Wednesday, December 18, 2019

Fuzzy Feet Revisited

Wanted to make a specific size with different wool than I had used in the past on my LK 150 midgauge.  This exercise just reinforced the fact that felting/fulling is really unpredictable.  These are intended for my 8 year old grandson as a stocking stuffer.  Guessing the stitches and rows,  I did 50 stitches x 60 rows, every other needle. (I am counting the actual stitches, not total needles on the machine.)  On my bulky machine I could use every needle.  No go on the midgauge.  Since the midgauge didn't especially like this yarn or the fact that there were two strands (one wool and one fun fur) I kept the fun fur on the floor and hand fed it with the yarn in the mast, both going into the carriage together.  So far so good.  These take very little time to knit.  After aggressive felting in the washing machine, they turned out to be my size. Pretty large.

Back to the drawing board.  This time I used 25 stitches and 40 rows.  Wild guess.  8 rows each color: red, yellow, purple, green, royal blue.  Same method.  Yea! they turned out the right size for an 8 year old, about 9" long.  I bought some googly eyes and sewed them on, also adding a dot of permanent fabric glue to hold the eyes in place.  Don't know if the eyes themselves will withstand washing, but won't be a tragedy if they don't.  Non- threatening monster slippers!  The slippers are really soft and so cute!

Posting this so that you know--- if you make them--- the process might take a few tries.  Unfortunately once they are felted, you can't undo them.  But if they turn out a size you didn't intend, they should fit someone! Check out my previous post for more specific directions.

Sunday, December 15, 2019

Another Stocking Stuffer : Quick Cowl


Cablely Cowl    by Mar Heck  ©2019

This is a really easy cowl/neck warmer that you can knit up in really short order.  Makes a nice gift and you can make several for yourself too!  I knit it on a midgauge machine, but you could make it on other machines adjusting the gauge so that you end up with a cowl that is 6”+ x 24”+. Use any yarn that works with your machine.  Variegated is nice.  The cables make automatic buttonholes!   Directions are given for the midgauge or bulky.  To knit on other gauge machines, get your gauge, then take a tape measure or piece of yarn and wind around your neck to see what length you want.

Machine:  Midgauge – I used Brother KX 350
Yarn:  Lion Brand Wool, worsted weight, run together with mill end variegated thread (poly and cotton slubs) – optional, or use any worsted weight yarn.
Other:  2 one inch buttons
Gauge:  4 st x 5 rows = 1”  (not too critical because you can block and also adjust the button placement)
Suggested Finished sizes:  After blocking, 6” height x 22” length, 8” x 24”,  8” x 28”

Directions:  Cast on with waste yarn over needles R 1-25 and knit a few rows T 10. 5
 E wrap loosely over all needles with main yarn. Knit one row.  Transfer stitches as in diagram.


In other words, put needles 3, 8, 13, 18, 23 out of work when you cast on over right 1-25.  If you are making a wider scarf, continue in the same pattern leaving two plain stitches at the sides.

Knit 10 rows.  (I did 10 rows because it is faster and also easier to keep track of on the row counter.)  Cable:  With two 2-prong tools, *make a 2 x 2 cable on stitches 4,5,6,7—9,10,11,12—14,15,16,17—19,20,21,22 (counting the needles out of work),   Knit 10 rows.* Repeat from * to * 8 or more times, knit 10 rows plain, one loose row and chain cast off pulling next stitch through the previous stitch with your latch hook.  OR, use the bind off of your choice.  Remove waste yarn.   Note that the sides of the cables form holes that are decorative and also act as automatic buttonholes. And, with serious blocking, you can make scallops.


Finishing:  Block the rectangle aggressively, pinning out the space between cables on both edges to make curvy lines.  Steam press hard if using wool, steam above the fabric if using acrylic, and leave pinned until it dries.  Remove waste yarn and sew in/hide yarn ends.  Sew on buttons two inches in from the end. (Or, adjust size for recipient.)  OPTIONAL- Bend over top corner and tack down invisibly with sewing thread.  I left the bottom more open rather than sewing on another button to better conform to a person’s neck, but you can add a 3rd button.  The red cowl pictured is more fitted to the neck.  You may want a looser one.

