Patience is a virtue...
To avoid the house becoming overrun with little knitted purses and toys, I've resolved to attempt some more substantial knitting projects this year. This is my first one, a simple garter stitch knitted blanket.
The pattern was featured in my 2011 Knitting Calendar and comes from Knit Picks in the USA. As Knit Picks yarn is not readily available in the UK, I substituted three shades of Debbie Bliss Luxury Tweed Chunky from Yarn Box. Although meant for the same 6.5mm needle size, I suspect my Debbie Bliss yarn was heavier than the recommended Knit Picks Suri Dream as I ended up needing 9 x 100g hanks, which at £7.95 a hank (and that's with 20% off) made this a relatively pricey project.
Knitting the throw was very zen as it's just simple 30 stitch wide strips of garter strip with either 16 or 26 rows of each of the three colours. It was moderately important to keep track of the number of rows so the strips would match up, so I used my Clover row counter and then checked the number of ridges too.
I reduced the size of the blanket slightly by taking out one block of the pattern on each strip and by making the centre strip of the five half as wide and completing it all in the pink shade.
There was a fair mount of weaving in to do on each strip as I broke off the colour for each rectangle. Joining the strips together was mildly painful as the yarn tended to break off when sewing. However, I was pleased with the neatness of the join I made by sewing under the ridges of the end rows of each strip from side to side. Happily all my strips turned out the same length so my counting must have been reasonable.
It has taken me a few weeks to get through this, partly because I've been breaking off for crochet and other projects. However, it's nice to finish something substantial. I've got a fox stole, a floor cushion and a castle lined up as major knits for later in the year too.
Melx
Round and round....
Having finally cracked at least the basics of crochet (knowing how to hold the yarn and where to put the hook as my friend Brioni succinctly put it), I've been keen to try crocheting in the round.
Not feeling quite up to magic circle yet, I experimented with chaining two and then making six double crochets (single crochets for you American folks) into the second chain, which seemed to work quite well, although I could see you might need a stitch to close the circle fully afterwards.
I used this technique to make this delightful crochet owl from Ana Clerc's Owls Two Way pattern that was free on ravelry. I made the owl with 5.5mm hook and King Cole Merino Blend Chunky Superwash Wool as I'm still not quite ready for spindly hooks. The owl is crocheted in the round spiral style.
To finish, I made a cotton bag of plastic pellets to give the bottom of the owl some ballast and then filled the rest of the owl with toy stuffing. I sewed the owl closed with yarn and then pulled up the corners to form the ears. I sewed two small red buttons on top of two larger purple buttons and (lazily) glued them to the owl along with a felt beak.
Cute, non? I'm also looking forward to trying the second owl from Ana's pattern, which is knitted in the round.
For my other crochet-in-the-round starter project, I chose these felted bowls from a pattern I bought on Etsy from knot.sew.cute. The pattern was for four nested bowls and I made the smallest two using my ubiquitous 5.5mm hook and some Icelandic Lopi, which was larger scale than the pattern called for but seemed to work fine, The bowls were made spiral style again and I more less managed to maintain the correct number of stitches.
I felted the bowls in the washing machine with two short 60 degree cycles. I stuffed them with carrier bags to retain their shape whilst they dried and now I have somewhere to keep my new crocheting notions.
With luck, next stop, amigurumi toys ...
Melx
Completely hooked...
I am a step nearer my 2011 crafty goals as I started to learn to crochet this weekend. On Saturday, I attended a beginners course at Purl City Yarns in Manchester, about an hour's drive from where I live. The course cost £54.99 for five hours of tuition and included two balls of yarn and a crochet hook.
There were just three of us on the course, which meant we got plenty of attention. All of us were knitters but I had the least experience with crochet and was definitely the remedial pupil. Our instructor for the course was the delightful Katy Bromberg. Katy showed us how to make a slip knot, hold our yarn, make the foundation chain and complete double and treble crochet stitches as the basics. We then started to complete a sampler of stitches.
Katy also took us through how to read a crochet pattern and discussed finishing techniques, including blocking and joining two pieces of crochet together. We were also able to ask our own questions like how to increase and decrease and how to crochet in the round. Katy also teaches pilates and showed us some stretches and exercises to avoid getting too stiff when knitting and crocheting.
