wedding foliages

While I have not taken the 'handmade pledge' (although that's about buying, not making), nor do I profess to be part of The Compact, both of these movements certainly encompass tenets that I try to live by - where possible don't buy new and choose handmade (preferably by me). So I knit our gifts for the wedding that we attended recently in Savannah (I must point out though that the bride and groom live in Chicago):

















The Vital Statistics
Pattern: Foliage by Emilee Mooney available free from Knitty - thank you!
Yarn: Sundara Yarn Worsted Merino in shade 'Watching the Night Emerge' and Noro Cash Iroha in the not quite so evocative shade 108.
Needles: 4.5 and 4mm for the grey/green and 7 and 5mm for the brown.
Size: I knit the two versions, the worsted (grey/green) and the bulky (brown). I wanted the hats to match but not be identical.
Stash/recycle content: All from stash (although I must admit recently and arbitrarily acquired). The Sundara was a curiosity purchase from someone who was de-stashing and the Noro was on sale at Churchmouse and I didn't want to leave empty handed ...
Start to Finish: 16 to 18 September 2010 (grey/green) and 21 to 24 September 2010 (brown).
Comments: I've knit this hat five times now and have enjoyed it every time. It has become my go-to gift knit. This is the first time that i have knit a bulky weight version - I had the Cash Iroha and some needles so I just gave it a shot. I think that this is a forgiving pattern - it has a bit of stretch but if it's a bit loose that's ok too.
Verdict: May their love grow and grow.

and we're back

Oh it's been an erratic past few weeks - my mum was visiting early in September and then we headed off on vacation to Georgia and South Carolina for the better part of ten days. 'Vacation' - that's still a hard word for me to use but 'holiday' here in the US very much refers to a 'holy day' such as Christmas, Easter or, unh, Hallowe'en.

We had a wonderful time away and I'll have some more photos and stories shortly. But this was quite possibly the best bit:

My birthday card from little miss bear on Hunting Island beach after swimming in the Atlantic (for the first time) with dolphins frolicking out yonder.

september reading

Ooops, a bit Sookied out this month - Dead as a Doornail
and Definitely Dead. Vampires, witches, demons, werewolves, no sex though. Lots of fun to read and I love the Sookie character. It's also great to have a visual on many of the other characters courtesy of TrueBlood.

my sewing circle

Ravelry for sewing? I know that there are a couple of sites like this around but mysewingcircle seems to be the one that all the cool kids are using. I'm on there too, user name 'amelia', and I've started an alabama stitching group for discussion and sharing of Alabama Stitch Book and Alabama Studio Style projects. If your a seam-ster/-stress (as opposed to a sewer which just makes me think waste management) you might like to have a look.

And here's something that I've sewn recently:

We're attending a wedding next weekend and little miss bear is very excited as it is her first since she was a baby. This dress is taken from a Japanese pattern book and the fabric is a silk-cotton blend recycled/upcycled from a Sally Smith womens skirt that I once upon a time bought at an op shop in Melbourne just for the fabric. I had to alter the style rather because I didn't have enough fabric to cut the extra flare that the original pattern included. To use up as much fabric as possible I also made it longer.

I left off the front ruching as the fabric is so lovely and I didn't want to break up the print. I also finished the hem with bias tape, again to make the dress longer. Actually, my finished dress didn't end up much like the tunic pictured here at all - the reason that I used this pattern is because it was cut on the bias as was the skirt that I was sewing from.

There wasn't a lot of fabric left over (surprising how much a child's garment can take up from an adult skirt) so I had to make the bias tape from lots of small strips sewn together; came out fine though. No hand finishing on this one except for sewing on the button loop and the button (both from stash).

And that 'decorative' zig-zag stitch? There are no mistakes, just design features (I didn't do a great job of sewing on the bias tape). Same goes for that diagonal seam on the right front shoulder - the fabric went through the overlocker by accident and I couldn't cut the whole piece again so I just had to make do.