Saturday, November 30, 2019

Need a stocking stuffer? Knit some Fuzzy Feet Slippers


Fuzzy Feet  by Mar Heck ©2019

 This pattern is adapted from an easy, old, hand- knit slipper pattern that for years has been passed along from grandmother to grandchild and probably has been knit a million times.   Adding three twists to the pattern:  they are done on the machine in lightening quick fashion in stockinette stitch, we are adding fun fur to tickle our fancy and we are felting them to make them extra warm. MACHINE:   9 mm Bulky or midgauge 

SIZES:
   Child to adult.  Adult in parenthesis.

MATERIALS NEEDED:
  3 (4) skeins Lion Brand Fun Fur™ (60 yards per skein, polyester), purple used for the sample
  1 (2) skeins knitting worsted weight wool yarn (Do not use wool yarn made to resist
   felting,  called superwash.) Light blue used for the sample.   Large eyed needle for sewing up

SKILL LEVEL:
    Beginner.
         Skills needed:  Making a swatch and determining gauge
                                E wrap cast on.               
                                Mattress stitch for hand sewing.



DIRECTIONS:

1.  Determine the recipient’s foot size by taking two measurements.  Measure the foot length from heel to toe and then measure around the instep close to the ankle.  The foot length will be the finished slipper length (number of rows)  and the width will be how high the slipper comes up each side of the foot on the sides of the heel/ankle (number of stitches).  The slipper is just a plain rectangle.

2.  Make a swatch .  You will make the slipper the size of the felted gauge. With one strand of fun fur and one strand of the wool held together, e wrap cast on 20 stitches and knit 30 rows at the largest tension your machine will do.  End with waste yarn and remove from machine.  The waste yarn will tell you which direction is the rows.  If it felts really well, it’s hard to otherwise tell which direction is which.  It will feel like a big waste of yarn, but you’ll only have to do this once for a particular brand of wool.  (You might be able to later think of a use for this little swatch.)  Throw the swatch in the washing machine until the wool felts.  Depending on the yarn you choose it may take a few cycles for it to felt.  After it attains the look you want, measure the swatch to determine stitches and rows per inch or centimeters, whichever you are more comfortable with.   Multiply the stitches and rows per inch times the dimensions you want to determine how many stitches and rows you will knit for your rectangle.  (See note below for calculating.) Note that it will have shrunk more in length than in width.

***If you prefer not to make a swatch, for a rough reference:  using the largest tension, my child’s slipper turned out to be at T 10.. 44 stitches X 50 rows to fit an 7-8” foot.  My adult women’s slipper, about a size 9, turned out to be 50 stitches X 74 rows to fit a 9 -10 inch foot. Because felting is not an exact science, you’ll need to do a little experimenting with the yarn you choose.  If you use the same yarns for different sizes, you can knit a pair using your best guesses for stitches and rows then adjust for other sizes by adding or subtracting stitches and rows. This works fine if you would prefer not to waste yarn on a swatch.  (You can’t reuse yarn that’s been felted, so some people would prefer to just dive right in.)    Another thought: you will want the slipper to be a bit snug, so do not add any ease.

3.  Directions for knitting.  Knit one rectangle for each  slipper.

*  E wrap cast on loosely from left to right with one strand of each yarn held together over the number of needles  you have determined you need.  Leave a yarn tail at the beginning about 10” long to later sew up the heel seam.

*  Put the yarns together in the feeder and turn the dial to the largest tension number.  Set your row counter to zero and knit one row from right to left.  (May be a bit hard to push the carriage.)