I have to confess that I was struggling a bit with my crochet, but things improved after lunch when I swapped my 4mm hook and double knit for a 6mm hook and some chunky yarn. I found it particularly difficult to get the right number of double crochets into the foundation chain. Katy showed me a great technique where you can create the foundation chain and the first row of double crochet in one go, which I found much easier to do.
I really enjoyed the class despite being a bit hamfisted and came away loaded with goodies from the shop, having put my 10% discount voucher from the course to good use.
I knew from learning to knit last year that the key to success was practise, practise, practise. So, despite my longish day on the course, I crocheted a couple more samples on Saturday evening. On Sunday, I decided to start my first project as I tend to get a bit bored just doing samplers and wanted to get on and make something. I decided to attempt a simplified version of Jackie Ebdon's Bag Puss project from April 2011's Let's Knit magazine.
The purse should be made with 4 ply cotton yarn on a 2.5mm hook. I made mine using a 5.5mm hook and King Cole Merino Blend Chunky Superwash Wool. I reduced the number of stitches from 28 to 12 to get roughly the right dimensions, but otherwise the pattern was the same - just double crochet and then a turning chain on each row until I had a rectangle long enough to make a purse with a flap. I had to be careful to ensure that I kept my 12 stitches in tact, but I think it looks broadly ok.
On this occasion, I decided just to oversew the the sides of the purse together rather than attempt a joining stitch. I then made the cat's tail using the combined foundation chain/first row of double crochet that Katy had taught me.
I used the template from the magazine to make the cat's face from two pieces of blue felt. I embroidered the facial features and then sewed the two sides of the face together and gently stuffed. I attached the face to the flap of the purse with a few stitches at each of four points on the cat's face. I sewed a press stud to the underside of the flap for actual closure.
To decorate, I opted to use a felt flower embellishment from The Bead Shop Scotland, which I think is rather cute. For a slightly more professional finish (to make up for the dodgy crochet), I made a lining from a cotton floral fabric from my stash. I cut two pieces of fabric and then sewed three sides together on my sewing machine. I folded the top of the lining pouch over and pressed and then hand sewed it into place in the purse using a slip stitch.
Not bad for a first attempt if I do say so myself. I am now avidly studying patterns to work out what I can try next. I'm not sure whether I'll like crochet more than knitting but I'm looking forward to expanding my horizons....
Melx
Round in circles...
I have coveted one of these gorgeous bags since before I learned to knit as The Toft Alpaca Shop is a regular fixture at the big craft fairs. However, even after I learned to knit, I held back a bit as I discovered the bags were knitted on circular needles and you had to pick up stitches.
Finally at the February 2011 Stitch and Creative Crafts Show in Manchester, I bit the bullet and bought one of the kits in steel grey yarn. I went for the mini version because £33 seemed enough to spend when there seemed every chance I might muck it up.
The bottom of the bag was in fact really easy - a garter stitch rectangle on 10mm straight needs. On the last row, I transferred the work to my newly-acquired KnitPro10mm circular needles.
The hard part was then picking up stitches from the other three sides of the rectangle to make the rounded shape of the bag. Beforehand, I watched several You Tube videos on picking up stitches and slightly got the impression that there might be several ways of doing it. Anyway, remembering that the bag would be felted and thefore hide a multitude of knitting sins, I somehow got the full 96 stitches onto the circular needles.
The circular knitting part turned out to be quite easy. I'd gone for a 60cm cable rather than 80, which turned out to be a great size for keeping the work moving. I also got to use one of my cute glass kitty stitch markers from Atomic Knitting. I worked the flap on straight needles across 10 stitches then cast off the remaining stitches from the circular needles.
The bag handle was again knitted on straight needles and then sewn on in half to create the tube-shaped strap.
I used the leftover yarn to make a little purse, which in retrospect should have been slightly more square:
Felting the bag and the purse was a doddle. One trip around the washing machine at 40 degrees yielded an excellent results, although I had the clean the fluff from the washing machine afterwards.
As per the pattern instructions, I kept the bag stuffed with carrier bags whilst it dried and then sewed on the signature Toft button on the flap. For the purse, I added a large press stud for closure and a cute cat paw print silver button for the outside.
So, it turned out to be far easier to get my hands on one of these bags than I thought. The yarn does felt beautifully and I would definitely like to try the Toft alpaca with other patterns.
Melx
