Red Done

This is proof that I finished my red sweater. Well, almost finished. The knitting is done so I'm doing a happy dance (I'll leave that to your imagination). 

I have to find buttons and sew them on. I have to sew in all the ends but I'm celebrating anyway. This is one UFO that's almost there. Whoo, hoo.

This is the basic V-neck from the Button Up Your Top Down book with a couple of modifications. I've knit from this book several times so mixing it up is fun and keeps my interest to the very end.

I made the buttonband 8 sts wide, just because I could.Then I played with it some more (see last post).

I made it an A-line by increasing stitches at the sides. I also played with the ribbing on the sleeves and at the bottom by starting the ribbing (p2) and working extra (k2,p2) every 8 rows. I also did this starting in the centre back. No photo because for some reason this red is very difficult to photograph. I'll try it in another room and see if that works better.

This is 100% wool (Naturally Nazareth Worsted by Kraemer Yarns) , not a superwash, so I knew that if I worked the bottom ribbing with the body-sized needle I could block it out flat and it wouldn't pull in. My figure does not need that!!

I'm so happy to get one done. I have a great big smile every time I look at it. Enthusiasm is spilling over to my next UFO, the green pullover.
Deb

This Top Down has a squarer neckline than a standard raglan,though not perfectly square. The back of the neck is 7" wide and the cast on for the sleeves is 4" wide. A more standard sleeve width would be 1"-2" wide. This changes the neckline, making it a wider rectangle and gives a nice drop to the front and back of the neckline without any fancy short row shaping.

The stripes are continuing. I'm finding that this is a cheerful knit. I smile while I'm knitting.

More Mittlets. Terry came to our Mariposa knit club this morning with her version of the mittlets.

She worked a lace pattern down the back of the hand in two different yarns, as you can see. But she went a litte further . . .

and ran the lace pattern up the thumb. Nice, very nice. All that from a plain mittlet pattern in stockinette stitch. A great idea.
- deb

Why choose to work with stripes in 3 colours? Two colours are easier to choose and easier to work, right?

But there is a beauty to working with 3 colours. The yarn is carried up both edges of your work when working back and forth. For my cardigan, worked top down in one piece, I will carry the yarn down both front edges which will make these front edges even. If I'm a little tight with the yarn carries, I'll be tight on both sides. And picking up the Front bands hides the yarn carries and evens up the Front edges even more.

Also, I don't have to keep track of which colour is coming up next. Once I get going, the colour I need is ready to be worked when I get to the end of each stripe.

Starting from the top, I work 3 rows of light blue, back and forth in stockinette stitch, and drop the yarn. Now work with the dark blue yarn, work 3 rows and drop the yarn.The last stripe is in black and after working 3 rows the yarn is dropped on the edge on the right side of my sample. When I look at my work, the light blue yarn is dangling right there waiting it's turn. I can carry the yarn down and begin my next light blue stripe. No thinking, no mistakes. It's magic.

 

With 3 colours I think you could work any combination of odd numbered rows and it would all work out - 1 x 1 x 1 row, 1 x 3 x 5 rows, 3 x 1 x 3 rows, 7 x 3 x 5 rows, fat stripes, thin stripes. It may be endless, have fun.

-Deb

 

 

Spring is in the air, even though yesterday it snowed a ton and we're back to below freezing weather. Never the less, I'm quite sure it will arrive sometime soon. So I'm knitting myself a spring sweater based on the Summer-time Top from the Button Up Your Top Down book (striped top in centre row).

It begins at the top with a square neck and 3 colours. It has a picked up buttonband so I can put lots of small buttons on it. I'm going to make the sleeves narrower and 3/4 length. I want to put in some body shaping and am leaning towards A-line shaping and a longer length. Then it could be worn as a cardigan or as a buttoned up tunic over capris or summer pants. Then I'll write it up as a pattern. Let's Begin.

I thought I would write this pattern up into the larger Plus sizes. It could easily be knit in one colour but I must say, the stripes are fun to knit. Are stripes a fashtion no, no? Do you wear them?
-Deb

Lace Shawls

Thought I'd drop in a photograph of the shawls I'll be taking to Stitches West in 11 days. (Wow! That show snuck up fast!) I've really enjoyed knitting these shawls and it's so interesting to see the different effects with different yarns and colours.