*  Hook the cast on comb into the stitches.  Add as much weight across the knitting as you can. Use ribber weights if you have them.  For the first 2-3 rows, pull all needles out to E position each row to make the stitches knit off a little easier.  Yank the knitting down after each row so that the fur doesn’t get hung up on the gate pegs.  Knit the number of rows you have determined you need.

*  End with the carriage on the right side.  Take the yarn out of the feeder and cut a length of the two yarns about 1 ½ feet long which will be used for sewing up the top of the slipper. ( I sewed mine first then felted them. ) Thread both strands into a large eyed  needle and take the stitches off their needles, one at a time from right to left onto this thread.  When all stitches are off the machine, pull the stitches as tight as you can.  This will be the toe.  You will most likely have a little hole, so stitch across the hole from north to south and east to west a few times.  Neatness doesn’t count because the felting and the fur will hide your sewing.

* Don’t break yarn.  With this same length of yarn, sew up the top of the foot seam with a mattress stitch from the toe towards the back of the slipper.  Again, for reference, I sewed a 3 inch seam for the child’s slipper and a 4 inch seam for the adult.  Fasten off by sewing through your last stitch again and then hide the yarn tail inside the slipper by sewing through the backs of 5-6 stitches and cutting the yarn off.   You need a large enough opening to slip the foot into, but small enough to stay on snugly.

*   Thread both strands of your beginning yarn tail into a large eyed needle and sew up the heel seam. You will be folding the back of the slipper in half and sewing from top to bottom.  The stitches face each other, so you can’t do a mattress stitch.  Any seam will do. Sew twice for strength.  Hide the yarn tail as above.

*  Note:  the edge that ends up around the ankle needs no treatment.  When felted it lies perfectly flat.  No problem there!

4.  Felt both slippers at the same time in the same wash load(s) giving them the same treatment as you did your swatch.  My wool needed 3 hot/cold cycles to felt, but each yarn brand seems to behave differently as do different colors, so you just need to monitor it.  When felted to the size you need, scrunch up some plastic bags, stuff the slippers so they have a nice shape and let them dry for a day or so.  Petting them doesn’t prolong the drying period, so have at it.  It’s amazing how the wool pulls together and makes the non-felting polyester “fur” more dense.  People are kind of surprised you can do this on a machine.  Just one bit of warning, they’re slippery on smooth floors.

5.  I found this addictive and made several pairs. They are so soft and cozy! For your next pair, you can do stripes and/or embellish them with bows, eyes, ears, tails, whatever.  Baby booties would be really cute and easy.  Because of the slippery nature of the slippers  (is that how the word came about?), the pattern may not be appropriate for toddlers or older folk.  You decide.  Once you have your gauge, the next pair is a snap. They are so silly, they’re fun!

New Knitter Notes:

Ewrap Cast On:
Pull needles that are going to be in work out to E position.  Make a slip knot and hang it on first needle on the left.  Push the knot back to the needle bed.  Just as though you were writing a cursive “e”, wrap the yarn around each needle counter clockwise, from left to right up against the bed, not in the hooks of the needles.  Easy does it---don’t wrap too tightly.  No need to wrap the last needle on the right.  Just put the yarn in the yarn feeder and that stitch will knit automatically as you push the carriage from right to left.  After your first row, hang the cast-on comb.

One way to calculate the stitches and rows per inch:
This simple method works in this case since we are dealing in approximations anyway.  For a sweater, you would want to do a more extensive swatch.  In this example, you knit 20 stitches and 30 rows and then felt your swatch.  When it has felted to your liking, measure the width.  Say your swatch, after felting, measures 4 inches across.  20 stitches divided by 4 inches = 5 stitches per inch.  To get your number of stitches for the width of the slipper, multiply 5 times the number of inches you want.  Say the length ended up to be 5 inches.  30 rows divided by 5 inches = 6 rows per inch.  To get the number of rows for the length of the slipper, multiply 6 times the number of inches you want.

