Striped Socks

Has yarn ever spoken to you?   For several years these skeins of sock yarn, from JaWoll, sat there and I wanted striped socks.  I think that they reminded me of my favorite summer dress as a little girl that was blue and white striped.  So, in my recent sock frenzy I took out these skeins and decide to knit them up.

JaWoll by Lang is absolutely my favorite sock yarn, it is consistent, high quality, comes in many colors, and has its own reinforcing thread in each skein.  These are the go-to sock yarns for me, and my husband has socks knit up with this yarn that are 20+ years old!  And he does wear all of his socks.

And using my newest favorite revision of the tubular cast on (Japanese tubular cast on), I started with 24 towns of twisted rib.

Then, I wanted to try a new type of knitting to reduce the dreaded jog in yarn color changes.  Here is the technique that I have tried in the past.  And there is a good tutorial video here:

Trying this technique for a few rows, I was not happy with the result.  Even though it does show the rows the same height, I was not happy with how far it had traveled over in just a few short color changes.  I am a nut for symmetry, and this would have always bothered me.

And here is another tutorial on just using a straight slip stitch.  I like the way that this looks better.  I tuck my yarn in as I carry it though:

So, the finished socks came out beautiful, and look like I had hoped.  However, I decided to put these in the gift pile for now.  I just knit up a pair of socks with Fiber Optic yarn, that I think I want to keep for myself instead.

Does anyone else notice the color difference in the blue skeins?  I ordered them online years ago, and in the skein they looked the same, but when knit up, the bottom one is definitely more grey in tone.

I made a short row heel for these socks, but with a twist.  I first made a small increase gusset prior to getting to the heel portion.  Then, I knit the short row heel, and decreased that gusset down again.  In the process of doing the short row heel, I added stitches by picking up at the end of the short row segments.  And using the German short row technique in the process.

This makes for a better fitting short row, in my opinion.  Myself, I have a high instep and between the mini gusset and the increases in the short row, these pull over my foot without stretching out at that point.  I also think that striped socks work better with a short row heel.

And, I finished off with a traditional toe decrease.

Now, I knit these socks at separate times, and there were a couple of vacations in between (these were knit on my beautiful signature dpn’s and I did not want them confiscated by TSA).  To keep track of my decisions on socks, since many of them are my own “designs” or improvisations, I have taken to the habit of writing down my instructions on small pieces of paper and inserting them into the leg of the first sock as I knit is up.  This helps when coming back later to finish the second sock.

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Japanese Knitting

Sometime in the past 3 months, I purchased this book, and had it sitting around. So, when I saw Japanese knitting being offered at Vogue Knitting Live  this year, I was interested in taking the class. It wasn’t until I had signed up, that I realized that the woman who translated this book was the instructor.  This is a gorgeous book, with beautiful patterns in it.

Japanese knitting is easy to learn and follow, as unlike any other country, they have standardized the knitting symbols, so once you know what they mean you are good to go with any book.  Clear & Simple Knitting Symbols is a great book which will teach you the knitting symbols, find it here.

My Saturday morning class was “Tips and Tricks from Japanese Knitting”.    The class moved at a quick pace, and I never lacked for a task to knit.  There was a bit of background, but not as much as I would have liked.  The instructor had lived in Japan, and I felt that there could have been more cultural information shared.  Nevertheless, I knit some swatches, and learned some new techniques.

This little swatch above shows 2 versions of tubular cast on (one I liked, the other I have little use for), button holes in the ribbing (this was a good trick and could come in handy), 3 sizes of bobbles (the little ones are hardly worth doing), and in the center of the swatch are two versions of 3 needle bind-off that lay flatter than the traditional way that we are used to.

Next we learned a decorative 3-needle bind off that reminded me of the Estonian braids.

This class, while not the most engaging teacher, was worth the time and effort for techniques that she had gleaned from Japanese pattern books.

In the afternoon, the class was making the fingerless mitts that are featured in the book.

First off, the instructor asked that people bring 200 grams of DK weight yarn.  Okay with that, but the yardage was too much.  Then she asked for needle sizes 6 and 8 dpns.  I opted to bring along more, the smallest I had being size 3.  There was really little new material taught in this class, I could have easily just read the book.   It was mainly knitting on our own, with a lot of quiet time (uncomfortable and boring).  I would have appreciated that knitting time having some background on knitting in Japan and a slideshow of shops, knitted items, etc.  Several people left early, as they had not brought along the correct needle sizes (they followed the class instructions), and their mitts were way too big.  I continued to knit mine, all the time feeling that they too were too big.