The shawl on the right is knit in our Cabin Fever Silk & Silver fingering weight (superwash merino/silk/sterling silver) which I dyed in shades of black/blue and hints of purple. You can't see it in the photograph, but the silver gives it a lovely, subtle, glitter. Very pleased with that. The pattern is leaves surrounded with ripples and the border has little clear beads with silver in their centre.

The shawl in the middle was the first one I did and it's in the Fibre Isle bison light sock weight yarn in it's natural colour. Very light and delicate and lovely to work with. The pattern is leaves and medallions and the beads on the border are clear glass.

The shawl on the left, which I just completed, is knit in Shelridge Farm's superwash merino in DK weight. The colour is "celery" but it said leaves to me! I'm taking these to the show as kits as we stock or dye all these yarns.

All of the shawls are knit from the top-down beginning at the garter stitch centre. And all the shawls are done using the "Knitting Lace Triangles" by Evelyn A. Clark. I am a big fan of hers! 

I've been writing up, and test knitting, the accessories for the teen book over the last few days so knitting up the samples, in hopefully their final format, is my plan for the long weekend while watching the Olympics. First off is the scarf to match Deb's Waffle Jacket. The mittlet looks lovely and I think the scarf will be terrific.

- Lyn

Kitchener - Waterloo Knitting Show

Back from the annual Kitchener Waterloo Knitting show which was terrific as it always is. This is a show that is completely run by the members of the KW Knitting Guild. We've been going for years - way back when, when the show was held at the highest level of bleechers in a hockey arena. We sold yarn, while the kids played hockey on the ice below us. Very appropriate we thought.

We see lots of old friends and meet many new ones too. I wanted to thank my two amazing helpers, Judith and Dana, who did a sterling job of helping me set up (and even more importantly, break down after the show!!) and worked hard during the day, along side Deb, answering questions and picking yarn colours. Yea! What a team!

Lynn stopped by to show off her beautiful Sarah, from our "Button Up Your Top Down" book, designed by Bernice Vollick. Here's the front view:

And the back view: (sorry I was a bit wobbly there)

Lynn knit this in Buffy's yarn (Shelridge Farm) and here's Buffy in her booth:

Lot's of old friends like Evie, in Karen's booth (SheepStrings)

Caroline of SweaterKits with her daughter Laura:

A great time was had by all and I've booked us to do it all again next year! See you then.

-Lynda

Shrug #2

So here is the 2nd attempt at a shrug for the movie premiere. I was very pleased as it fit! I used our Cabin Fever Cotton Tweed DK in black, and loosely based the structure on Deb's Basic Aran V-Neck sweater from our "Button Up Your Top Down" book. I used the needles appropriate for me for the aran weight (ie 4.5mm/US7) and, as I'm quite a loose knitter, I ended up with a gauge even slightly more than aran. You can see that it's fairly plain with a stocking stitch body and a 2 x 2 rib for the neckline and cuffs. I didn't have to do any "patternwork" as the texture and flecking of the tweed worked very well. The sleeves are a tiny bit shorter than I was thinking of but I was running out of time!! (I got the shrug done and buttons sewn on 20 minutes before I had to leave to drive to Toronto - that's cutting it fine!)

I also used this as an exercise to try "knitting backwards". This is where you don't purl. When you come to the end of the knit row you DON'T TURN, you just knit backwards across the row. Very cool. Slower of course than purling but it worked! And I was surprised to see how even the gauge was.

Oh, and here's a picture of the "red carpet". : )

Lynda

Self-Interview about Self-Publishing

March 19, location - downtown Toronto, DKC knitting guild (http://www.downtownknitcollective.ca/) , present - many knitters knitting, Lynda and I speaking on Self-Publishing.

I put myself in the position of the knitting audience and asked ourselves questions that I thought they might be interested in. We did a Self-Interview on Self-Publishing. You might recognize a theme here - self, self, self. We DO like to do things ourselves. At least we thought so until we asked ourselves "How many people were involved in making the Button Up Your Top Down book?" - an astounding 22 !! - 6 of us doing the designs, a photographer, our contact at the printers, a friend doing the copy edit, several models, 2 pattern checkers, another friend wrote some style text, a graphic artist did the cover, several test knitters and ... I'm sure I'm forgetting someone. Anyway a big crew and now I look back I'm not sure how it all came together but it did.

I do remember moments, like choosing the cover. We had the basic style set and had to choose between 4 different colourways. So we pinned them to the wall and 3 of us are stood with our eyes closed, open your eyes, which one do you see first? Change them up, eyes closed, open and which one jumps out? We all agreed, Done.

