Go KU!

I've completed the KU colors wool stadium blanket!  I'm so pleased with it!  I learned a lot of lessons after the KSU colors blanket: including how to handle the stretchy and slippery knitting yarn, as well as a better way to twist the fringe.

The blanket is made from 100% washable wool, what we call "superwash".  Cascade 220 superwash in two colors: Hyacinth (blue) and Really Red.  It has all the warmth of wool but ease of care like an acrylic. The blanket measures 57.5" x 33.5".

I made this blanket both wider and longer than the previous model, and I'm glad I did. It's a perfect cuddling blanket and will work great in the stadium. Here's my 4 year old, Elijah, demonstrating.  I'd say it's large enough for two people to share.  It'd be great as a seat cushion too!

 Cheesy, right??!

The fabric remains a bit weft-faced still, despite changes I made, but I'm happy with it!  

I discovered that you didn't need to tie the warp threads before twisting to make the fringe, and the result is much cleaner. 

So ROCK CHALK, JAYHAWK (a tribute to my alma mater)!

An update on current weavings:

I'm dressing my loom right now with cotton rug warp for a quick rag rug while I wait for some back ordered yarn. I'm excited to attempt my first rug!

On the table loom are the placemats. I'm nearly done with the second of four. It's in doubleweave, and it's been fun doing it. I've learned that a firm beat is not possible on the table loom, so future projects that need it should be done on the big loom from now on. But I've adapted the pattern and I still think it will turn out nice.

Inventing an infinity scarf

In my world, desire to not be wasteful is the mother of invention.  In my previous post, I told you about my experience with a loose knit in stockinette stitch, and how frustrated I was with how it curled.  I realized that in certain circumstances, you WANT curling at the edges.  It makes for a nice edge if done in the right way.  With that thought flowing through my head, I realized that I had some other leftover light-weight yarn (Knit Picks Galileo from my Striped Cowl) and I decided to try another item on the same needles as the Aimee Dew Cowl. 

So I began with an intentionally curling edge, and then started inventing.  I wanted the curled edge to stand out, so I made the edge a border in a different color.  I put a purl ridge on each side of the middle panel to help it lay flat.

Then I inserted a panel of chevrons in the middle, and finished with an identical border.

It's a fun, eye-catching accessory.  I really fussed with the edges in some of the pictures, it really curls on the edges more than it appears. 

The pink really gives it a pop of color.

It took me only about 4 hours to knit this one (similar to the Aimee cowl), and it was fun to use my brain and figure it out!

Here is the pattern:

Hogan Infinity Scarf
Yarn: Knit Picks Galileo (50% wool, 50% bamboo) or any sport weight yarn
          50g/131 yd - I used 1 skein of Abalone (7201) and 33g of Luster (1815)
Needles: US 10 (6.0mm) circular needle, 80cm long
              US 11 (8.0mm) straight or DPN for binding off
Notions: tapestry needle, blocking pins
Gauge: Gauge is not critical for this project

Abbreviations:
CO             Cast On
YO                  Yarn Over
K2Tog              Knit 2 Together
S1K1psso        Slip 1, Knit 1, Pass Slipped Stitch Over
BO                   Bind Off

In contrast color, CO 198 stitches.  Then join in the round, being careful not to twist the stitches. 
Rows 1-5 : Knit
Row 6: [K2Tog, YO]* repeat to end of round, don't forget the last YO!
Rows 7-9: Knit
Rows 10-11: Purl
Change to main color
Row 12: Knit
Row 13: [K4, YO, S1K1psso, K3]* repeat to end of round
Row 14: Knit
Row 15: [K2, K2Tog, YO, K1, YO, S1K1psso, K2]* repeat to end of round
Row 16: Knit
Row 17: [K1, K2Tog, YO, K3, YO, S1K1psso, K1]* repeat to end of round
Row 18: Knit
Row 19: [K2Tog, YO, K5, YO, S1K1psso]* repeat to end of round
Row 20: Knit
Repeat rows 13-20
Change to contrast color
Row 29: Knit
Rows 30-31: Purl
Rows 32-34: Knit
Row 35: [K2Tog, YO]* repeat to end of round, don't forget the last YO!
Rows 36-39: Knit
Change to size 11 needle and use traditional bind off.

