Shop Talk ed. 4

In case you haven't checked it out yet, I've put up a new design in the shawl pins. I like it a lot. I almost wish there was one that I had "messed up" on, so that I could keep it. Actually, the two new designs are looking like that, right now. Too many tool marks ...

(5 minutes later) Err, I just took a break to play with one of the designs. Apparently, what I needed was a break from it in order to get the symmetry right. Oops. Expect to see that up in the shop in the next day or two.

I have to say, though, that using Tiffany for design inspiration is a dangerous prospect. He had a whole shop full of people to do the grunt work for him, and even polish and produce designs. It's just me and my ten fingers here, bending wire inspired by his shapes. I have to say though, I do love his work.

Oh the cuteness!

For those that like busting stash and can crochet, I found the cutest thing!

Free Amigurumi Patterns

Check out the cuteness! If I felted these things, they'd be great cat toys. Otherwise, if left in intact yarn form, Delilah Damnit would just eat it. (You think I'm joking, but no. One of my cats is part goat and eats plastic.) However, she doesn't eat felted/fulled/what-do-you-call-purposefully-shrunk-crochet? items. Don't ask me about the logic behind that one. She is a force of nature until herself.

As for those that know me, I have issues with leftover yarn. As in, I always have it. It kind of drives me a little crazy. Okay, it drives me alot crazy because I do these projects that are supposed to eat up yarn... and they don't. Seriously, a swallowtail (without the knupps) and an asphyxiation out of one ball of knitpicks shadow? How? I don't know. The boyfriend said he'd put a knit kitty on the back of his motorcycle if I could find it a leather jacket. It's oh so tempting, especially since finding hand-made stuff for a guy is tough to do.

Sock it to me

Actually, before I get to the knitting news, I just want to put out this apology to anyone who's tried out the xsmall size of the swirl skirt pattern. There's a typo in rows 6, 8, and 10 of the pattern. It should read as follows:

Row 6: *[YO,K1] 3 times, k2tog, K7* repeat 7 times more. There is a total of 8 repeats of this pattern per round.

Row 7: *K12, K2tog* repeat 8 times.

Row 8: *[YO,K1,] 3 times, k2tog, K8* repeat 8 times.

Row 9: *K13, K2tog* repeat 8 times

Row 10: *[YO, K1] 3 times, k2tog, K9* repeat 8 times.

Row 11: *K14, K2tog* repeat 8 times.

The extra small version is the one that has a 96 st cast on. If you've started that version, and couldn't figure out why it was off, this is why. I'm sorry. Hopefully, this will catch all the mistakes and such.

In other knitting news, I've caught a little knitting ADD. I finally finished panel 2 of the front the graduation dress. I've put the front and back halves together as I made them, so to speak. I made the waistband and picked up stitches for the bodice and panel 2. That way, I had less seaming to do once I was done with knitting a part of the dress. After the ocean waves cardigan fiasco, I'm going to block these halves of the dress and put it together to check the fit. If it doesn't, then I'll have time to reknit one part or another as needed. Hopefully, I should get that done this weekend.

Since I finished knitting that panel thursday night, I had a terrible realization. I didn't have that many on-going projects. There's the design I'm creating, but that's most decidedly not mindless knitting. I bound off the cuff of the boyfriend's practice sock part 2, and followed that with the toe of the second sock. I had a sudden realization, however, that I've never made socks for myself. So, I cast on the "Falling in Love" socks by Anni Designs, that was on the MagKnits website. That website, sadly, isn't functional anymore. It's a neat little design with a heart lace panel bordered by cables. I've done cables before, but I'm not very good at it.

I just heard the derisive laugh from my friends on ravelry.

Fine, I can do cables decently well, but they're not easy for me at all. We shall not speak of how many times I dropped the cabled stitches, and leave it at that.