Hand sewing a mattress stitch: 
Have the right sides of both pieces facing you, side by side.  With your large needle, go under two bars on the right side of the first stitch of the piece on the right, then under two bars on the left side of the first stitch on the left piece.  Go back and forth repeating from side to side, pulling the yarn taut now and then.  The stitches from each side pull together making the seam invisible from the right side.





Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Christine Linfeld’s shawl as a poncho



ridelikethewind’s PONCHO
Check out her poncho on Ravelry in her projects.  Hers is much prettier than mine, I'm afraid.  She used worsted weight yarn on a midgauge so her gauge is larger than mine, that is less stitches and rows. She was inspired by Bill King's waterfall sweater. She kindly helped me get my head around the construction and once I caught on, it was easy and went fast,

I used mohair from Cindy Schmatz when she had a yarn sale.  I used about 10- 50 gr hand knitting skeins I think…   Wound onto cones.  Unfortunately, I lost track!  Used my  LK 150 at T 4.


There are eyelets down center front and center back only, not also over the shoulders as in the original Christine Linfeld’s shawl. Also, the original shawl has 4 points.  This has two: one in front and one in back.

Overview of construction:


Start with waste yarn several rows and 1 row ravel cord over (110) needles.  On last row of waste yarn, transfer to the needle setup of lllxlllx….  Add extra stitches at each side which will be neck and bottom edges.
 Start with straight section and knit (72) rows. CAR.

Begin short rows: Set machine to hold. At the opposite side of the carriage, Hold 3 needles, knit 4 rows.  At the same time, short row at the neck (left side) 3 additional stitches and wrap end n every 8 rows.  (didn’t do enough the first time see note at end)
Finish short rowing:  Opposite the carriage put 3 N in work, knit 4 rows until all N are in work.

Straight section: Knit the same number of rows as you did the first time.  Front (or back) completed.


Repeat the whole thing for the other side of the poncho.


End with one row of ravel cord and  then several rows of waste yarn. You will be joining at one shoulder.  Kitchener stitch the seam.  It’s kind of awkward kitchener stitching because of the needle out of work loop.  Try to stitch 3 st to three st so it looks continuous but lies flat.  Truly it takes much longer to seam this than it did to knit it,  Run in any yarn tails.


Additional comments:  I recommend using a highly contrasting waste yarn color to help you find the stitches for kitchenering.  I have put my measurements in parenthesis because you will want to use your own number of stitches, hence rows.  I am rather fluffy these days so mine is XL, which is comfy for a poncho for me.  Because I didn't short row the neck enough, the neck turned out huge!  She ended up with 22 ridges, I have 27.
 Attempt to tighten neck because I didn't want to rip out the whole thing!!!:
3.25 crochet hook, yarn DOUBLED.  Chain stitch (not sc) around starting at shoulder picking up every other knit stitch x 9 then skip 2 knit st for the 10th  chainstitch. Row 2 chain in each chain st.


Mine ended up with these measurements:


32" seems like a lot for the neck, but it really isn't.  I prefer to not have clothing tight around the neck.  This sits nicely on the shoulders.  The neck doesn’t look so puffy when worn so I’m not that unhappy about it.  Next time:  short row  # ????  Will need to experiment.  Did leave the bottom edge alone even though it curls a little.




Close up of eyelets:


 Red is super hard to photograph, especially with this cheap phone camera of mine. Plus the halo of the mohair doesn't show. As always looks much nicer in person.  I hope you have a good imagination because this pattern really is a gem.  I think it will be good to wear this in spring and fall and also in the house when temps are below zero outside. 


Tuesday, November 12, 2019

Garter Carriage Running Again

I bought my garter carriage years and years ago.  Used it to make a few things, put it on the shelf and forgot about it.   Kind of dumb to let a piece of equipment go unused, right?  Judging from members of my mk guild, it's common to NOT use it.  People are a little intimidated.  So, not having used it for a good while,  I took a refresher class from Cindy Schmatz sponsored by our mk guild and got the thing going again.  It's an 89 version with a new motor.  She tells me it's exactly like the newer versions but will not cast on automatically like the newer models do.  I can e-wrap just fine.  So I'm happy about that.