Finally, I too left early, there was really nothing to get from the class, and I knew at that point that I was going to rip them out and start over.

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The color of the yarn is very pretty, and I like the motifs.  I will rip these back, and knit with a size 2 or 2 1/2.  I think that I will scrutinize class descriptions more carefully in the future.

Good information from the class was that there are a few more Japanese books being translated this year.  I have some pattern books, but they are all in Japanese.

To come in 2018:

And, if you really like Japanese knit designers, here is a list that was shared to look up on Ravelry.  The Japanese have such a talent for putting detail and thought into everything that they do form knitting to quilting to cuisine to architecture.  I am always inspired.

 

 

English Tailoring Part II

A few years back, I took a class at Vogue Knitting from CocoKnits on English tailoring, and loved it.  We made a baby sweater in that class, which I gave to a friend’s grandson.  I repeated a similar class with her a couple of years later, hoping to hone this process and apply it to more sweaters.  Most recently, I gave Dan yarn for Christmas last year, and have attempted to knit one of CocoKnits top down sweaters for him, I had great difficulty with the gauge, and he has yet to receive that sweater.  I am thinking that this might be a good Holiday project for me…

So, I posted recently that I was working on this Dale of Norway baby sweater, and wanted to do the set in sleeves as the English tailoring method.  I am proud to say that I have completed this, there was a bit of ripping back and experimenting, but I am quite proud of the end result.

The only seaming is a few stitches under the arm.  And, the fit is a nice shoulder.

This sweater has a sweet flower pattern at the bottom.  The pattern called for knitting the fair isle back and forth, but I choose to knit it in the round for those few rows, and steek it.

I also knit the sleeves in the round.  These few adaptations really made this work as a great English tailoring sweater.

Hoping to sew the short steek soon and finish this up.

Julie Weisenberger is a really great teacher and I would highly recommend her classes.  If you are not able to take one of her classes, I highly recommend her new book, which I purchased this past year.

 

Julie also has several great tutorials on her website that you all should check out, regardless of whether you use the English tailoring method.  I am always on the lookout for new techniques that either minimize finishing or give my knitted objects a more finished professional look.

Another book that comes to mind is The “I Hate to Finish Sweaters” Guide to Finishing Sweaters.  This is a great book on sweater finishing, i.e. thinking about how you set up your sweater before you start knitting.  Many, many years ago I took a finishing class, and the instructor recommended this book.  It is a short spiral bound book, and one that I refer to over and over again.  I saw it on Amazon for $36!, but found reasonably priced copies here.

 

Tubular Bind Off

Or perhaps I should call this Je Suis Fini!

Yesterday after posting how to do the French Cast On (Formerly known as Tubular Cast On), I had the inevitable questions of how to bind off in this manner.  I know that the infamous Elizabeth Zimmerman has her sewn bind off, which is similar, but lacking in one very important way.  My method involves 2 rows of set-up which truly give you the stretch that is desired.

Here we go!  Finish your ribbing to the length that you want.

• Set up Row #1. *Knit first stitch (I continued to use my twisted rib), With yarn in front, slip the next purl stitch (slip as if to purl)**       Continue from * to ** to end of row.

• Set up Row #2. *With yarn in back, slip the next knit stitch (slip as if to purl), Purl the next stitch**     Continue from * to ** to end of row.

• Prepare for cast off.  Using 2 don’s held side by side, slip the knit stitches to the front needle, and the purl stitches to the back needle.

• Now, Cut a long enough tail to Kitchener off all of the ribbing.  I have done this for 300+ stitches, just with a very long tail.
• Start Kitchenering the front knit stitches to the back purl stitches, one at a time.  Much like sewing together at the end of a sock at the toe.  This post explains the process to Kitchener.
• Here is a good video explaining how to Kitchener.

• Keep your tension taught, not too loose or it will be sloppy, nor too tight or you will defeat the purpose of this lovely bind-off.

• Since we are working in a round, only a few stitches at a time can be set up on to the front and back cast off needles.  Because I use 5 dpns, I do the first needle, then the second then the final 2 together. Once you have reached the approximate 1/2 way point, you can put the remainder of the stitches on the cast off needles and finish sewing off.