So, I've got enough sock to cover the toe of my foot, and wow! I finally understand what the fuss is all about with the hand made socks. I'm making it out of that new yarn by Deborah Norville. It's 50% superwash wool, 25% rayon from bamboo, and 25% nylon. I love it, and the price is amazingly reasonable. It's a new yarn that's being carried by the larger Joann's craft stores.

Last, but certainly not least, is the wings of a dream shawl. I've gotten a couple of more rows done. I'm really curious to see how it will turn out, since I modified the pattern quite a bit.

Last, but not least, I've got a couple of shawl pins done. I should get a couple of shop updates in tomorrow. Happy knitting!

RIP: Eulogy for Ocean Waves Cardigan

It's official.

I'm putting this project to rest, mostly because I'm just that mad at it. I frogged the offending panel, but that wasn't enough to abate my fury. I still want to knit only top-down raglan cardigans. I'm crazy enough to take an oath only to knit raglan constructed cardigans. I'm open minded enough to consider bottom up, knit-in-one piece cardigan. They're teaching a class on it at TNNA's summer show. I'm planning on taking it, and I have EZ's book on knitting in the round.

I'm just not pleased with what happens when I knit pieces that require seaming. You'd think I wouldn't mind seaming, because I learned to sew before I learned how to knit, but no. At least with sewing, I can just re-cut a piece if it doesn't fit well. The idea of cutting my knit fabric just makes me sick! Reshaping a knit piece takes 15 hours not 15 minutes, like it does with sewing. Bleh!

So, I'm officially putting the ocean waves cardigan to rest. Rest assured however, the argosy yarn is going into another project that's staying under wraps for now. For those of you that know me, I've got some designing ambitions, and there's some deadlines that I want to meet. That's right, it made me so mad that I said screw it, and I'm coming up with my own design. I've been taking meticulous line-by-line notes, and it's going pretty well. Here's hoping it works!

And no, I'm not just working on 2 projects. The wings of a dream shawl has a whopping.. uh, 3 rows on it? Heheheh. I don't really count projects as started until they hit several inches long. 3 rows just looks like ... well... not much at all. On the upside, I'm only one lace repeat away from finishing the front panel on the graduation dress! Speaking of that, I should be working on graduating! Aka studying. Rest in peace, ocean waves cardi.

Shop Talk ed. 3 - Shawl Pin Tutorial

Hooray! The shawl pins are up and running! I'm totally in love with some of them, and must remember that they are supposed to find good homes that aren't mine. But, before they do, I realize that they aren't the most intuitive design ever. To help with that, I've created a tutorial on how to use a shawl pin that doesn't have a stick pin.

Each pin works on the same principle:

1) Poke the free end into the fabric.
2) Rotate the pin
3) Poke the free end back out of the fabric
4) Rotate until you have the pin situated the way you want.

It'll take a little bit of practice before you learn how to place the pin just right, but it's worth the effort to have a pin where you don't need to worry about losing different parts.

First off, I have the Swan pin, which has flown to a happy home with Joyarna.

Start with the pin at roughly a 90 degree angle from where you want it to be. So, if you want it to look like this:


Then you should poke the wing tip into the fabric like this:


Once it's in, rotate the pin another 90 degrees, and push as much fabric as you want to hold it into place on the pin. Then poke the wing tip back out of the fabric.


Then it's alot of rotating at this point to get the shawl pin where you want it to be. Here's a step by step progression of 90 degree rotations clockwise to get it where you want it to be. See?


And finally, the swan is where it should be, swimming happily in lace. The swan and the delicately swirling shawl pin have the most amount of twisting around and rotating to get it into place. All the other designs have an easier progression to get the pin in place.

For example, the treble clef works in the same way the leaf would. To get the treble clef into the lace like this:


Start by inserting the curved in at the top of where you'd want the pin to be.


Then rotate the shawl pin and push through as much fabric as much as you want onto the pin.


This next step you can do one of two ways. I took a picture in natural light so you can see the curved end of the shawl pin poking through the fabric better. By tilting the shawl pin a little bit, you poke the curved end right below the top for good alignment.