Weave in the ends, block and enjoy!

I have listed this as a FREE pattern in Ravelry!  Make sure you post pictures when you complete it so I can see your handiwork!

Aimee Dew Cowl

More than a year ago, I made a beach pullover with this beautiful yarn: Louisa Harding Yarns Aimee. 

It is a blend of cotton and cashmere and is SOOOOOooooo soft.  I had 2 skeins leftover from that project, and I found this pattern to try.  This DK weight yarn on size 10 needles resulted in a really loose knit.  I was so happy with the result...until I removed the blocking pins.  This pattern utilized mostly stockinette stitch, and was supposed to be blocked aggressively to open up the eyelets.

Well, when you do that, especially with a yarn that is not firm and has plenty of drape, you get curling.  Nevertheless, I am pleased with the result - mostly because it feels like butter.

This was a quick knit, only took about 4 hours, and I think it'll be a great accessory in the bright blue color.  Reminds me of the beautiful color of the ocean at St. Croix (where I wore the beach pullover I made with the rest of the yarn).  

This cowl makes me think of summer!  Come on warm weather!

Striped Cowl

Oh my goodness.  This has to be one of my favorite things I've made.  And to be honest, I hated the way it was looking as I knit it.  But check this out:

This is my striped Terrain cowl.  I started off with the yarn.  This is Knit Picks Galileo and ever since I saw it in the Knit Picks magazine, I wanted to use it in something.  They combined merino wool and bamboo in a 50/50 mix, and boy does it have a beautiful luster to it.  It's also super soft. 

As you can see from the photo, it's made from alternating colors in stockinette and then reverse stockinette stripes.  While in process, the reverse stockinette stripes curled around, almost hiding the pink color completely, and I was sure aggravated with it.  The pattern seemed to play into this problem, having fewer rows in the pink stripes.  But I plodded along, grumbling quite a bit.

There is serious magic in blocking.  After soaking in wool wash and laid out to dry, everything became behaved, and it looks fabulous!

It is a very long cowl, so will drape nicely around the neck and give a bulky look.  I'm sure it'll be very warm, too!

Rebeaming

I've sat and stared at my table loom and avoided it for long enough!  Time for action.

Here's the dilemma:

After beaming on nearly 6 yards of cotton, I ended up with super uneven lengths at the end. 

Now there are a couple reasons this may be.  

1. When measuring the warp on the warping board, starting off, the yarn is wrapped in contact with the wooden pegs, so they were all the correct length.  But as more threads are added, they were on top of earlier threads, which made the later threads longer. 

2. When measuring the warp, if the lengths are pulled tightly, it will bend the pegs inward. This will make your yarn shorter than desired. 

3.  The beaming process was uneven, which itself can be caused by several things:

     a. Inconsistent tension/speed while rolling

     b. Irregularities with the warp spacing material (cardboard between the layers of warp)

     c. Tugging on the loose warp as it's being beamed. 

After considering all this, I decided the only one that made sense was 3b. I had been trying to use cut paper bags as a warp spacer, and with this length of warp, I needed 9 of them. I also had so many tangling issues while beaming, I'm sure that contributed. Bottom line was I needed to rebeam. 

(Insert scary music here). 

Now no book I have describes the best way to pull forward your warp and rebeam. I found some tips in weaving forums online, devised my plan, and gave it a try...hoping tears would not be involved. 

First, the front warps needed tension. For this, I used water bottles. I fussed a good while trying to figure out how to secure the threads to the bottles, and eventually used rubber bands. 