After a couple of mishaps (the main one not getting the carriage seated properly on the bed and it made a terrible clanking sound) I had some success.  The first thing I made was a baby hat.  Not so many stitches and rows, so it went faster than some other projects I hoped to make.  I shoulda/coulda wiped out the partial stars on the seam edges, but just wanted to see if it would chug along correctly.  No dropped stitches, feeling pretty good about things.  This baby hat wouldn't be warm enough in a Minnesota winter, but under the hood of a snowsuit would be ok. 
The rib looks ok (better than the picture shows) but I coulda/shoulda done that part with the ribber in 1/10 the time.  (Next time.)  The pattern is large snowflakes from a Brother G carriage book.

So- gaining some confidence, I programmed in another Brother G carriage pattern (073) adding 2 x 2 staggered edgings so it wouldn't roll.  I love this design.  My friend Sandy I. has made gorgeous baby blankets with it.  I made it long--- the length is the width worn--- and have worn it doubled since it wouldn't be super warm with a single layer using this particular yarn.  Since this cowl is 127 stitches and 372 rows it took maybe 16 hours to knit! I kitchenered the first row to the last but that's all I had to do other than hiding 2 yarn tails.   Here's a screen shot of the DAK pattern:

And a picture of the cowl folded double:

I have read that one shouldn't steam garter carriage stuff, so I didn't.  The picture doesn't show the texture as nice as it is in person,  Nice! I like it.

I have some  wool that would be warm enough with a single layer, so I changed the middle pattern to half.  Same Brother pattern.  Haven't knit it yet, but it's on my to-do list.  This is a screen shot of that pattern:

Being 68 stitches it will go a little faster.

Here's the original 24 st punch card pattern from Brother that I manipulated in DAK.

 If you have DAK and would like any of these patterns emailed to you, write to me and I'll send. 

It's getting cold here already so the extra winter wear is welcome.

Friday, November 8, 2019

How to knit mk hats---- lightening fast



I posted this on Ravelry in the machine knitting group, but some people may not belong.  So I thought I'd repeat my post here hoping it will help someone. I should give credit to my friend, Bruce, who taught me this trick.
Some people have asked how I can make hats “in minutes” on my knitting machine. Here’s how.
  1. For my charity hats, I used a midgauge which requires less stitches and rows than a standard. Sometimes I had to double the yarn. A bulky would even be faster.
  1. The trick: Buy a metal rod that is the length of the width of your knitting machine. (Very cheap at hardware store.) Should be substantial in weight.
-Pull out every other needle for the width of the hat and knit one row main yarn. (no waste yarn)
- Hang your cast on comb BACKWARDS making sure each loop gets a tooth of the cast on comb.
-Pull out the rest of the needles so they will knit.
-Knit 2 times the length of the hem.
-Bring out every other needle all the way.
- Hang onto the cast on comb with your left hand pulling down slightly
-place the metal rod mid way, horizontally.
-Pull up the cast on comb up over the rod, hang loops so that each needle that is all the way out gets a loop. Takes some practice at first. Remove cast comb by tilting it so that the stitches land properly. If you miss some, use a single transfer tool to hang them.
-The rod is still in the hem and acts as an even weight throughout. Set the cast on comb aside.
-Knit the height of the hat and transfer every other stitch to its neighbor. Push out of work needles to out of work position so they do not knit but you don’t have to move the stitches inward.
-knit one row and take stitches off (I try to plan so the last row goes left to right because I am right handed) with a double eyed needle and enough of a yarn tail to sew the seam. Remove metal rod. It will start to fall down anyway. The stitches at the top cinch in just fine, especially if you are going to attach a pom pom which hides the opening. Seam the side.
The inside of the hem is not especially beautiful, but show me a kid who cares.
7 minutes knitting time! (Works with any machine) Sorry I don’t have pictures or a video. Hopefully my words are clear enough. Write to me if questions.  PS  I used the free pattern on my blog here and pictured below.

