Finished Object - Bloom Shawl

It was so great to come back from Bendigo with yarn for specific projects and so motivating to cast on straight away.

When I arrived home on the Sunday afternoon I immediately balled up the charcoal and teal corriedale I had purchased for Colleens Crafts to make the Bloom Shawl by Kiri FitzGerald-Hillier.

The version of the pattern I followed is the original as it was published in Issue 31 of Yarn Magazine.

My default for reading patterns is the written instructions and then referring to a chart, if provided, as a reminder guide as I complete each round. After completing this pattern, my advice for anyone else is to follow the charts, as the written directions seem to be inaccurate or at least confusing in parts.

First thing I did was find a tutorial on how to do the pinhole cast on - I used the one from Very Pink Knits. It took me a couple of tries to get it right but overall not a hard thing to master.
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The directions were for 5 dpns, but I knit the whole motif on magic loop. One thing that was not clear in the written directions was where to place markers - to split the motif into its four sections. If I had realised this earlier I would have been able to get this information from the chart. I guessed a little as I went along and I think in the end it is not noticeable that I fudged it a bit.

I made several modifications in the wing sections. For the decreases on both the left and right wings I knit two together through the back loop. I tried a few different decreases and decided that in the garter stitch I liked the look of this method best. I flipped the wings, so that the decrease side was the top edge, the finish and angle of the wing seemed to lay better that way. I also connected the blacks at the top of the motif together by knitting the last black stitch of one wing with the first black stitch of the other.

This was a super quick knit - it took me 15 days and zoomed along. I think part of the reason for this, apart from being knit in a DK, was that until you get to the edging there are really not many stitches on the needles, so the rows are short.

In the end I used all but 8 grams of the charcoal (from 213 grams). I do have plenty of the teal left, having only used 40 grams of a 100 gram skein.

I wet blocked the shawl, using blocking wires on the motif to make it square. Then pinned the wings and edge into shape around that square. I also pinned out each point of the lace pattern.

The Bendigo Haul

Shawl pins from All Buttoned Up

I had such as wonderful time at Bendigo this year.

Did I stick to my list? Pretty much.

I have added all my new yarn to my Ravelry stash already, but wanted to do a blog post to highlight all the great vendors.

Needles and cables - all purchased from Fiberific!.
Two ChiaoGoo "Spin Cables", 75cm and 125cm. For most things I prefer these over the red twist cable as the are more flexible and they spin at their base which I really like.

Wool N Wire stitch markers

Three sets of the "Twist" Lace needle tips in sizes 2.75mm, 3.5mm and 4mm - sizes that I regularly use.

Accessories and stitch markers
Two shawl pins from All Buttoned Up - Vintage Jewellery Melbourne.
A set of blinglets medium sized stitch markers from Fiberific!
A set of stitch markers from Wool N Wire


Yarn
Dyed by Hand Yarns (top three skeins):
White Gum Wool DK - 2 skeins in Purple Sea Urchin
Tough Stocking (4ply)- 1 skein in Blue Ringed Octopus
Tough Stocking (4ply) - 1 skein in a "one hit wonder" purple colourway

Colleens Crafts (first two, bottom row left to right) :
Corriedale DK - 2 skeins in Sage Green Tones
Corriedale DK - 2 skeins in Charcoal

Mayhem & Chaos (middle right and bottom right):
Crazy Eights (DK/8ply) - Voodoo Lady - enough for a sweater (thinking this will be the main colour for the Pixelated Pullover)
Lollisox - Taste the Rainbow - sample of fingering weight

What to wear to Bendigo?

A quick post this week, as I prepare to head to Bendi this weekend.

The shopping list is prepared. I have added some tools to the list too; additional Chiagoo needle tips and the twist cables.

Travel plans are set. I am driving to a friends on Friday afternoon to catch up, craft and have some wines. Saturday we are driving to Bendigo together, then back to her house to “play” with our purchases.

Final thing to sort out, I think is the toughest – what am I going to wear!?!?

I have three suitably warm knit tops. Miranda, Charleston Tea and Tric. Yarns for all three of these projects were purchased from previous Bendigo trips. They are all comfortable and I'm really pleased with them and proud to show them off. So I am thinking I may pack all three and decide on the day.