I have spoken now at the DKC 3 times, a friendly and very active guild. It's a joy to go there because of all the familiar faces and of course each time meeting some new knitters.

If you are in the Toronto area at the end of April come to the guild's Knitter's Frolic (see their website above) it's a terrific show, lots of vendors and a great line-up of classes. We'll be there as vendors and teaching.

"Lynda, What is the trickiest part of doing a book like the Button Up Your Top Down? - The layout.

What's the most work? - The layout.
What's the most fun? - The layout.

The knitters continuing to do their thing.

Rocky brought her Top Down pullover from the Top Down For Toddler book. And look, it has 3 tiny pockets (you can just see the yellow lining of the pockets). Wow, what a great addition. I love it.

I'm off for the weekend. My husband and I are celebrating our silver anniversary with some time away and some time at the curling rink too as our daughter is playing in the Tim Horton's Trophy Provincial championships. Fun for us to watch her doing what she loves to do. I am of course taking my knitting, it's second sock weekend, being as it's a celebration of coupledom.

- Deb

Votes Are In

The votes are 3:1 for the more complex instructions/better looking v.s. simple instructions/some distortion.


Ann wrote "I would vote for the more complex directions that result in a neater finish – and I feel that way whether the sweater be pint sized or enormous! I think that one of the attractions of so many of your patterns is the very “clean” lines one achieves by not having seams in the usual places. Any shaping within the piece needs to reflect that precision, and where stocking stitch is being used, this is even more important, as there is no flexibility for “hiding” increases or decreases by careful placement within the stitch pattern."


SuEllyn wrote "I vote for the second one because it’s not much more complicated and looks really good. If I only had the first choice available I would work it through because it doesn’t look bad, just not as good."


From Sascha (who regularly leaves a comment, thanks for that) "I like the look of the second method of decreasing. For me it wouldn't make a lot of difference in keeping track, as I just write it all out, circling the dec rows and check them off. I'd do that with either method. I just like the look better on the sweater using the second way."


Ann also tagged on "Also, the inclusion of a little spice in the form of a more challenging technique, especially one that is only worked for a relatively small part of the overall process, would be appealing to many knitters."


Yay Ann, I'm also that kind of knitter or I wouldn't be pushing the Top Down construction to see what it can do. But simpler instructions let a lot more knitters into the process.


Heather wrote "I don’t mind the distortion at all, I actually kind of like it. So I vote for distortion + simpler directions."


As a designer these are important questions for me. I want to let lots of knitters of different experience levels into what I do. And trying to work things out the easiest and most logical fashion is a continuing challenge. This is not 'dumbing down'!! This is doing things as straight forwardly as possible and not using complexity just because I can which is a poor excuse for not giving it enough thought to find the easier way. I'm also looking for a 'good bang for the buck' as they say. If I use something more complex I want to know that the result is worth the trouble of doing it.

I now have a plan. After talking to my friend and fellow designer, Bernice (www.mommabearknits2.blogspot.com), I finally worked out that I actually have 2 Baby sweater booklets worth of knitting here. I am going to work one booklet in a simpler fashion with a shallow V (below) which I used in the Button Up Your Top Down book. I'm going to include both cardigans and pullovers.

The second booklet will have the complex directions with the deeper V for the more advanced knitter looking for something different. Something like these.

I am going to work the booklets in the same fashion as the books - write out basic patterns, give them to Cabin Fever designers and let them have fun with them. This is a long road so don't expect anything soon. I'm hoping one booklet will be done for June/08. I'm so happy to have a plan. Lots of baby things to knit, yes, yes, yes!

Thanks for all the comments. I really appreciate the input. It helps me settle things in my head and also gives me a feeling of who I am designing for - You.

- Deb

Short Row fun

Ahem, class we are ready to begin: Here is the collar and a couple of short rows worked on my baby cardigan. About 4 short rows across the shoulders and back of neck have been worked. In the next photo you can see a close-up of the turning point, there is a gap on the needle where I turned and worked back leaving a bunch of stitches unworked on the needle. This is what defines the short row, you turn in the middle of the row and go back. On the next short row I will knit 2 sts past that gap. That's how you move down the collar sts and eventually get to the end of the row.







I'm much further along and there are many more rows across the shoulders and the back of the neck. I have crept along the collar stitches and the gap is closer to the buttonbands on the fronts which are designated by the red ring markers. I also have a very nice V forming on the Fronts along the raglan shapeline (where the increasing is done - white markers) which will result in a lovely V neck.
In the close-up of the turning gap, I can see that between the gap and the red marker I have 9 sts which means I have 5 more right side short rows to go since each short row ending there takes up 2 sts each time, and the last time I knit right to the end of the row.