At the end you have a slight jog, which is taken care of when weaving in the end of the yarn.

And Voila! again.  Once you get the hang of it, the process is very quick.  I bound off these 48 sts in less than 5 minutes, including taking photos.

You have a lovely finished edge that truly distinguishes the finished product from craft to art.

French Cast-on

A woman visiting our SnB group last week mentioned trying to do a French Cast-on.  I must admit that she had me perplexed until we talked a bit, and it was just a fancy way of saying tubular cast-on, although I do prefer the name French Cast-on, and may have to use it from now on.  This got me to googling it when I got home.  Nothing new, except that I found this video by Eunny Jang:

Ignore the fact that her producers did not have her use 2 highly contrasting yarns so that it would be evident as to what she was doing.   Normally I make a tubular cast on starting with a crochet chain where I pick up the requisite number of stitches needed in each of the bumps on the chain.  I have shown that in the past in this post.

• What intrigued me about Eunny’s technique was that I could actually cast on 1/2 + 1 the final number of stitches needed in a contrasting color and just knit, (use a needle 1-2 sizes larger than you will end up knitting with.  Here I used a size 3 don). I wanted to end up with 48 sts for my mittens, so I cast on up 25 + 1 = 25sts.  I am only using 4 needles here, the stitches on 3, as there are so few to work with. Join in a circle (with the forever mentioned note:  be careful not to twist your stitches), and knit 3-4 rows.

• knit for couple of rows, then start with your garment color and knit 3-4 rows still using the larger needles.

• Using the needle size that you will be knitting the socks with:  *Knit the first stitch.  For the second stitch, reach over the top of the knitting into the cast-on edge, and pick up the first “purl bump” of your sock yarn (not the contrasting color yarn that you cast on with), this is where using a clearly contrasting color such as I did really helps.  Put it onto the left hand needle and purl that stitch.**
• Repeat from * to **, ending with a K1.  You will now have your desired number of stitches plus one extra on your finished needle size, the first and last stitches will be knit stitches.

  

• Do 2-3 rows of 1×1 ribbing. On the first row knit the first and last stitch together. The stitch count will now match your pattern requirements.  I am doing a twisted 1×1 rib here, using 5 size #1 dpn’s.
• After you have knit at least 3-4 rows, or anytime in the pattern progress that you feel like, it will be time to pull out the contrasting cast on yarn.

• You can clearly see here how the coast on yarn (purple) is now pulled underneath the fabric.

• It always helps to have a pair of Eiffel Tower scissors to trim with.

• Just cut a row or 2 into the cast on contrast yarn.  Cut off the bottom cast on row(s).

• Pull out all of the cast on yarn

• And Voila! you have a beautiful finished edge that looks like the knitting just rolls over on itself.

• It is very stretchy, almost feels like the edge has elastic in it.

The key to making this work is to do the set up rows where you have 1/2 the number of stitches, in a larger size needle.  Otherwise it will be very hard to pick up and not have the stretch that you are looking for.

Merci Beaucoup!

Slo-Mo

I was away with girlfriends for the weekend in Michigan.  Great time, and as usual, I was busy knitting while there.  Chris videotaped these of me knitting in slow motion.

As you would see me knitting:

As it looks from my side:

Twined Knitting

Last weekend I took a class from Beth Brown-Reinsel on twined knitting.  We had to wind center-pull balls to use in the knitting of twined fingerless mitts.  Years ago I had taken a class on knitting Gansey’s from her at Stitches Midwest.  She is a really great teacher, and a really wonderful person also.  I knew that the class would be good, and this was a technique that I had been wanting to try for a long time.  I am not sure that I would have been able to knit this from a book or website (maybe my good friend Manning would have, she is better at that than I).

Twined knitting was invented in Sweden and is also called Tvåändsstickning which is Swedish for Two End Knitting, it has also been found in Norwegian and Danish garments. This technique, in which you use both ends of the same ball of yarn and twist the strands between each stitch, produces a firm, wind-resistant fabric that’s ideally suited for mittens, hats, socks and used on cuffs of sweaters.  While there are examples of sweaters knit entirely in twined knitting, the fabric is not as elastic, and I think better reserved for the areas or objects that get a tremendous amount of wear.

