, P7.

Bind off 2, K5.

Bind off.

-------------------

With the stitches still on the needle:

Bind off 4, P12.

Bind off 5, K7.

Bind off 2, P5.

Bind off.

Sleeves:

On size 6 needles, cast on 31 stitches.

Work 20 rows of 1 x 1 ribbing.

Switch to size 8 needles.

K1, *M1, K1, repeat from * to end.

Work 7 rows of stockinette stitch.

(K1, M1, Knit to last stitch, M1, K1. Work 7 rows of stockinette stitch) x 9

Bind off 3, knit to end. Bind off 3, purl to end.

(Bind off 2, knit to end. Bind off 2, purl to end.) x 3

(Bind off 1, knit to end. Bind off 1, purl to end.) x 2

Bind off 2, knit to end. Bind off 2, purl to end.

(Bind off 1, knit to end. Bind off 1, purl to end.) x 2

(Bind off 2, knit to end. Bind off 2, purl to end.) x 2

Bind off 3, knit to end. Bind off 3, purl to end.

Bind off.

Sew shoulders, attach sleeves, then sew side seams.

Pick up 70 stitches around the neck using double pointed or circular needles.

Work 8 rows.

 Bind off loosely

Share pictures if you make one.

Spine Poncho Pattern is finally here!!

You may remember A while ago I asked for some help with a pattern that I came up with. After a little help from the ravelry community, I figured out how to chart this thing. The color came first, but after I uploaded the simple chart, people started to ask for the full poncho pattern.

Spine Poncho

 **A few people have had problems with Scribd  so I've decided to provide an alternative means of downloading. For those of you who would rather download from ravelry, the file is now posted there too**

This PDF is a diagrammed chart of the whole poncho. I don't want to write it out line by line because the pattern is very simple and easy to understand once you see it laid out. It's just a really big mitered piece.

For me, this was a stash buster, using up a bunch of yarn that was really warm and a bit itchy, good for a jacket type project. I never wrote down the yardage, so the file might be a little low on the amount needed of the main color.

Unfortunately, I do not have the resources right now to test this pattern before posting it, but I am sure any corrections or notes will be easily fixed once people start to make it. If you find one, just let me know in the comments section and I'll modify the file.

How to dye a long gradient with wool and Kool Aid

This tutorial is going to show you how to dye a 200 yard skein of plain wool to have a long, slow gradient. This sort of coloring is popular this season in a lot of trendy sweaters from Urban Outfitters. It is also similar to a lot of self striping yarns, just a bigger stripe. Here is a picture of a shawl that I made using some wool that was dyed with this technique.

You can see that the gradient is not entirely smooth, it is kind of variegated, which I think is a nice effect.This is because the wool is essentially tie dyed.

OK, lets start the tut...

You will need:

2-3 packets of kool-aid in your favorite color.
A skein of 100% wool, I used Paton's classic wool
A pot
A stove
A spoon or tongs
Rubber gloves, unless you don't mind chromatic fingertips.

Take your skein...

And roll it into a ball. Don't wrap loosely, make sure there is some tension on the yarn as you wrap. 

Put about 1.5" of water into your pot and add a packet of kool aid. Heat the mixture on the stove until it is steaming.

Add the ball of yarn to the hot pot.

Use the spoon or your hands to move the ball around and to cover all sides with dye.

You will know when to take the yarn out of the pot because the color will be sucked out of the liquid and into the fibers. The kool aid water will be almost totally clear.

Take the ball to the sink and run water over it until the entire ball is soaked.

Fill the pot again, this time with 3" of water and 1 pack of kool aid. Heat the pot until the liquid begins to steam.

Put the wet ball of yarn into the pot, this time, the capillary action of the wet yarn will draw the dye deeper into the ball.

Make sure to roll the ball around and cover every side with dye. When you feel you are done, take the yarn out of the pot and rinse it under cold water.

When the ball cools, you can wind the yarn into a skein.

you will see the inside of the ball slowly getting lighter. Take the skein and wrap it in a towel to take out some of the moisture.

Hang it on a hanger to dry.

There are a lot of projects that you can do with this yarn. some of you may remember the ironic gnome and some chrysanthemum hats that I made with yarn dyed this way.

raspberry lemonade flavor on white yarn

This uses black Rit dye on aqua wool instead of kool aid.

This uses cherry kool aid with a bit of orange on pink yarn.

I hope this is useful for everyone who has asked how to make the gradient. Please post pictures of your projects if you use this yarn, it will be a lot of fun to see what people do with it.