Monday, October 21, 2019

Challenge Completed! 113 hats for charity

As I posted a few months back, I said I'd post pictures of my 104 hats.  They were done as a guild challenge, which was to knit 104 hats for the year, approximately 2 per week, for charity.  I finished them plus 9 more a while ago but hadn't photographed them.  Not easy to get decent pictures of so many hats.  They are mostly going to an elementary school near where we have our meetings.  Some will go to a group home.  That must be a lot of yarn used up, but why is my stash still so huge? Ha.  I used the midgauge pattern here on my blog in case you need an easy pattern. Varied the sizes from about age 5 to 16 and some for boys, some for girls.  I tried not to make the same hat more than once, but sort of ditched that idea. I got so fast at it---took me 8 minutes to knit one hat, then another 15 to do the pom pom and seam. Made our cruel winter go a little faster.

So anyway.......... voila'.  Here they are in two pictures:

and...

Sunday, September 15, 2019

Educats and Edudogs

I'm pretty proud.  Mary Ann Oger has used my Educat and Edudog baby blanket patterns a few times for gifts.  I designed it with DAK and used my Brother 970 machine to make them.  The pattern was in a Knitwords issue (can't remember which one).  I suspect her preferred machine is a Silver Reed standard gauge machine.  Somehow translating it to a SR from a Brother created some issues.  Or, it's just the way SR machines work.  I dunno.  She shows how she dealt with it on her blog:  http://knitwords.blogspot.com/    Still  pretty cute patterns, if I do say so myself!


Friday, September 6, 2019

DAK 9 update/upgrade

If you are a DAK user, no doubt you have heard that there is an update available.  Reading the description, I was not so sure about it.  But I admit, I haven't seen all the possibilities.  I'll upgrade anyway. It isn't so expensive, as software goes, to upgrade from 8 to 9. I have this feeling we should support the businesses that are involved with machine knitting or they will disappear.
One nice thing in the upgrade is that the lace module is included.  That should be fun to work with.  I opted not to purchase it last time.
If anyone already has it, I'd love to hear what you think.

Sunday, July 21, 2019

It warms the cockles of my heart

I haven't the faintest idea where that expression comes from and it's 90 degrees F here as I write so I don't need any warming.  But needless to say, I'm pleased.

The picture on the left is my grandson about 4 years ago and the picture on the right is his little friend who has a Peppa Pig themed birthday party coming up next weekend.  He passed along the Peppa Pig sweater I made him and it looks like it is in good shape still.
It probably didn't get worn much since California is not especially conducive to warm sweaters (or the other way around).  I still have the DesignaKnit pattern I worked up for the Peppa design if anyone wants it.  Just write to me.  I used an iron on nylon interfacing for the motif on the back side and it worked wonders to keep all the floats hidden and in line. It was knit on my 970 as a large motif so the patterning would be easy.

You know how many times you give yourself a B+ and wish you had done something differently?  Well, this time it was the drop shoulder.  I should have done a fitted sleeve or a raglan.  Those little 3 year old shoulders are just too small.  O well.  Live and learn.

Our knitting guild is participating in a challenge where we knit 2 hats  for charity per week ending up with 104 hats to donate for the year.  There are 9 people participating and many of us have done lots more than 2 per week so I imagine we'll end up with close to 1,000 hats.  They'll go to the charity of each person's choice.  There is a needy elementary school near where we hold our meetings so that's where mine will go.  So far I have 110 hats but haven't photo'ed them yet.  Last winter when it was so blasted cold I just stayed in and knit my little heart out.  It got kind of addictive and felt good to be getting that yarn stash down a little.  I found I could knit about 9 hats from one cone, so the stash is still there.  I mostly used the yellow hat pattern with the doubled brim, free on the right side of the blog in case you are interested. I did pom poms on all just because I like them.  Some members have made ear flap hats, some have made doubled so that there are 4 layers over the ears when the brim is folded up.  I just made sure the area over the ears was at least doubled.  Otherwise, they are useless in our extreme winter climate.

