Junebug859 has added cables to the back of her mittlet. Nice, tight cables make a distinct pattern. They look great.

How about adding some bling?  Barb added beads to the Little Poncho pattern.

"Here’s the poncho with my sweet granddaughter Clara wearing it. I used the Czech glass beads interspersed in the broad band at the bottom." Barb.  [Doesn't Clara look happy? Ed.note]

Adding Beads. There's an idea!
Add Beads wherever you want:  Knit the stitch where you want to place the bead. Pinch the knit stitch off the Right needle, insert crochet hook into the hole of the bead and pull the knit stitch through the hole. Place the beaded knit stitch back onto the Right needle.

Are ponchos on their way back?
-Deb

 

 

I got some wonderful feedback on the mittlets (2 posts back) and the Challenge. The increase didn't cause anyone any problems, phew. The Challenge was to make up a 8-stitch pattern for the back of the mittlets to see how they would turn out.

Miss Mouse (teal pair) made a plain pair to check out the increase. 

Brenda (brown pair) put a rope cable of her own on the Back.

Bernice made up her own knit/purl pattern for the back of her mitten.

 

I think there are a couple more coming. Bring them on. I'm looking forward to seeing them. THANKS for joining in. I really appreciate the feedback.

-Deb

I'm working on my class for the YarnOver SleepOver Retreat, April 12-14. The idea is similar to the Challenge in the last post and the talk I did at the Kawartha knitting guild. There is a theme here that I've been working on.

A Basic pattern, and we all have some in our libraries, has a lot of possibilities that you can't see in the photo. If you can take a step away from the written pattern, just a tiny step, there are many options available to you from every Basic pattern you own. What do you see here?

Small projects with acres and acres of stockinette stitch. What could we do with all those stitches? Could we put a cable in there, a texture pattern, maybe some lace, how about a stitch pattern you make up yourself? We'll talk about what we might do, how we could do it and have some fun thinking up as many wild and crazy ways to decorate as we can. It's sounding like a good time to me.

-Deb

 

If you're interested in a weekend away and can join us, here's the info YarnOver SleepOver Retreat . I can't wait to see what we come up with.

This is a mittlet pattern I'm going to put in the Accessory Book we're working on now. There are instructions for both versions: a Basic (stockinette stitch mittlet) or a Patterned mittlet (with a pattern up the centre back). Would you like to try it out and tell me what you think of it? In the book it will be in many gauges but for now it's really quick to knit in chunky weight yarn.
It has an interesting increase which you may or may not like, let me know. You could substitute the easier Kf/b increase if it's a problem.
And if you can catch any errors please let me know. (If you print this off it's about 6 pages but watch that you don't continue to print the 5 posts that follow it, that's a lot of paper.)

CHALLENGE: The challenge I gave the Kawartha Hooks and Needles Guild was to make up their own 8-stitch pattern. Have a go. There's an empty chart at the bottom. You can make your stitch pattern any number of rows high. Send me a photo of the mittlet with your own stitch pattern on it. I'd love to post them.

I'm going to take this down on March 11.

 

ERGONOMIC MITTLETS
For Adult with CHUNKY YARN
Designed by Deb Gemmell

Pattern will be available on Patternfish in April, 2013.

This evening I'm doing a talk at the Kawartha Hooks and Needles Guild. I'm going to use mittens

to point out that there is a very nice blank canvas right there on the back of a Basic mitten pattern. What might we do with it? I've made some samples with patterns from the Need A Hat book.

Basketweave pattern from the Ice Cubes hat,

and the Mock Cable pattern from the Snowshoe Hat. Also it's easy to see that any mitten pattern can be made into fingerless mittlets. We're going to have fun playing with patterns and imagining all kinds of mittens we might make.
-Deb

The new Crescent Spokes scarf is up on Patternfish. I knit it in Saucon Fingering, my current favourite yarn. It's a cotton/acrylic fingering (sock) weight yarn and makes a really great scarf. I think I'm a convert to scarf wearing now. I had a great time figuring out how many ways this scarf could be worn.

 

Deb

We are hard at it, planning our April 12-14 retreat. Here we are doing it the way knitters do it: knitting, eating and planning. We were working out a class schedule and some ideas for fun things to do over the retreat weekend. YarnOver SleepOver Retreat

Ten of us are working on this project. It involves many designers, a couple of yarn distributors, a yarn dyer, the patternfish.com ambassador, a couple of tech editors, sample knitters, a store owner, a machine knitter, a couple of crocheters and probably some areas I've overlooked. It's been an exciting way to get together with different people who work with fibre, all self-employed, independent workers in our crazy industry.

 

Are you working on any community projects, yarn related or otherwise?

Deb