It can be done with one color or as 2 or more colors.  The key is to “lock” the center pull ball in place and let the twist gather between your knitting and the ball of yarn.  When the twist gets to be too much to work with, you unwind the ball by holding it in the air and separating the two strands, the ball will spin until all of the twist is taken out.  For those of us old enough to remember telephones that were attached to the wall with a long cord, remember holding the cord and letting the receiver spin to take the twist out, same concept.  This style of knitting gives a very durable fabric, and the inside has the look of a corrugated cloth.

I almost finished my first mitt.

And here are the class mitts in progress:

Zebras Again

I finally finished the Zebra sweater and dress for my niece Riley. It had sat unfinished for quite some time waiting for steeking, which is always a bit unnerving regardless of how many times that I do it. You spend all this time knitting a complicated fair ilse colorwork, to then take scissors to and cut it in half.

The biggest advantage is that all those ends do not have to be woven in.

The sleeves are more difficult, as they need to be the same depth. I put a black yarn in the center of the sleeve steek, counted the stripes and added a pin to know where to stop.

I love the soft pink and orange stripes that I chose for this sweater. The orange is a tribute to my brother’s favorite color, softened down for a little girl. The zebra stripes give it some pizzazz.

Waiting for a little girl to play in it.

Pattern: Zebra Striper
Pattern Source: Dale of Norway Pamphlet #8101
Yarn: Baby Ull by Dale of Norway
Needles: US 1 & 2
Date Started: 4/8/10
Date Finished: 12/30/12
Finished Dimensions: 3 Years old

Just ask Martha

I want to take a couple of posts to talk about some of the Christmas presents that I gave. Hard to write about them on the off-chance that the recipient might actually read my blog (definitely not a problem with items made for my husband).

Just ask MarthaThis sweater and hat and mitten set was made for my niece Rebecca, for her American Girl Doll Rebecca. If you have been reading my blog for a while, you might remember the amazing thank you drawings that I got in the past for Barbie clothes that I knit for her. She is such a cutie, and an appreciative recipient. This was a pattern that I bought many years ago to make for my daughter’s doll. While my daughter did receive some sweaters for her dolls, I was not confident enough in my stranded knitting at the time to tackle this pattern. The pattern was very well written, much better than most that I find today.

The knitting was very straight forward, I used some Baby Blatt yarn that was in my stash. As I was applying the last finishing touches, I needed to make a pompom for the top of the hat. In the past, my pompoms have often been less than fluffy, and the double doughnut method never seems to work real well. So, off to google to search an alternative, and I found this post by Martha Stewart.

Essentially you take a strip of cardboard the radius of your finished pompom size. Cut slits at each end and insert a longer piece of yarn

Then wrap the yarn around the cardboard about 150 times.

Gently slide out the cardboard, keeping the longer yarn separate. Tie a tight knot.

Cut all of the threads and trim!

Voila! A perfect pompom.

Vogue Knitting Live Recap

I spent last weekend at the historic Palmer House Hotel in downtown Chicago taking classes at Vogue Knitting Live, their first appearance in Chicago.

Day one was a class on English Tailoring.  The gist of which is that you knit an inset sleeve to the front and back instead of sewing, and have a tailored sleeve with 2 small seams at the back.  Judy Weisenberg (cocoknits) was the instructor, and I loved this class.  Can’t wait to apply it to my own sweaters, but I think that I might first practice again by using one of her patterns.  Would have been the perfect class if I could have stuffed a ball of yarn in the obnoxious person who sat behind me and tried to talk over the teacher each time she spoke.  How does a teacher control that?  Wish that I had been able to say something to quiet her, my friend said that I should have said that I spent money to listen to the teacher, not her.

Day 2 was lectures only, the first one being Parlor Tricks, learned some great things, absolutely worth while.  The second was Nicky Epstein, and I could have passed on looking at her past projects.

Day 3 was 2 classes, the first we learned to put in a zipper.  Great class again!

Second class was Oddball stitches with CookieA.  I have the funniest swatches from that class.  Fun as always to be in one of her classes, what a great teacher.

The market was under whelming, although I have my eye on ordering some bamboo in the future for a bamboo Fair Isle sweater, so soft and lightweight.  I did find this cute project bag with a grommet in it for my sock knitting.

And, I purchased this book, hot off the presses.  I love it, have almost finished the cover hat. More on that tomorrow.

The last day, I finally found the gallery (they had to move it from an obscure corner, as nobody knew they were there), with some amazing knitting and knit art.  This was a knitting group project knitting up of all of the US Presidents:

Go Obama!!!