I used my overlocker/serger on most of the seams so hopefully there will be no fraying after washing. Impeccable finish is very important to me and I was put off home sewing for many years by the fact that I didn't have an overlocker and I just couldn't bear those raw edges. Funnily, nowadays I actually find those overlocked edges tacky; they are redolent of commercially produced garments rather than hand made. When using a weave, I actually much prefer French seams like I was doing on the (admittedly, yet-to-be-finished) tunique francaise; there is clearly so much more effort in them, the hand of the maker is somehow more present.

booksleuth

I think that I have a good memory. I remember peoples' names, I remember details about them, I remember episodes and feelings from childhood. Sometimes what I remember though is just a sliver and that can be frustrating. For ever so long now I have had a fragment of memory of books that I read as a child, probably in the eighties:

1. in this book the young female protagonist gets kidnapped and raises the alarm by switching on a stove which ignites a bag that is sitting on it and sets off the alarm.

2. a book about a kidnapping; when the young male protagonist tries to escape he recalls that people often stand with their weight on only one foot.

3. a spooky book where the young female protagonist has an excellent sense of time and so realises that her father's new love interest and her son are somehow living forever.

These are truly the only details that I could remember about these books. I posted my queries to Abebooks' BookSleuth® forum and lo and behold within a day I had my answers from other readers:











Third Eye by Lois Duncan
On the Edge by Gillian Cross
Locked in Time by Lois Duncan

I'm really excited to read these childhood favourites again, but also apprehensive as I guess that the impact that young adult fiction will have on me twenty years later will not be quite so profound. I'll let you know.

what colour is your parachute silk?

What Color is Your Parachute?* is a famous job hunter/career counselling book. For someone who has always felt so conflicted about career choice, it's kind of funny that I have never read it. I wonder if it even includes motherhood as an option?

Anyway, having children changes you, obviously, but in subtle ways which you might not expect. My experience is that when you get over those first few weeks (months) and re-emerge from your tracksuit pants into the world you find yourself a different person. You want to wear different clothes, different colours. Dark blue, which I had always eschewed as looking matronly on me, is suddenly just the right colour and I have recently acquired a few t-shirts (yes, the dreaded VS) and two cardigans (Ben Sherman and H&M via Goodwill) and Yves and Daybreak have come off the needles.

And suddenly you also want something different in your life. Something neutral, something chic, something ... beige. Yes, I was looking at yorkiegirl's knitting projects on Ravelry; all those neutrals - cream, oyster, alabaster, parchment, linen - so serene, so sophisticated, so what I wanted right now. So, I knit myself something.

The Vital Statistics
Pattern: A Little Ruffle, available free from Sadie & Oliver. Thank you!
Size: As per the directions is a great size.
Yarn: I had always thought of paler neutrals as something that I couldn't wear but on this project I didn't care, I wanted something beige (or thereabouts, I'm calling it wheaten). And I'm delighted with it - I received a compliment immediately from a very colour- and design-savvy friend that the brown looked great and the grey picked up my blue eyes and I felt wonderful. I will have no hesitation in wearing this with confidence now.

Oh and the yarn, well of course I liked the colour - it was a men's zip-up cardigan that I bought for Tim but there was a mark on it and a hole appeared and it sat around for a few weeks so I decided to make it into something else, for me. To achieve the weight I wanted, I ended up double stranding this yarn but picking out a single ply as I knit along - tedious and a bit wasteful. It's 92 per cent merino and 8 per cent cashmere - it didn't knit up very nicely which surprised me, given the yarn content. That was perhaps because it was recycled and had a lot of kink in it. Once I blocked it the drape became beautiful and it's very soft.

The grey is some Columbia Minerva Princessa that I got free at a stash swap, colourway is 2229 'Dark Oxford'.

Needles: 4.5 and 5mm.
Start to finish: 18 August to 15 September 2010.
Stash/recycle content: Whoo-hoo - all of it!

Comments: Excellent, simple, free pattern - not really a half-circle shawl, more like a scarf with tapered ends and a frill. I did a provisional cast on of the initial 10 stitches to avoid having to pick stitches up in order to do the frill. that just seemed like double work and I try to avoid that where I can. As for the striping, I just winged it on that. As I didn't carry the yarn up the sides of the work, I was able to knit three rows of alternating colours and I really like the effect, it's quite graphic.

