Another 8-shaft Weaving Project

Upon completing my Ombre Cardigan, I had tons of laceweight yarn left, especially the lighter shade of grey. I decided it might be fun to try weaving something with what was left. Because I had less of the darker shade left over, that was my limiting factor, for the size of the project. I chose a complicated looking 8-shaft weaving draft that I'd spotted on Weavolution (which originated on Handwoven.net) and did some math. I deliberated a bit about the appropriate sett (density) of this yarn in this pattern, and decided to weave it at 20 epi. At that sett I had enough of the darker shade to do one pattern repeat across the width of a scarf and eight repeats in length.


I wound a warp and put it on the loom and yesterday I started the weaving. The sett seems a little loose at the moment (in weaving parlance, we call that "sleazy" fabric, which is pretty awesome terminology, I think) but I am hoping that once I have it off the loom, no longer under tension, and wash it, it will be a nice fabric. Time will tell.

The variegation in the two shades also takes away from the weave structure, but again, I think it will be better once the lighter shade is under less tension and can fluff up a bit. Certainly if you click on the photo to see a close-up, that will help you to see the design more clearly. If you are curious, the papers on the right hand side of the photo show the lift plan for this pattern. It takes a bit of concentration, but isn't nearly as hard as it looks. I have two repeats done, so far, so six to go. Even with frequent sock-knitting breaks, this one shouldn't take too long.

North Wind Hat

Before I got all excited about my rainbow scarf, I mentioned that I'd recently made a couple of new hats...


This one happened simply because I fell in love with this colourway (Sweet Georgia Yarns' Saltwater.) When I saw this glorious vibrant blue colour, I was totally enamored of it, and once I saw Felicia's North Wind Hat pattern (which only takes one skein of her Superwash Worsted weight) I was reminded of Oscar Wilde: I can resist anything except temptation.

It's quite a different yarn than the worsted weight yarns I'm used to, very dense and round, but lovely. Every stitch of this project was a labor of love, since it's so darn pretty. I am only sorry it didn't last longer. It's very comfy to wear; I think the folded-over ribbed hem is the best part. The colour does nice things with my eyes, too, which is always a bonus. Supporting another Canadian yarnista by buying yarn and patterns is the cherry on top.

Rainbow Gamp Scarf

A colour gamp is a weaving project where you make a progression of colour stripes in the warp and match those stripes in the weft. It lets you see how various colours will interact with one another, in a woven design. They are often done just as an exercise for weavers to learn about colours in weaving, but they are so beautiful that I decided to use the idea for a scarf, instead.

The original scarf design was from Handwoven magazine, May/June 2009. It was done in a heavier yarn, made of alpaca, and used only two colours: ivory for the circles and brown for the borders. I wasn't very impressed with it, to be honest, and wondered if there was any way to make it more attractive. Colour is the obvious answer, and I thought that if I dressed it up in rainbow shades, it could be quite lovely. I decided to use Knit Picks Palette, since it comes in so many colours and is inexpensive and feltable. Of course, choosing a new yarn changed the sett and required me to do a lot of math to reconfigure the whole thing.


I showed you a close-up of the fabric on the loom, last time. I did finish weaving the scarf the next day, and twisted all the fringe the day after that. After some serious hand-washing and hand-fulling, I laid it flat to dry and ended up with a nice light warm wool scarf. I have been wearing it, which is why it looks somewhat wrinkly in the photos. I enjoyed weaving this scarf, and actually considered doing more of them in different colour themes: maybe shades of pink and orange or blues and greens...

It's the first time I have tried using all 8 shafts on my loom for a project. Fortunately it wasn't very complex, and I managed it without much difficulty. I think I might even try another 8-shaft project before going back to some simpler projects I have planned. Stay tuned.

Scarf Progress

I finally took some time during the last couple of days to put my new scarf project on the loom. Then, since the hard part was done, I started weaving it. As one would expect, the changing colours do encourage me to keep at it, and I am well past the part shown in this photo (taken during the first repeat of the design.) I'm actually about at the halfway point for the project, now.

It shows great promise on the loom, but once it's off and finished, the little coloured squares should be more like circles, and the woven colours should be smoother. Another day or two, and we'll know for sure.

Rosebud

No longer just a clever reference to Citizen Kane, Rosebud is also a lovely wooly hat designed by Jared Flood for his Fall 2011 collection. (Making that link just reminded me how many other lovely pieces were in that collection. As if I didn't have enough projects queued.)