The other way you could do this last step is simply to push the whole curved bit through, to get to the final step.


And there you have it. I like the treble clef and leaf better than the others, because the curved wire over the pin part of the shawl pin holds the lace fabric in place. In the others, you're relying on the tension of the fabric and the many curves of the pin to hold it in place. They work well, don't get me wrong, but there's just that added bit of security with that second wire.

In other shop news, the row counters are finished! Hopefully, I should have some time tomorrow morning to post the new designs up. I've got lovely shades of red, green, and blue glass beads on ribbons in combinations to suit almost anyone. The beads slide smoothly, but still have enough friction to hold their place while you knit. I indulged myself and made one for myself to test out - to make sure that it works well, of course! I wouldn't want to sell something I didn't test first. Yeah. That's my excuse, and I'm sticking with it.

For other things you can look forward to for the shop, I picked up brass wire! So, look forward to shawl pins in 16 gauge brass wire. I'll more than likely make a few of the current designs and maybe make one or two more new designs. I'm excited!

Shop Talk ed. 2

So, just a quick update on the shop. I got the feedback from my friends who were testing out the stitch markers. They definitely liked the idea, but the beads were a little tough to move. One of two things has to change, before I go forward with the design. Either the beads need to have a larger hole for the ribbon to pass through. Or, the ribbon needs to be smaller. Since I haven't a clue how to drill out glass beads, it's looking more and more like I must make that trip to the craft store. Perhaps this weekend, if I get a good chunk of stuff done.

For news of the other expansions, I'm working on some shawl pin designs! I had made a shawl pin for myself out of some heavy gauge wire I had from another jewelry project. A friend suggested it would be a great design to add to the etsy shop. (Thanks Joyarna!) I like shawl pins that don't require a stick pin, because, let's be honest, I'd lose the stick pin and resort to using double point needles to hold the shawl pin in place. Then I'd lose the double point needles, and then I'd be in a vicious cycle. As it is, I manage to misplace my DPNs well enough on my own when I'm testing out various projects.

Therefore, I'm working on designs where you don't need a stick pin, in case I hadn't made that point clear enough. So far, I've got three basic shapes and a need for more heavy gauge wire. Yes, it has occurred to me to raid the boyfriend's wire stash. (He's a born tinkerer and an electrical engineer. I do honestly believe he has more miles of wire than I have yarn. He disagrees.) Although, all of his wire is, you know, for circuits, and coated with plastic. I may have to talk this over with him, since I'm still on the learning curve for understanding how wire behaves.

I need wire to practice on. Some of the sketches I came up with, like the darling blue bell design, require sharp, sharp bends in wire that heavy gauge silver and copper don't like to do. Oh, by the way, I'm making them in silver and copper wire! Just in case you didn't catch that. They should be up in the shop this weekend, so keep an eye out for them.

Misadventures in Knitting: Frogging Fun

By fun I mean (insert your favorite expletive here).

This is what has happened to the ocean cardigan after I blocked it and loosely pieced it together to check the fit. Apparently, I could not get away with the extra stitches like I thought I could. If you'll notice, one side is 2 inches longer than the other. No, it's not supposed to be like that. No, I do not like asymmetrical cardigans.

How did this happen, did you ask? Somehow, I added extra yarn overs near the front right button hole strip. I haven't a clue how I added them in. Instead of having three little lacy legs, I had four. And then, I had five. How I added that next one, I don't have any idea. Anyways, I thought I could get away with it. I thought quite wrong. I decreased back down to three lace legs, and thought I was okay to block. All those extra legs translated into two extra inches of length as you can see. I was absolutely stumped as to how I could fix it.

The most reasonable suggestion made was to frog the right front piece, which was much better than my idea to frog the whole thing. I'm still tempted to frog the whole thing and write a new pattern. However, reason ruled and the cardigan is cooling while I ponder what to do next with it. Which brings us to the whole reason for this post.

