Once in a while you come upon a great pattern that is zippity quick, simple to make and turns out great. (Rhymes!) Yesterday I knit Kris Basta's Bulky Felted Slipper. You can find the pattern in the files of the Yahoo machine knitting group. Her website is http:KrisKrafter.com/
She sells newly designed garter bars too, if you're interested. It is a great pattern for my recently enhanced Schuss Plus wool "collection". Kris has also given permission for me to use the pattern in our guild's newsletter. We're knitting slippers for the troops and they have to be either acrylic or felted because of the way stuff is washed in the service. A local organization ships them for free for us!
Never ever being content to leave well enough alone, I did make a couple of mods to the pattern. I wanted the heel to ride up a little higher in the back so knit 2 rows before shaping the heel. (Probably didn't make a smidgeon of difference. Could have done more, but they look and feel fine as is.) I knit them at T 10+ on my bulky rather than the T 7 she used. Don't know why other than I always use the largest tension when I'm felting something. It meant that I had to run the washing machine load 3 x to get them to felt way down. I knit 36 rows rather than 40 for the foot. It just looked like it was getting toooooooooooo long, so I kind of panicked. Finally, I seamed them by hand using a stitch that abuts the edges to lie as flat as possible. I believe she seamed hers on the sewing machine. Not huge changes, I'll admit. Next time I might follow her suggestion to pad the foot. I bet they would last longer that way.
Confession---I know better---but I felted them the last time with a white terry towel among other things in the load. It left a lot of linty fibers on the slippers. Crap. I spent some time pulling these off and "shaving" them so they looked new again. Won't repeat that performance any time soon!
Anyway, I think they are super attractive. The style would suit a man or woman I'm thinking.
You can see in the second picture that we still have snow on the bottom deck even though the temps have been in the 50's the last few days. Picture was taken out my craft room window. ugh and aargh.
A scan of the bottom of the slipper:
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1 comment:
Hi Mar!! I have a front loading washer. A friend told me that she felts in her front loader & uses the plastic dryer balls to help the slipper felt quicker. Haven't tried it yet, but that way, no lint. Anyway, they look awesome!! Sheryl
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