I divided the warp into 1-2" sections, looped a rubber band through like this, and then wrapped the open loop around the neck of a water bottle 2-3 times until snug. 

Here are all 6 bottles hanging and providing tension. At this point I simply released my back beam and slowly let it roll out. As the bottles reached the floor, I would untie the rubber bands, move the bottles up, and repeat. 

As the warp rolled out, I let the segments pool on the floor. This is cotton and it clings together like glue. So the segments didn't tangle. If I were working with another fiber, I probably would have had the segments fall into separate containers to keep them neat. 

Once I saw the tie on knots on the back beam, I secured my new warp separator material: single-sided corrugated cardboard, which is in a long roll and should be much more even than the paper bags. 

I began rolling on again the warp, as evenly as possible. It went much smoother this time, I'm sure a lot of the tangles had been resolved. 

And here is my result:

Yay!  An even roll!  I'm so glad I went to the trouble of rebeaming. And now I'll have this documentation should I ever need to do it again!  I'm sure I'll refer to it in the future. 

Now to weave some placemats!

Stadium cushion

I've completed my 10 week weaving class that my husband gifted me for Christmas this year. It was so much fun getting out of the house, meeting with other people who know weaving, and learning a thing or two. 

I went into the class already knowing how to weave, but wanting to learn a new technique: doubleweave. My instructor, even though she had no experience with doubleweave, pointed me in the right direction. I pulled out my copy of Doubleweave by Jennifer Moore, and read (a time or two) the introductory chapters on how to doubleweave. I learned just about all I needed right there!  

After seeing how you can use doubleweave to create tubes, I had a brilliant (I'm convinced) idea to make a stadium cushion in school colors. 

I did a lot of math, picked my colors, ordered the yarn, and started in. Now I won't get into boring logistics, but in doubleweave, you are weaving two layers simultaneously. I found it fascinating and rewarding to see it weave up. 

In order to make your two layers of woven fabric connected at the sides, I simply interlaced the wefts at each edge (photo above).  Once the pocket was as large as needed...

See my fingers sticking into the pocket?

...I stuffed the pocket with polyfil...

...and then the layers swap positions (bottom to top and top to bottom), effectively sealing in the stuffing. 

Here is a side shot of a completed stuffed tube (dark blue) and working on the next tube (light blue). 

Once I had finished the number of tubes I needed, it's done!  There were unstuffed tubes at the beginning and end of the weaving, which was my next task. 

I carefully removed the header from the material and spent a brief moment admiring the layers.

I then stuffed it with polyfil, and took two top weft threads and tied them to two bottom weft threads every 20 groups, giving it some stability. 

I then worked down the line tying knots. 

There may be a better way to finish off the seam, but I couldn't think of any way other than leaving a fringe that wouldn't significantly shorten the end pockets. I may need more thought on this, but it works fine this way too. 

So here's the final project!

It measures a generous 21.5" x 13.75". 

I'm so excited to have learned something new and it resulted in a nice finished project!  I call it a big success. 

I sure like making baby blankets!

I've really enjoyed making baby blankets - and this latest finished project was no exception.  I was given a huge skein of Bernat Handicrafter Cotton by my Grandma, and it had a neat variegated pattern of baby pastels, so I figured a baby blanket was in order.  I found a simple stitch pattern and set to work.

It was so nice to have one huge skein, since the only tails to weave in were the cast on and cast off edges!  I wish the skein would have been a little bigger, actually, so the blanket could have been a bit longer, but it works nice as is.







The stitch pattern was easy to remember, and knit up quickly.  There were only two rows to this stitch pattern, but it looks like more.

 

The colors are subtle and delicate, and I think they would work equally well for a boy or girl.  Being cotton, it will be a nice springtime stroller or car seat blanket.  Cotton is always a nice material to work with when it comes to babies, it just gets softer with repeated washings (which we all know will happen when it is around a baby), and it's very durable.  

 

Teddy bear liked it too! :)