Verdict: I really love this scarf. I have already worn it a couple of times and felt great for being a bit daring. My only reservation about it is that it might be more a 'little house' than 'little ruffle with the brown and grey but I think that the graphic effect of the stripes updates it a bit. I must say that wearing it, I realised, that if you are a knitter, you need to be comfortable wearing knitwear.

* I'm not one for extreme sports but I have been watching Project Runway lately so parachute silk seemed like a more appropriate title for me.

whorls

I have finished placing, cutting and pinning the spirals on my alabama dress. I have even done a little bit of stitching. There are a lot of pins though so it is unfortunately not a very portable project. And heavy too! All that cotton adds up.

stella

Stella is a lovely neighbour of ours who recently turned nine (ok, not so recently, in fact, weeks ago but I only just finished making the present for her). There is a great home decor shop in Capitol Hill that I forget the name of - I'll look it up and provide details but for the moment it's just along from Molly Moon's Ice Cream, reason enough to go there - that sells 'green' products: recycled, upcycled etc. There I saw some blank books that were actually bound in fabric that had been salvaged from clothing with the pockets nicely placed in the front centre of the book. I love the idea of always having a handy place to store your drawing materials.

I realised that book binding is outside my craft skill set and besides, it would be sad once you had filled the book to no longer have use of that cute fabric cover (and especially the pocket), so I decided to sew a sketch book cover that can be reused (even greener!). For the fabric I chose a floral-printed mini-corduroy jacket that has been in the cupboard for sometime (bought at a thrift store here in the US though, so less than two years).

The construction is a very simple - a rectangle with flaps sewn at either end which the book covers slip into. There was no appropriate pocket on the jacket so I made the pocket and pocket flap (and a buttonhole - still a mental block for me but actually oh so simple) just the right size for some mini pencils. I went to a lot of trouble to make sure that the pattern met up across the pocket and flap - it worked out well. The button is from the jacket cuffs.

As a finishing touch I embroidered Stella's name on the inside flap using some embroidery floss that I bought at the thrift store (of course).

august reading

Three books!

She Walks These Hills by Sharyn McCrumb - More in the Ballad series, really enjoyed this one.
Last Rituals and My Soul to Take by Yrsa Sigurdardottir - I actually picked the second of these up at the library from the 'grab and go' shelf but had to put it back because I saw that it was the second book with the same character and well, I had to read the first one first. So I did, and then the second one immediately afterwards. Great Icelandic murder/detective fiction. I'll be on the lookout for her next novel.

spirals

As much as I keep saying that I would like to show more in-progress shots of what I am working on, I am aware that I just keep pulling finished items out of nowhere. Like this:

The Vital Statistics
Pattern: Yummy Scrummy Cupcake, available free!
Size: the regular size; there's also a pattern for mini cupcakes.
Yarn: Tahki Cotton Classic in shades 'white' and 'cotton candy' and just two rows of Grignasco Bambi in shade 416.
Needles: 4mm.
Start to finish: 28 August to 30 August 2010; this is part of the reason that it is only now making an appearance in its finished state - it all happened so quickly.
Stash/recycle content: all from stash - hooray.
Comments: Hmm, looks a bit more like an iced dumpling than a cupcake. I should have knit on much smaller needles in order to tighten the gauge and achieve a firmer finished object. The top is decorated with three of the sparkly buttons that I have also previously used on the red vintage baby booties. Stuffing comes from a cushion from the thrift store that didn't survive the wash very well.
Verdict: Could have been better but still cute, and for a wonderful cause. This cupcake is destined to be part of the Knit for Life fundraising display in the window of The Yellowleaf Cupcake Co. in the Belltown neighbourhood of Seattle - "Working with one of Seattle's most inspirational knitting groups, we will donate $1.00 of every regular price "PINK SNOWBALL" cupcake to Knit For Life. Helping to make every hospital visit a "stitch" easier! One Cupcake, One Stitch, One Smile...Knit For Life!" Sweet.

So, in an attempt to remedy all this - my other current knitting as I continue to recover from Daybreak (which I think should be renamed 'Crack at Dawn') has been a very pleasant, meditative stocking stitch number - 'A Little Ruffle'. I am not yet up to the ruffle. The yarn is recycled from a 92 per cent wool 8 percent cashmere zip-front sweater that I bought at Goodwill, that Tim wore for a while and then left sitting around for too long so I unravelled it. That's the way things go here.