The hardest part to choose is the rest of the outfit and knit accessories. Victoria has been experiencing an extremely wet and cold winter, and Bendigo has a reputation for being extremely cold. Gloves, scarf, beanie etc will be essential. But how much knit is too much knit?? Is there such a thing? Also need to keep in mind that I will probably also need a coat (which then covers up all the knitting) and I think gumboots will be the footwear of choice (with hand knit socks of course). My blanket box is full of choices, will be hard to decide. I may end up taking a lot of this with me!!

How do I choose what to wear from so many knitted accessories??

Thoughts of Bendigo Sheep and Wool Festival

It's dark and it's cold! You would think the perfect time for knitting. But I am making slow progress. A couple of reasons come to mind; my hands are cold at home, so I find it hard to knit, but the more prominent reason is that I want to knit all the things. Distracted by thoughts of the up-coming Bendigo Sheep and Wool Festival next weekend.

So what has been taking up what should be knitting time? Knit planning!!

I know that I want to knit more sweaters and multicoloured shawls. At the moment whenever I look on Ravelry, these are what I am drawn towards.

I am really enjoying wearing my current selection of coloured shawls as they are great fashion pieces and practical for keeping warm in cool air-conditioned offices. And as far as garments are concerned I feel that I have only just begun to get into this part of knitting and want to expand my wardrobe for more occasions and weather.

My library, queue and favourites are already filled with projects that I have added over time. I have been going through each of these areas as a starting point for new projects, especially from my library. It is amazing how many patterns are in my library that I have not yet knit, I purchased them because I liked them and intended to knit them but they have been left unloved and unknit. I am not the world's fastest knitter, so this will not be rectified in the short term, but at least I have reminded myself that when I have an urge to cast something on I should check my library first.

So what stands out to me now?

The Bloom Shawl - by Kiri FitzGerald-Hillier

Tau - by Melanie Berg

Pixelated Pullover - by Jennifer Beaumont

Crossover Cardi - by Maria Yarley

I also want to knit multi-coloured shawls and have a collection of them in my library (mostly by Melanie Berg).

I have looked at my stash, and I have potential yarns for coloured shawls, lots of single sock skeins, but nothing in stash for the sweaters. It is interesting to reflect and review the stash. I will take a deeper look at stash in another post in the coming weeks (maybe after I have added to it at Bendigo and need to do a proper update/audit of everything!).

My lists are almost complete. I have made notes on yardage and yarn types for these projects and also have in mind a rough idea of colours. But once I am in the midst of all that yarn I know I will get carried away and probably come home with some skeins that are pretty rather than practical. That is, of course, all part of the fun.

Cupcake mittens, deadlines and making changes to the pattern

My sister requested that I make her Cupcake Mittens.They looked super cute, so agreed that I would give them a go.

I am satisfied with the end result and pretty happy with my colour work, but these were a hard slog.

The beginning of this project caused me frustration. I had trouble getting gauge, first they were too loose, then they were too tight - playing with needle size and stitch counts until I on the fourth try I was happy with the cuff. I also found that by knitting the cupcakes on the palm as well as the back of the hand the mitt was very tight (partly I think due to my inexperience in colour work). So I chose to rip back to the cuff and change the pattern. I knit the cupcakes on only the back of the hand, five on the first row, four on the next and then alternated those two rows. I also knit three plain rows in between, in order to give myself a break from the colour work, provide an opportunity to knit in ends as I went and to hopefully prevent the overall mitten from being too tight.

I also changed the pattern further, by making the mitts convertible. I used the directions from the ChemKnits tutorial for transforming any mitten knitting pattern into convertible mittens.

After three repeats into the cupcakes on the first mitt, I thought that the thumb as written in the pattern was going to end up making the mitts too tight and not sit correctly, so I made the decision to start adding in a thumb gusset. The end result was a stumpy looking thumb that looked weird and felt wrong. I blocked it so see how it would end up, and had my sister try it on. Immediately I knew I had made the wrong decision with the thumb. I put that completed mitt aside and started the second one, following the pattern.

Although the first mitt ended as a bit of a fail, it had actually knit up quickly once I had started. So I was keen to get going on the second one to get it right. But the one by one twisted rib on 2mm needles broke me and I struggled to get it going. I knew I had a deadline, my sister was waiting for these mitts and now, not only did I have to knit the second one, but I had to go back and see if I could save the first!! But the brain is a funny thing, right? I wanted to cast on other things, or didn't feel like knitting at all. I think if I had no deadline and the first one had been a success I would have been into it and quickly finished the second. But with the weather getting colder and my sister eagerly expecting the finished pair, progress on the second one was slow.

