Tag Archives: clothing

10 Minute Fingerless Mitts

10 Min Fingerless Mitts

Despite these beauties, my smugness is gone.

I used to get all superior when either my dad, brother or husband said, “This is an easy (computer) problem to fix.  It’ll take just a few minutes”.  I’d roll my eyes and continue about my business, knowing in my heart they’d still be scratching their heads for at least another couple of hours.

I found an easy tutorial for these super cute mitts online, bought my fleece and jumped right in thinking it would be a quick, instant gratification project.

What would likely take the average beginner just a bit of time took me a smidge longer, and here’s why:

  • Make pattern, no problem.
  • Cut fabric, no problem.
  • Get excited because everything is on a roll.
  • I may have (cough) even taken a few moments to show off here.
  • Start stitching, realize zigzag is not quite right.
  • After about 3rd time of stitching, finally realize the basic zigzag was just fine and I really shouldn’t have been scrolling through the fancy schmancy options on my machine.
  • Check the finished mitt and realize it won’t fit anyone in my family.
  • Say a few curse words.
  • Get up and walk away.
  • Double check the directions and realize should have used 1/4 inch seams instead of 1/2 inch.
  • “Think” on it for a couple of days.
  • Rip it all out in the presence of others so I stay civilized about it.
  • Finish it up, again.
  • Check the newly finished mitt and realize it fits the one person in the family who has the most narrow hands.
  • Sew up second narrow mitt so said family member can at least have a pair.  (Bless his heart, he’s worn them nearly every day for about a week now.  Love that boy!!!)
  • Screw up courage a few days later and make 3rd mitt (with some minor adjustments for size).
  • Realize I needed to only increase the fabric in most but not all areas.  Whaaaat?!  I have a custom hand?!  Sheesh!
  • Stew for another couple of days.
  • Rip back the area that now needs decreasing.  (This step is becoming disturbingly easy now.)
  • Re-stitch.
  • Check sizing.
  • Score!!!
  • Make second mitt.
  • Admire its super cuteness… 7 days later.

photo

So, these same mitts my daughter wants me to make for her in sunny yellow really should take about 10 minutes now, right?  Right?!  (Give or take a couple of days?)

Using handspun…

Project 365 6/13/12 handspun

I’m a new spinner.  As such, the idea of using my hand spun for actual knitting or weaving is a bit daunting.  I want things to look good and not scream “homemade”.  Lumpy, bumpy hand spun… uummmmm.  However, like any stash, spun yarn seems to reproduce itself in the closet and needs using up to maintain any organizational order.

I started with Romi’s Taygete Shawl back on 5/15/12

5/15/12 Project 365 Taygete #3

My hand spun is a wee bit under spun… as in not enough twist in the ply.  This means my Taygete shawl could end up being a little fragile in the long run.  But, it means that I also know more what under spun yarn looks like… just by knitting with it with it.  And, if it starts falling apart I know that my washing machine felts things VERY well.  It can then become fabric that I cut and turn into something else entirely.

Project 365 6/13/12 Taygete #3

The hand spun has some subtle striping both in the body and in the lace.  It draws you in to find all of the delicate color combinations.  What amazed me a bit was realizing that your eye tricks you into smoothing out the yarn visually.  If you were to knit with this yarn, you would see and feel that there is quite a bit of variation from one inch to the next… but you don’t see it when you look at the shawl as a whole.  It’s kind of like pointillism in that regard.  Very cool.

In the beginning I was nervous using the home spun.  There were a lot of hours put into just the spinning and I had no clue if the yardage was sufficient.  But, how beautiful is it stuck in a box somewhere?  And really, why not play with your fiber?  I was very surprised and pleased with the results.  The yarn worked structurally and visually.

If you spin, what did you make with your some of your first hand spun?  Was there anything about the process that surprised you?

Emergency knitting for puppy…

My new to me little darling Cricket spent most of the day yesterday at the vet’s office.  It would seem that her, ah, new to the doggy scene owner mistakenly gave her unrestricted access to a rawhide chew.  The result was a gluey rawhide mass in her tummy and a $500+ vet bill.

To deal with my anxiety (and guilt) while waiting for the vet’s call I opted for a “drop everything emergency knit”.  My poor little darling needed a sweater and I hadn’t knit one yet.  This was the time!  I selected a straightforward little number by Brian Herzog for speed and efficiency.