Frogging.

Every knitter I know lives to avoid this most dire of fates for their finished objects, but sometimes it's just inevitable. If, like me, you can't possibly figure out any other way to save your project, start by picking out your bound off edge. I like to use a thin but not sharp yarn needle to pull the loose end through the loops until I've gotten back to a row where it's purely knit stitches and not bound off stitches. Then I can pull on that sad, kinked end to unravel my stitches until I've reached a desired point - in this case, the other end of the front right bodice.

However, that sounds like a much smoother process than it really is. Some yarns, like cashmere and alpaca develop a halo either as you work with it or after it's been washed and blocked. True to form, the argosy yarn developed a lovely soft halo with form fitting drape. While I want that in the finished garment, it makes frogging difficult because some of that halo wraps around the yarn as you frog it. It forms something like a fabric bead that can almost knot one strand of yarn to another. As you might imagine, this is not a desirable thing for a piece you are frogging. When that happens, the smooth pull of the frogged yarn stops, and you'll probably have a long piece of yarn dangling from a loop with something that looks like a knot.

Stop pulling the yarn at this point, it will just make it worse. Remember that thin but dull yarn needle I used earlier? Bring that back out again, and use it to pull part the "bead" formed by the halo wrapping around the yarn. Sometimes, you can hold both sides of the frogged yarn in the front and back of the bead and pull it apart from the loop. Hold onto the loop while you pull apart the bead of halo, otherwise, you'll continue frogging the yarn below the loop and that makes for a tangled mess. Sometimes you may have to pick apart the fiber bead quite a bit to pull it apart before you can continue frogging.

I've found that the more halo a yarn develops, the more likely it is to form that fiber bead that makes frogging so different. That's why frogging yarns like mohair and angora is so difficult - they have halo in the skein, and the halo just gets fuzzier with knitting, washing, or frogging. These are the least forgiving yarns for mistakes that have to be ripped out. It's a lucky day if you can tink back a few rows in mohair, much less frogging more than that.

Other yarns that I've found difficult to frog include alpaca and cashmere. Both yarns knit up well, but their halo really comes out when you block or wash the knitted fabric. If possible, frogging is best done before you get them wet. Sometimes, that's unavoidable, especially if you're doing lace, where the pattern really doesn't appear until after it's blocked. Lace yarns are delicate to begin with, and frogging them must be done carefully. Sometimes knitting is enough to bring out a halo and that seems to make the yarn a little weaker and more prone to breaking when you pull the yarn out for frogging.

Wool tends to forgive frogging, at least the first time around. Depending on how tightly its spun, wool can be knitted and frogged several times before the fiber beads appear to make frogging difficult. However, single ply wool does NOT frog well at all. Cotton, even thread weight cotton, almost always forgives every frogging attempt. Silk, particularly the smooth silks, present a different sort of challenge. The slipperiness of silk practically allows the stitches to fall out from one row to the next, making it prime knotting territory. Bamboo can be prone to this problem as well, because it makes a notoriously slippery yarn. Acrylic forgives frogging almost as often as cotton does, and that sums up my review of different fibers and how well they frog.

A quick note on how to get rid of the kinkyness of yarn after it's been frogged, wind it up into a skein. Tie lots of figure 8 loops around it to keep the strands from getting tangled. Let the skein soak in a sink or bowl full of cool water, before gently squeezing out the excess water. You can roll it up in a towel and hop up and down on the towel to get rid of the water. Then, hang up the skein on a plastic hanger to dry. You can weight it down with more hangers hanging off the loop to pull the yarn straight if you so desire. Dyers and spinners will be completely familiar with this process. Give the skein at least a day to dry before you wind it up into a ball, and this should take most of the kink out.

In other news, I should have some exciting updates and news about the shop tomorrow. If people want, I can do a frogging tutorial with pictures to illustrate the process of frogging.