I think I was also dragging on knitting it, because I knew I was going to have to tackle fixing the first one when I was done.

To begin this process I looked to see if I could rip it out from the bind off, but because it had been blocked, the ends were hard to find and it had fused together a bit, not felted, but just difficult to rip out. So I grabbed a pair of scissors and cut the top off the mitts, just above where I needed to restart with the thumb as written in the pattern.

As painful as that was, it ended up being the best option. Once I had taken the plunge, ripping out and picked back up where it needed to be I felt so much better and it took me less then a week to then knit up the rest of the mitt.

Lessons learned:

• I really do not react well to deadline knitting (when the recipient is expecting the item).
• I should have followed the pattern;
• or at least read it through first - perhaps if I had read the entire pattern I would have started a thumb gusset earlier, preventing the stumpy thumb I created.
• I enjoy the result of colour work and would like to do more, perhaps on a jumper.

knitrospective - inside my notions bags

This is not so much a look back, but a look inside. Something I have developed over time is the contents of my notions bag. It has gone through many stages. Starting out with not much in it, to bulging at the seams, to a now pared back version of what are my essentials. There is quite a lot jammed into this little bag, but everything is there for a reason.

Let's take a look...

- Tapestry needles - a small plastic case with needles of varying sizes for darning, weaving in ends and grafting

- Zip lock bag of spare yarn - for holding stitches, inserting the spot for an afterthought heel and emergency stitch markers. I keep it in little butterflies in the ziplock bag to stop it getting tangled

- Measuring tape and safety pins - both fairly self explanatory and always come in handy (my marathon running husband has even been happy I take my notions bag with me everywhere as he has needed extra safety pins for his events bibs)

- Emery boards - for fingernail snags but also for needle snags (small rough patches on wooden needles or small imperfections that sometimes occur on the cables of circular needles).

- Three bags of stitch markers

• a set of the plastic locking markers for holding dropped stitches or marking increases and decreases
• pretty markers; mostly small gauge with beads and some cute dangly sheep - I generally use these ones for marking the beginning of a round, sleeves, back/front etc
• larger, closed rings; that I use for marking pattern repeats - a little repurposing with these ones - they are the rings from old bras that I cut the rings out of

- "Stabby things" - this metal container (also repurposed, originally the case for a stylus pen) holds all my pointy things. Two different sized crochet hooks. A cable needle. Needle threader. Fold up scissors - they take up less space, and if left in a bag with knitting will not snag or cut accidentally. A tapestry needle. I also include in this case a small measuring tape, two stitch holders (not pictured, as they are currently in use on a project I will be talking about on the blog in the next few weeks), a few stitch markers and a pencil. I can then grab this case out and put into a small project bag knowing I have the essentials.



My preference for pencils are these mechanical ones. They do not require a sharpener, draw a precise clean line and have a retractible tip.

The final thing in my bag is the cute little container pictured below. I think of this as my mini notions kit and is perfect for throwing into an "on-to-go" sock project. Light, compact, and useful. In it there is a length of yarn for a lifeline or afterthought heel, a locking stitch marker and a few elastic rings to use as stitch markers.

So, these are the essentials for my notions bag. What do you keep in yours? What tool can you not do without for a project on the go? I think I am at the point that I have the contents of my notions bag set, but interested to see what other people use as there are always new ideas and different ways of approaching things.

First attempt at self-striping sock yarn

After dying for longer colour repeats on a chunky yarn, I decided the next thing to try was a self-striping sock yarn.

I used the same method for winding and dying the yarn as I used for the previous experiment and again sectioned the yarn into four equal sections.

Colours used this time around:
a light blue/green - mixed using emerald and turquoise
a dark green - mixed using emerald and turquoise
light purple - straight from dye stock
gun metal - straight from dye stock

The bottom image is the toe of a sock, I could not wait to cast something on. I am fairly happy with how it has come out, although the stripes are not very thick. For thicker stripes I am either going to have to limit myself to two colours per skein, or find a new piece of equipment to wind longer skeins.