And my current addiction - sewing knit fabrics, particularly working on projects from Alabama Studio Style. This may become an obsession. The cotton knits are so nice to work with and I'm fascinated by all of the possibilities that the book allows. I have sewn up the tank dress using fabric from a very simple (boring) black t-shirt dress that I bought at Goodwill and some black t-shirts because I needed more fabric to complete the length of the skirt - photos of that later - and am pondering how to go about the embellishment. A word first though about showing projects underway - it's scary. What if it doesn't work out? What if I don't finish it (ha ha, that wouldn't be a first)? What if I can't achieve the thing that I have in mind and that gets revealed to the world? All the usual angst about making things really and perhaps a good way to confront them.

It's also a lack of confidence about my creative abilities. I have, ahem, rather high standards and expectations and a lot of what I do along the way I don't deem to be very good or at least good enough. Like drawings and sketches and so forth. So, without any further ado, here is what I have in mind:

I have the black dress done - good start. Now I'm thinking about how to do the spiral appliques. What I have in mind is three tiers of spirals - from hem upwards in black, purple and blue - in diminishing size and with diminishing coverage in silver. Not sure how to do the silver yet - I have tried some silver fabric spray paint but wasn't happy with the effect. I have also tried just drawing onto the fabric with a metallic Sharpie. And I did a test run spiral:

The silver Sharpie, unfortunately, looks very flat in this photo (whereas the spray paint that I tried had too much 'glimmer') but this little project showed me something - the circle distorts once it is cut into a spiral shape as does the gradation of the silver shading. So I think that the silver, if any, has to go on after the spirals have been applied to the dress. Good - off to cut out spirals.

shetland

No, we haven't been travelling, except down to Tenino (rhymes with, umm, wino) just outside Olympia, where we have Shetlands in our own back yard. Shetland sheep that is, and it's the sheep herder's side paddock and ...

Point is, we own a sheep (ok, technically two-thirds of a sheep as part of a mini fibre co-operative organised by a very resourceful knitting friend - thank you Aimee). There are four sheep altogether, the one in the middle is nominally 'ours':

We've all bought into the co-op and will share in the costs and proceeds (proceeds being raw fleece). No idea what I'm going to do with it when the time comes but getting it will be really exciting - we will not be shearing the sheep but instead rooing them! Australians must be good at that.

Below are some up-close photos of the sheep on the left's fleece (he was the only one that we could get hold of and pet). Aimee and I held on to one horn each and I had an awful irrational fear that they would just break off as though made of chalk. Although small, sheep are quite strong when they want to get away from you!

Oh it's going to be so much fun picking all that vegetable matter out of the fleece. I'm serious, that's just my sort of micro-mindless task. As long as it is just vegetable matter ....

stretch target

Ahh, corporate speak - stretch targets, personal and professional development plans, key performance indicators. Anyway, on 1 January this year I stated that stretch was one of my goals for 2010, that is, sewing knit fabrics, and promptly forgot about it until I started working on my Alabama projects. I have decided to leave that blue/green tank unfinished and consider it a toile and ditto for the pink (which is from Alabama Stitch Book - I wanted to try it out for comparison, fit- and length-wise).

I used my overlocker to sew both of these and wouldn't actually recommend it (although I also wouldn't recommend hand stitching as who could bear to rip out those seams as you work on getting the fit right?) Next time I am just going to use the sewing machine with a very shallow, long zigzag stitch and a little less pressure on the foot than usual.

So what, I wonder, would the key performance indicators for motherhood be? Sometimes we catch up with people whom we haven't seen for a few weeks and they ask what I've been doing. Well, I want to say, both the children are still alive and in one piece and we're all wearing clean undies. I mean, that really is meeting my targets (the first one about keeping the children alive being non-negotiable).

And speaking of clean undies - that is my other recent stretch project.