So that's all until next time. I hope to take a picture of those hats one of these days...


Monday, April 1, 2019

Experiment with artwork

If you remember, I was trying my hand at converting zentangle art to a knitting pattern using DAK.  (See previous post for tips.) I finally managed to produce something.  I seem to enjoy the fooling around with the computer as much as the actual knitting.

Learned a little along the way.  One tip is this:  after you download your (free) zentangle design and open it in Paint, go "save as" and when it gives you the option of different file formats, choose monochrome bitmap.  It doesn't always completely convert it to black and white, but it does save some time in combining all the whites and blacks to 2 single colors. Ignore the "warning". Sometimes it works great. If you are proficient with another image processing program, use that.  The second is the cardinal rule, which I ignored, is to do a swatch.   A little arrogance, you know?? Not so much as to size but in my case whether the colors go together.  I loved the colors each by themselves but am not so crazy about what they look like together.  O well, was an experiment.  Finally, I think the larger design elements show up better than little tiny details.  But this may be just personal preference or this particular design.  Now that it has been knit up, I can see some improvements that could have been made.

So, anyway, here's my experiment.  I didn't want to do a time-consuming long scarf, so I opted for a cowl.
I wanted the cowl to be about 30 inches around and 10 inches high after hemming.  In order to get the 30 inches, it had to be knit lengthwise.  I used my Brother 970 standard gauge. My dimensions at a gauge of 7 st and 10 r at T9 were 140 ( 10 inches doubled)  stitches x 300 rows.  I didn't pay attention to whether any of the design matched anywhere it was to be seamed.  I did knit a few rows of waste yarn then plain rows at the beginning and end to make the kitchener stitching join easier than using the fairisle stitches. I decided I could put the join at the back of my neck so it wouldn't show.

Once off the machine I joined it into a tube with the kitchener stitch, then folded it in half to make it double, thus hiding the many long floats. I seamed with a mattress stitch.  I was careful to not skew the edges.   I didn't find the long floats an issue, but I suppose you could deal with them as you are knitting if they bother you.  They are hidden anyway, and when you block the knitting, the stitches stay put. Maybe if you were using a silky yarn, the stitches would not stay put.   I put the seam in the middle so that it wouldn't be visible, then steamed it aggressively.

Was a fun and fast project.  I think I'll do more.  I have amassed about 30 designs to keep me out of trouble for a good long while.  As always, write to me if you need help converting the design in DAK or any other issue.

April 1st!  Yea, spring is arriving.  We had a terrible winter, so the milder temps are really welcome.

Thursday, January 31, 2019

It's for the Birds

As I write this, the wind chill in Minneapolis is -66 degrees F.  Tomorrow is supposed to be lots better, but in the meantime, this old girl is staying inside.

My MK guild has a challenge this year to knit 2 charity hats per week from November to November.  That's all I have been doing---and now I have 53 done out of the 102 we're supposed to do.  UGH.  This isn't that much fun, but somehow I'm hooked.  I gotta do it!  One nice thing is that I'm using up some of my stashed cones.  I'm doing them all on the midgauge so there's a lot of doubling up yarn with my Silver Needles cone winder.  By the way, LOVE that thing and highly recommend it.

I have lots of yarn ends as a result of all this knitting.  So, I'm thinking about all these little birdies outside and wondering how in the world they survive in this below zero weather.  I have chopped up some of these yarn ends into 1" pieces and will set this paper plate full outside to see if there are any takers.  (This is just the ends from yesterday's knitting.) I am envisioning colorful nests all over the woods.  If no takers, o well, I tried.  Good intentions.
Will let you know if my good intentions have done any good.