I knit this hat in a day, back in November. I don't have any of Jared's lovely Shelter yarn, so I used some wool/mohair Peace Fleece I had buried in the stash. This was a skein of Kamchatka Sea Moss, which is a really nice spearminty green with flecks of white and a brighter lime green. This colourway is so beautiful in the sun, and never ceases to make me smile. As for the style, I love it - the cable isn't my favourite for some reason, but it really works, especially with the slouchy garter-stitch body.

I've been wearing this hat pretty much all winter long, and it has kept me warm and smiling, although in recent days I made a couple of new hats, so I have a bit more selection, now.

Ombre Cardigan

Part of the reason that I posted so little throughout January was because I was participating in the Tanis Fiber Arts January knitalong. I ended up being pretty monogamous with it, since I chose such an ambitious project. Toward the end of the month, I was starting to worry I might not finish it before the deadline, but fortunately I had the 31st off from work, so I had time to knit the last of it, weave in ends, and block it, just in time.


Tanis' Ombre cardigan is lovely and featherlight. Being made from two strands of laceweight yarn means the fabric is barely there. Being made from Tanis' Pink Label laceweight means it is also soft and warm and beautiful. The hardest part might have been choosing which of her two colourways to use.

I ended up going with two shades of grey: Shadow and Stormy. Turns out that the Stormy is actually teal as much as it is grey, which of course works for me, since varying shades of teal are mainstays of my wardrobe. The two yarns work well together and have a lot of contrast, which was of course my intention.


The first thing I did when I started knitting the cardi was to widen the seed stitch button band - in the original pattern it is only six stitches wide, which I thought would be a bit too narrow for my cardi. I decided to widen it a bit, in proportion with the increased bust measurement, and ended up doing ten stitches instead of six. The knitting was simple and meditative until I joined at the underarm and realized that the armholes were about 6 inches too big. I ripped it back and rethought the math and ended up with a better size. Once I'd made one modification, well... I decided to do a bit of shaping in the body and made four darts beneath the bust to give it some definition. Then I did some increases beneath the waist for my hips. Finally, I did a few more increases before the ribbing at the hem, since I like ribbing that isn't all stretched out.

The sleeves were easy after that, and then with a quick blocking and some perfect buttons, I have a lovely light cardi. Now I'm just waiting for the weather to warm up a bit so I can start wearing it more.

Warm Plaid Blanket

I've put off blogging this finished object for a while, until I could come to terms with it.


I finished the weaving and sewed the panels together - it was huge and wooly and lovely. Then I took a couple of days to twist the fringe at either end, which took a while since there are so many ends. Having done that, I was left with the question of how to finish it. Back when I made my series of Kindergarten Scarves, I would wash each one by hand as I finished it, using friction to lightly full them. Well, this blanket is far too big for that sort of thing, so I decided to use technology to aid me. I soaked and washed it in the bathtub, and then put it in the dryer.


I know, I know - the dryer?! Well, to be honest, I've had a couple of felting projects that I've tried to felt in the washer/dryer in my building, and have had little success with it, even when running the item through the machine two or three times, so I was quite confident that it wouldn't be a problem. Well, okay, only confident enough to leave it for a few minutes before checking on it. Fifteen minutes in, I opened the dryer, and was disheartened to see that it had already felted further than I'd intended. Sigh. Lesson learned. So it ended up a bit narrower and a bit thicker and a bit fuzzier than was my intention. I was pretty upset about it, but friends and family have reassured me that it isn't actually a total failure on my part (as I had initially worried) so I am learning to enjoy it. By the time I use it on some bright spring mornings on the balcony, I think I'll even learn to love it.

On the Needles

Although time may pass by without me posting, it is usually because I am working on so many projects that I don't take the time to blog. In January, I was pretty monogamous with my TFA knitalong project, the Ombre cardigan (pics soon) but once I finished that, I was anxious to get back to everything I'd put on hold while I worked on it.


First of all, I've been slowly plugging away on this alpaca cardigan for a long time - I've knit a plain brown stockingette body, and finally got to the more exciting bit, at the sleeves. The stranded work turned out pretty well, and I'm sure it will tidy up more with a good blocking. One more sleeve to go and I can knit the matching yoke and finish this up. Doesn't the colour combination make you think of Neapolitan ice cream?