I haven't been happy with any of the girls' underpants on the market here so, having seen Omi Creates' endeavours, I decided to make some. Modern yet modest is how this underpants pattern from that*darn*kat is described and I think that is spot on. And such a fabulous way to use up scraps, old t-shirts, favourite baby clothes - fantastic. You can still see the (admittedly upside-down) Esprit lable on this pair from a top that I bought at an op shop many moons ago. The blue was from a t-shirt of mine that was in decent condition but had a stain right down the front, the red for the bands was some yardage that I had bought previously for something else but decided not to use.

These were mostly sewn on the machine, with the overlocker to neaten up some hems but I question whether that is really necessary. The overlocker is great for knits but the thing is, knits don't really unravel so raw edges are not going to be such a big deal. I actually like to use the overlocker on woven fabrics to keep them from coming apart.

Anyway, I've met my stretch target. Now I just need to go about getting a raise ...

dryclean only

Who knew? Sometimes it's true.

Yes, this is my sadly misshapen Margaret O'Leary (via the thrift store) cardigan. The fibre content is 55 per cent linen 45 per cent flax so I really didn't think that going through the wash would wound it too badly - but it did. The part that has shrunk is the solid grey section; the striped portions are fine. Unfortunately, this distortion makes it a bit difficult to work out exactly how the garment lay previously.

(And actually, upon double checking, the tag just says 'dry cleaning recommended' - maybe I could take it back if I had just kept that Goodwill receipt ...)

While I am aware that I won't be able to reproduce the cardigan by hand, I do want to try and recreate some of the design features. I particularly like the way that the back of the garment wraps around to the front under the arm so that the 'side' seam is not actually at the underarm but rather level with the shoulder seam.

I have had a go at reconstructing the sleeve but got the calculations wrong. What you see here on the right is the sleeve cap of a partial of sleeve. I cast on seven stitches less than called for and proceeded to knit the sleeve with everything above that seven stitches missing. To abbreviate a long story - the gap between the green and orange stitch markers is roughly equivalent to the gap in my calculations.

The solution? To knit a few underarms (like this one at the left) and a few sleeve caps (just the initial decreases) to work out at just what point they match up. Laborious perhaps but I think that it will be worth it.

donegal kidsilk tweed

A new yarn idea for Rowan perhaps?

I recycled this Donegal Tweed yarn from an L.L. Bean cardigan made in the Republic of Ireland. It is a natural coloured yarn with neps in blue, rust, pink and maroon. I've picked out the pink here by knitting it together with a strand of Rowan's Kidsilk Haze in shade Blushes (which is pink). Partly I wanted to soften up the knitted fabric and partly I wanted to enhance the pink tones.

I'm not convinced though. From the bottom is stocking stitch with the KSH, stocking stitch without; garter stitch with, garter stitch without. I'm certainly tending toward the stocking stitch but am not sure about ... about what? If you have any ideas, please do let me know.

westknits

I've already waxed lyrical about Stephen West's Daybreak pattern. He also offers a number of other patterns under the Westknits lable so when I saw on his blog that he was doing a spot of destashing before moving to Amsterdam and offering a free pattern into the deal, I jumped at the chance to explore some yummy yarns. I bought from him (top to bottom):
- Madelinetosh merino, worsted weight, in colours graphite, sequoia and baltic.
- Sundara Yarns worsted weight in shade 'Watching the night emerge'.

I'm thinking that I might be able to stripe the graphite and sequoia to produce a slightly larger item.

And thank you to Ann, Wendy and Leonie for their interest in the Daybreak pattern giveaway. I will contact you individually to organise transmission.

And my free pattern? I received Flamboyan, "...an elegant triangular shawl composed of garter and stockinette stitch along with a ribbed edge. Basic intarsia techniques are utilized to achieve a block of color in the center of the shawl. Choose your favorite color combination and luxuriate in this special piece of knitwear!"

eta - oops, except I can't find contact details for Wendy; could you please send me an email?

ask and ...

... sometimes you receive an answer! I emailed the Alabama Chanin company last night with my querulous sleeve query and got a prompt response from Natalie Chanin herself - there will be sleeves in their next book which is due out Spring 2012. Hooray!