She practically jumped into the sweater, so it’s terribly funny to me that she’s looking so underwhelmed in these photos.  Maybe it’s because her bit of knitted love is not in purple.  Guess that means I’ll have to knit another!

One approach to deciding on a knit project…

5/15/12 Project 365 Strawberries

Somewhere in my very first pound of spinning fiber I spun a lovely little 4 oz. of lime green, sock weight yarn.  It was my first 3 ply yarn and I spun it with a “z” twist to see if I would notice a difference while knitting continental style.  But… it was lime green and only 4 oz. of fiber.  I knew I would either have to knit something small or pair the yarn up with something else.  Lime green meant it lingered.

5/15/12 Project 365 2ply lace wt yarn

Just in the last week, I finished up this lovely turquoise yarn.  It is in an “s” twist and spun as a two ply.  I was thinking as a two ply, it would make a nice lace yarn.  The color is beautiful and the photos do not do it justice.  I was pondering the Haruni shawl, but I was concerned I would not quite have enough yardage.  I decided to risk it and went in search of the pattern in my stash as well as some yarn that could pair up with it if the worst happened.

5/15/12 Project 365 2ply lace yarn closeup

While I was looking for the Haruni pattern in my binder, I ran across another pattern I had already knit up twice already.  What can I say, it’s a great pattern.  It was Romi’s Taygete shawl.  I knit it once in purples as a gift.  I followed that with one made of lovely tans + pale, sky blue.  The second was done up in a couple of sock yarns that had too much bounce to them.  I practically stood on the iron trying to flatten the thing out, to no avail.  (It is in a pile to be “frogged”.  Ribbit, ribbit, rip it).

Then I noticed the colors on the Taygete pattern picture were nearly the same as the two yarns I had sitting right next to it.  Huh!!  I very rarely choose the same colors as what is written in a pattern, but this seemed a little too odd.  It was like my subconscious taking the driver seat.  The decision was made… or it found me… I’m not entirely sure which.

5/15/12 Project 365 Daisy photo

My handspuns are not bouncy sock yarns, just worsted spun merino, so hopefully my curling issue will be a thing of the past.  I’m not sure how the “z” twist, “s” twist and ply variations will play out, but given the structure of the shawl (mostly garter), I think it will be balanced enough not to misbehave.  I may have to use a slightly larger needle for the lace section to compensate for the lighter weight yarn by itself in a larger area, but it should work.  And, I will get to showcase my handspun turquoise yarn in the lace.  Whoohoo!

5/15/12 Project 365 Taygete #3

The project begins.

Cheerfully requesting your votes to help me win a knitting bag! Whoohoo!

No, I’m not kidding.  Most folks know I don’t usually do this kind of thing.  I actually decided not to after I did the first design, but I got 2 likes in the first half hour on Polyvore and thought, hmmm….  So here’s to self expressing and throwing caution to the winds.

What:  I’m trying to win a Jordana Paige knitting bag.  (Even Miss E helped and stepped in to offer fashion advice.)

Why:  Because even though I’m not a fashionista myself, I REALLY like nice bags.  And, I would rather have a non-knitter tell me they love my bag than have someone know it’s a knitting bag and say nothing.  Trust me, it’s totally preen worthy when it happens.

When:  Right now through April 24th!

How:  Follow this link and either “like” or “repin” any of the outfit collages you like on Pinterest.  You can choose as many as you like.  If they are my designs, even better!  (And if they aren’t mine, just don’t tell me and we can still be friends.  Giggle.)

Jordana Paige Globe Trotter Pin Up Challenge

Many, many thanks!!!

(ps.  The geek in me is totally loving this whole contest.  It will be very curious to see “where” the outfits go…)

Crafting vs. blogging? Crafting wins every time!

This has been a great day and a great week for crafting but maybe not so much for blogging.  As I told a lovely friend I ran into during an evening school event, there are days when I have a half and hour… and that half an hour is for making stuff.  My goal is still very much that I craft every single day for 365 days.

I spent Saturday in a sewing class.  While I diligently worked on my 2nd custom t-shirt and waited for the instructor to announce she was showcasing zippers, I apparently missed the intro to zippers.  Gah!  I saw the second part, but it was like a foreign language if you hadn’t seen the first.  Grumpily, I decided to finish the t-shirt and maybe see what home zipper projects I could start.  I figured I could bring in questions later if needed.

Sunday I helped enable a troop of Girl Scouts as they decorated their own TOMS shoes.  My favorite quote of the day was “Sparkles” (said with great reverence).