I know, techy stuff. I love it. I love how short rows can do all this terrific stuff. They are what makes the V neck and I can now make them shallow or deep depending on how I work the short rows. Isn't this great fun?

I'm happy with my little baby sweaters and will proceed with the rest of the caridgan now that I have this all sorted.

Don't hold your breath, that means I will add this to the UFO pile and work on it over the next week. I can't believe I just added 3 more sweaters to the pile. They are only small but still.

I did finished one sleeve of my adult top down pullover> I'm giving myself a pat on the back for that one. Still one sleeve to go but there is progress.

-Deb

Sally Melville speaks

Last evening I attended the Aurora Knitting Guild. Marlene wore her Button Up Your Top Down cardigan called A Hint of Lace. She choose electric blue with lime and light blue and it looks great. A lovely colour combination which my camera does not to justice. It was great to see it and I remember Marlene picking the colours a the K-W Knitting show in Sept. so a quick knit too.


The guest speaker at the guild was Sally Melville and it's a treat to hear speak. Her topic was Using Your Stash which was the main theme in her Styles book. She had some wonderful samples to pass around and the knitted samples which were overdyed were terrific.

Here she is talking to the woman who were wearing garments from her various books. Great to see them being worn and loved by the knitters who made them. I love to see that.

A fun evening and some new ideas to think about.

-Deb

No Finishing Here

There is no excuse for any of this. The startistis bug has got me firmly in it's grip and I can't stop. Someone help me!

This blue Top Down is an adult version of the Tweeny pattern (www.cabinfever.ca/P617.html) . I really liked the neckline on this so after finishing the Tweeny pattern for teenagers and small adults I immediately started one for myself. I did work out the sizes from 39" to 53" and the writing of the pattern should be following but ... it is not at present.

No, I started another pair of socks. I incorporated a pattern from a hat I knit over the Christmas holidays. It swirls but I'm not convinced this is a great pattern for a sock yet since it is not well defined enough. But I love the swirl. So I may look for a better swirling pattern but does anyone want to finish a couple of socks? I'm soooo close to being done. But there they sit in the pile of UFOs.



And another lonely sock. Yes, there are more. This is another Lacey Leg sock (www.cabinfever.ca/P165.html) using Shelridge Farm's wool since I thought the orange I used previously, a gorgeous lace sock, did not photograph well. All that colour was distracting. But this sock is lonely and wants a mate, it's starting to moon around something dreadful. Sock romance is so pitiful. I will have to knit another one soon. I can't stand the sighing from this ever growing pile beside my chair.

This sweater you may remember from before Christmas. It's been side tracked by so many other beginnings and I'm really starting to feel guilty. I missed photographing the second sleeve which has dpns in it and is knit to the elbow. It would take no time at all to finish and strike one more project off of my guilty UFO list. And I'm going to do that, really I am, soon, really soon.

Right after I wind up this green wool which reminds me that spring is coming and that the days are getting longer and ... I really need a green sweater, with navy trim and a large collar and huge buttons and ribbing down the centre front and back. It's all right there in my head. How can I resist that.

I know, I am weak, so weak. And I didn't even show the photograph of the baby sweater I started yesterday. But it's tiny, hardly worth a mention. And I intend to finish it soon.

- Deb

A Hint Of Lace

Isn't this beautiful? Betsy M. made this for her daughter Ann. I met Betsy when I taught in Houston with the Knit At Night guild ( http://www.knitatnight.org/ ) in Sept 07.



This is the Hint of Lace from the 'Button Up Your Top Down' by Cabin Fever. In the book this sweater is done in blues and a second one in brown/pink. This is a lovely colourway and shows how different it can look with a change in colour.



We had discussed some changes she could make to the pattern for a better fit. Betsy was knitting the second size but wanted to make the sleeves a little slimmer. We decided that if she stopped working the increases on the sleeves when she had the number of stitches needed for the first (smaller) size and continued to increase on the body Fronts and Back until she had the number of stitches for the second size body she would get the sweater she wanted. She could then continue to work the body instructions for the second size and the sleeve instructions for the first size. It looks like this has worked out.

It's so cheerful, it makes me smile to look at it.

Thanks for sending the photo Betsy. I love it.



-Deb