But my shoulders might get cold during the winters between then and now so I have taken matters into my own sewing hands. This morning I cut out and sewed the basic tank top from Alabama Studio Style. I used some cotton knit yardage that I bought a while ago - these garments take up a lot of fabric and there wasn't enough in the purple top that I had hoped to 'upcycle'. I cut the pieces out using a rotary cutter - so easy! Using the cutter you don't have to handle the fabric so there's no slipping around under the pattern pieces. I did use my overlocker for the sewing which I think was a good choice for the first effort because I was able to alter the seams very subtly to get a good fit.

Then I went to my old t-shirt stash and cut a sleeves off a few of them. I'm going to pin the sleeves into the tank top and see if any of them fit well. If one does then I hope to be able to use the sleeve as a template. Think and sometimes you can receive inspiration!

alabama

It's a couple of years now since Natalie Chanin's Alabama Stitch Book was released and although I loved the ethos of recycling t-shirts for the cotton jersey, the emphasis on hand stitching and the lovely techniques that it describes, most of the projects left me cold and I wasn't inspired really to try any of them. So the techniques remained inspiring but I didn't really feel that I had anywhere to use them.

Then along came Alabama Studio Style and - hooray!! - there is so much in it to love and want to make and bead and embroider and .... Given the intricacy of the decorative work on these projects, I really do feel like they are something that I could quite easily occupy myself with for the rest of my life. There is the one basic camisole dress with a number of variations, including a tank top neckline and skirt option.

So last night, rather than try and work out what I want to be knitting, I grabbed some paper and cut out the pattern pieces to make the tank top. I am absolutely taken with this image from the book and would also like to try making a dress at some point. Thing is, as much as it impresses me, I don't think that I could stay true to the hand-stitching ethos. I might just machine sew the garment seams and then do any finishing by hand. I am hoping to go eco though and construct the tank top out of some existing t-shirts. I just have to see whether I'll have enough yardage.

My only regret about these garments is the sleeves - there are no sleeves. I really like sleeves and am constantly left wondering why they are not included on so many projects. Is it because they are too hard to draft? I hope not, because then what hope would I have of improvising some? Do designers think that their audience is not interested in/scared of fitting and sewing sleeves? I guess that I am but only because their lack of inclusion makes me think that there is something scary about them. Sleeves please!!

gone fishing

I'm casting around for something to knit. I have of course a few things on the needles which I really need to face up to - Baudelaire socks perhaps? - but more on that some other time. I have cast on for a few things, looking for 'what to knit now'.

I'm still grieving a bit about my completed Daybreak shawl and am looking for that same hit, that feeling that this is exactly what I want to be knitting right now. (And thank you to Lynn in Tucson who so accurately described Von Trier's Breaking the Waves as "the best film I never want to see again".)

This is the possible beginning of another shawl - Shaelyn by Leila Raabe. The yarn is 92 per cent merino, 8 per cent cashmere, recycled from one of Tim's sweaters that was starting to look a bit tired (and was from Goodwill originally). I'm a bit undecided whether to knit with a single strand or double strand, one seems too lightweight, the other too heavyweight ... so I have to decide what sort of shawl I want and what size needle to use.

And this one, well - am I nuts? I have never done stranded knitting but necessity and invention and so forth. I have, however, long wanted to knit this project - a tea cup, blue and white of course - but in size 5 crochet cotton? on 2mm needles? hmm ...

And last but not least, the beginnings of a sleeve with a provisional cast-on. At this point probably the most straightforward of my possible projects but not for long. A few weeks ago, I ruined a great cardigan that I bought at Goodwill - strangely enough it was a hemp/cotton mix which I didn't think would shrink. I've rarely had any trouble putting woollens through the wash. Anyway, there are aspects of this poor old cardi that I really liked - non-standard construction, clever use of stripes, asymmetrical front opening - and after having had so much fun knitting with the Noro Kureyon sock yarn, I have decided to try and reproduce it as a handknit. Something else that I have never done before. The dark blue shown here is Dale Baby Ull, a superwash 100 per cent merino 4ply/fingering weight yarn. It is lovely and soft, even if a bit splitty and this really is my favourite weight of yarn to work in. I love the weight of the fabric that it produces.

The logical solution to all this? Spend the evening sewing.