Never-Ending Tunic

Finally finished the back of mum’s tunic!  The shaping is a bit odd as you can see, it’s completely straight then about six rows worth of casting off stitches at the beginning of each row and then…. that’s it!No wonder I was getting bored!  The front is a bit more interesting though.  It’s split half way up so it’s worked straight for about 14 inches then each side is worked on it’s own. I think that’s about as interesting as it gets, so this might be a long project!

I’ve also added to my queue Na Craga  from Alice Starmore’s “Aran Knitting”.  This is for my dad, but I’ve yet to find the right wool yarn for it.  You can’t have a fisherman’s sweater that’s not made out of wool!  And there’s a new addition to the extended family due in September so I’m thinking of knitting some cute baby things too!

Wordless Wednesday: Dave Modelling Rosie’s Jumper

Calculations

Ok so I confess I’m still on the back of this damn tunic.  I’ve just started my fourth ball and my fifteenth pattern repeat.  I’ve made some calculations, which are as follows:

• Each repeat is about an inch long
• Each repeat takes about an hour
• The ribbing was about five and a half inches

Therefore:

• For twenty eight and a half inches I need twenty three pattern repeats (including ribbing)
• The remaining eight I have to finish should take me eight hours solid knitting

I’d like to say this only takes me to the shoulder shaping, but at that point the end is in sight.  So technically if I knit all today without pause, I should get it finished!  Watch this space….

Wordless Wednesday: Rosie’s New Jumper

Freedom Spirit Tunic

As promised, this is the tunic I’m knitting for mum!  When I bought this pattern, I made the same mistake you probably are right now – ooo, it’s cabled!  But no, that’s not cabling, it’s actually unblocked lace!  Lesson learned – read the pattern before paying for it, or you really will pay for it later!

The yarn is Freedom Spirit by Twilleys, and is 100% wool in a colour which is a loosely spun mix of caramel, brown and red plies that  stripes subtly over a few rows.  I had to cut a small amount out because of a rather unattractive slub, but that didn’t seem to make a difference to the stripe.  It was actually discontinued when we bought it, and on sale at half price – absolute bargain!

So far I’ve done 42 rows of rib and 48 rows of pattern, which is about twelve inches, really slow going for over a fortnights worth of work!  There’s another sixteen inches worth before I even start the shoulder shaping (I don’t think there’s any sleeve shaping, but I might be wrong – at least I hope I am because sewing it together is going to be a nightmare!) which is going to be a bit of a faff – I’m intending to butcher the pattern a bit so I can use a three-needle bind-off for the shoulder seem, I always think that looks a lot neater and much more solid than I can manage with a yarn needle!

This is another one of those “I was gone but now I’m back” posts

It’s true, I’ve neglected this blog AGAIN.  The truth is that I’ve been really busy, and I’ve been meaning to write, but never did.  Yesterday I read an article about a site called 750words.com, which basically encourages you to splurge 750 words in complete anonymity and privacy with the aim of increasing productivity and inspiration.  So over the past two days I’ve written over 1500 words, and some of it did indeed have some real gems to post here!

So, between the last post and this one, I’ve knit two hats, a scarf, a hoody for a little’un, a dog jumper and I’ve started a tunic for my mum!  I did say I’ve been busy!  Sadly I took zero photos, so there’s nothing to show here for my efforts, but I can at least tell you about them!

I knit a hat and scarf set for my auntie in February just before we had that sudden cold snap – right when you want to have just received a knitted gift!  I knit it in a simple basket stitch, from a red shiny yarn by Patons i think.. helpful i know!  It was very soft though and I was very happy with such a simple knit.

The second hat was in a chunky variegated blue yarn which i also knit in a sort of basket stitch, this time for my mum.  Again i cant remember the name of the yarn, I may have had the time to knit but not the time to write all this down!  I had just under half the yarn left so i started knitting a hat for myself, but havent finished it yet.  I had a horrible suspicion that I would run out of yarn, so i did what every sensible knitter does – put it to one side in case it magically spawns more yarn!

The next thing I knit was a hoody for my sweet little niece.  It was using some yarn I was gifted – already knit up into something else so I can claim I never actually knew the brand of yarn!  I designed a top down raglan cardigan with moss-stitch button-bands and cuffs, and a lovely King Charles Brocade through the body.  And of course it had a hood, with the same moss-stitch border around the edge.  I finished it off with some lovely pastel-coloured flower buttons.  I’ve been intending to write up the pattern for this but not got around to it yet!

The last thing I’ve finished is a wee jumper for Rosie.  She’s been feeling the cold of late – after all she is quite a slight little dog, so I butchered a drops pattern that was meant to include all kinds of intarsia and fanciness which didn’t get included in my version.  I used a striped yarn (Striped, not self striping – so the resultant effect is  more like awful camouflage) and knit the size meant for Chihuahuas, but it is still a bit too big!  I will probably knit her another one but this time not do as many rows before the split for the leg holes comes, and also the small strip that goes between the legs (and eventually is picked up from for the leg-cuffs) needs to be 2-4 stitches narrower.  She really is tiny!

Next time I will show you (with pictures, I promise!) the tunic I’m knitting for mum.  It really is going extremely slowly, possibly because I’m comparing it to my last few FO's, which have all been quite small and quick!

Of beads, and Trees and Pretty Baubles

You know when you have a really great idea in your head for a knitted project, and then you spend AGES on it and it doesn’t work out too well?  That's what my green jacket thing is doing to me right now.