I used Monday for finishing the t-shirts.  The 2nd t-shirt was better “fit” wise, but I’m still working out the kinks on those iron on transfers.  Sadly, nothing photo worthy for the t’s.  (As a side note, I think the patch iron-ons are way better than the design sheet iron-ons.  And, did you know, there is apparently an appropriate height for the design?  Ask me how I know that now!)

Tues I took on the zipper challenge with the denim dop bag in Brett Bara’s “Sewing in a Straight Line” book.  Check it out!  I actually cut the pieces properly!  And the zipper, while not perfect, looks mighty fine for my first foray into zippers.  With all the step by step instructions, it was actually easier than what I expected.  It certainly made me question the bad rap that zippers have.  I did it in canvas instead of denim because I enjoyed the TOMS shoes that the Girl Scouts decorated so much.  Sparkles anyone?

3/23/12 Project 365 zipper

Wednesday I shopped for skirt material.  Our sewing class will be taking on elastic tomorrow and I wanted to at least have the project set up and ready to go so I wouldn’t miss any demos again.  Today I turned to the one-hour skirt from “Sewing in a Straight Line”.  And, success!  I still need to stitch in the ditch (what is that?), but it’s looking pretty good.

3/23/12 Project 365 one-hour skirt

Between yesterday and today I finished off the first piece of the Quercus Cardigan.

3/23/12 Project 365 Quercus progress

I topped off my Friday with an iron-on for Miss E.

3/23/12 Project 365 peace

What a great showing for crafting this week!

Today’s mistake is a “design feature”.

Yesterday I wrote about needing to rip out 7 inches of knitting, but today I’m keeping something in.

I found a cable where I needed to swap the order of the stitches 4×4 but instead had done a little 5×3 swap.  It’s only a few rows down.  If I had caught it at the major rip out… well, let’s just say that’s not an option now.  (I’m trying to let it go.)  I “could” fix it by redoing those 8 stitches in that section (and the 4 rows above it), but it’s a bigger cable, and I’ve only just mastered the 4 stitch cable repair.  It’s just intimidating enough to give me pause.

You have to look for it because it’s not visually obvious.  If I never pointed this out, I seriously doubt anyone would ever know.  The non knitter will not see it.  If anyone did, chances are they are a master knitter and would be kind about it anyway OR they had knit up the sweater themselves and knew the cabling well.  What really tipped my thinking when it came to deciding which direction to proceed was the notion that this particular error hangs way low on the bum.  If anyone is looking in that area, I’m thinking odds are pretty good they aren’t looking at the cabling.  (Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.)

And so, the knitting continues.  Between you and me there is now a deliberate “design feature” on my bum, I mean cable.

I’m doing the right thing. Why do I still feel so bad?

Yeah.  It’s been that kind of day with all of my projects it seems.

I realized yesterday that I had over knitted a rather large piece of knitting… by oh, 7 inches at least.  It knitting terms this is pretty major… nearly a whole freakin’ sleeve… 3 afternoons at least…  This is due to a) relaxing into a different gauge, b) being arrogant enough not to double-check myself at least once, and possibly also c) just not paying proper attention in the moment.

Given that I had spent a good portion of the afternoon ripping out a black seam on a black t-shirt with my over 40 eyes, gumming up a couple of sewing machine needles and following that with a borderline acceptable iron-on job, I figured I’d move to something a wee bit more mind numbing and less accident prone.  Besides, tearing at something kind of fit “the mood” at that point.

I learned (the hard way) that if something is not quite right with your knitting, it’s best to fix it as soon as you notice.  These things tend to give way to new issues structurally that you hadn’t thought of… and possibly even more tearing out than you would have had to begin with.  But did I follow that lovely little tenant this time?  No.  I thought longer was probably just fine.  Who would notice?

It wasn’t fine on the booty in the mirror.

It wasn’t fine when I saw how the weight of the fabric changed the look of what I had already knitted.

It wasn’t fine when I began to think of the calculations I might need to do for the other piece that was going to be joined with it… and the extra yarn it might require.

(Insert 1.5 hours of ripping and picking back up nearly 250 stitches.)

The thing is, I truly don’t mind the extra knitting.  Knitting is good any way you can get it.  I just dislike being inefficient in getting to my sweater payoff.  I’m mourning those “lost” hours.  Silly, but there it is.

My next step is to do what my mother always suggested… put the crafting down and get a good night’s sleep.  Tomorrow is a new start to my beautiful cardigan.