Also in the pink vein (it must've been Valentine's Day) I have started a complicated pair of socks (i.e. my usual) with a lovely soft pink from Tanis Fiber Arts. Well, I started and restarted (and restarted) them, really. It took a few tries to get the fit right. I also finally got a better sense of the pattern by the third try, so now I can knit it without painstakingly following the chart, stitch by stitch. This is still the first sock, so I have a way to go with this pair.


Then there's a hat - not much to see yet, but just look at that fantastic yarn from Madelinetosh. So perfect and round and soft... and what a colourway! It looks so grey in some lighting, and so blue in other lighting. As my eyes also shift a bit from blue to grey, I think it will be a good hat for me. Because I need another hat.


Lastly, not really on the needles, but soon to be on the loom, another scarf. Because I also need another scarf. As you can see, it's going to be all rainbows, offset by navy (because one can't always go with black.) You can't really tell from the warp how complex and awesome the finished scarf will be, but it's going to be pretty cool, once I actually get to it.

Also, I just realized that I also have another cardi and a blanket that I didn't take photos of... so you'll have to imagine those, for now.

In the meantime, photos of finished projects coming!

Queen Alice Socks

The sweater problem that was plaguing me the last few days has been resolved, and after ripping back a few inches and redoing, I am heading back in the right direction, now. I'm pretty sure the hard part is over (famous last words?) and while I do intend to take a photo of the Work in Progress soon, I don't have one today, so in lieu of that, here's a pair of socks.


The first moment I laid eyes on the pattern for Queen Alice socks, I was enchanted: little daisies in the cuff and delicate twisty cables along the length of them, and that one big ol' cable filled with seed stitch, tumbling down the rabbit hole. I envisioned it in a bright vibrant colour, and dug a skein of Sweet Georgia's superwash sock out of my stash.

Funny story - when I saw this colour (called Dutch) online, I thought it was a bright golden yellow, with a tinge of orange to it. Of course, you never know whether a colour is accurate on your computer monitor, right?

When it arrived at my house, I was happy to see that it was precisely the vibrant hot yellow I had hoped it would be. So imagine my surprise when I pulled it out of my stash and wound it, a month ago, and realized that it's actually orange! It's super duper orange, and I don't know how I thought it was yellow, before. Seriously, like it's almost identical to the Hazel Knits orange I used for my Jubal Early socks, and if you recall, I totally made a huge deal out of how orange that yarn was. I swear this one was actually yellow, once. Or else I'm going crazy.

But I digress.


I did have a bit of an argument with these socks at the beginning. It was trial and error until I got the gauge right, and then having a good portion of the leg done, I decided that they were too tight at the right gauge, so I went up a needle size and then realized that the stitch pattern in the cuff was actually pulling in too much so I just did that part in plain ribbing instead. It all went smoothly after that, and all I had to do was switch back down to the right size needle at the heel flap. I also changed the decreases at the toe, but that's nothing major.

They actually knit up fairly quickly, considering the complex stitch pattern. At the beginning, I thought I'd never memorize it (like I always do) but somewhere past the halfway point of the first sock, I had it memorized (like I always do) and it was smooth sailing.

Great pattern + great yarn = awesome socks.

Cabled Blanket

I decided to participate in a loosely-defined knitalong with TFA yarns this month, to start off the new year right. However, I just hit a bump in the road and may have to rip back a ways on said project, so why don't we just talk about something else today, instead?


Last spring, my HLM was bragging to his family about how crafty I am, and he suggested that I make them a quilt or something, to give to them as a gift. I suggested an knitted blanket, instead, since it'd been a while since I made one and I had a hankering. I gave him a few options, and he chose this free pattern from Bernat. I hemmed and hawed a bit about what to knit it with, but ultimately decided on Knit Picks Swish Bulky, so that it would be machine-washable. He also picked the yarn colour, a now-defunct Douglas Fir.


I started knitting it in the spring, but of course the weather eventually got the better of me, as it got too hot to knit with a growing bulky-weight blanket on my lap, so it got set aside for a few months and then picked up again in the fall. I ended up ordering a few more skeins, as well (this was during a particularly difficult time when I had three projects on the go for which I seemed to have underestimated my yarn needs.) I ended up using 14 skeins in total, before I was happy with the length of it.


In the end, the blanket seems somewhat narrow, but it's because of the way the cables and the purl columns between them make it draw in like ribbing. If you actually sit under it, it will spread quite wide and really curls around you for a comfy couch experience. The cables are really squishy and luscious, which is why I loved the look of this blanket, initially. It will be a super warm and cozy blanket for naps on the couch.