a little upset here...

I was watching my new favourite show, ‘Call the Midwife’ on Netflix – I like it so much, I got the book from the library and am reading it along with watching an episode or two (okay, or three) per night and am loving both of them – the book fills in what you miss on the actual show, so I like that. Anyway, not to spoil things, but it’s nice to see actual knitting going on in the show, the two needle kind, mostly by Sister Monica Joan – you might say, she’s my favourite character, but I do really love them all! Maybe the lead character, Jenny Lee seems like she’s a bit stuffy and uptight, but she’s the author of the book and she really is.
So, I’m getting toward the end of the second season and they’re trying to give Sister Monica Joan a bit of a make-work project and she’s supposed to be knitting squares to be sewn into either baby blankets or an afghan. There’s a scene with Trixie and Jenny working the two needles, supposedly helping to knit more squares and then, oh so disappointing – they are sewing together CROCHETED granny squares!!! Wow! hard to believe BBC has no one on staff or even that any of the cast didn’t see this major faux pas!

finally, #190

I’ve been waiting to see how it’s going to look and there is a new website too!

 
 

www.knitstylemag.com is the new link. I sent in my garment back in September and then you tend to forget about it for a while. I was happy with my design but, like I’ve said in the past, I make it in a finished 36 bust size, so there is really no hardship in parting with it because it doesn’t fit me and the yarn was chosen by our new editor, Cari and I really didn’t like the colour, a tealy green, but that’s just me. You can check out some of my background story, ‘anatomy of a design…’ Sep 6/13.
In early December Cari sent me this photo of my cardi and I was totally impressed! She did ask me to keep it to myself until the magazine came out, so I couldn’t share it earlier. It looks great and the more I studied at it, I knew I was going to regret not having one. Thought about it on and off between my getting-ready-for-Christmas projects and was planning to get some yarn to make it – what am I thinking? I prefer standard gauge garments and I already have a stock of innumerable selections of suitable mercerized cottons to make it on the standard gauge. Yes, that’s the way I’ll go! I did a swatch of the drop stitch and it looked lame - actually the drop stitch is an easy way to make a lace pattern on the mid gauge, but with the Silver Reed lace carriage available why bother with a hand transferred technique.
I did some hybrid knitting (see - Jan 16/13) – I used the lace stitch from No 40, ‘Lacy in Red’, the hem from ‘Borderline’, No 25, the shape from my KS design in my size, oh and the yarn I’m using is Yeoman Yarns Cannelé which is the same as 'Borderline' and I had done a remake of ‘Lacy in Red’ for myself using Cannelé back in ’08 so no swatches needed!!! I re-gauged the hand-transferred yoke stitch pattern, using a 7-prong tool for the waves so 2 repeats still looked good on the sideways knit yoke – just need to do the final putting together!
Did I mention they had a sucky name? ‘Lots ‘o Lace’ – I did try to rename it. When I sent in the pattern, I made a compromise and called it ‘Lace Waves’ – but it obviously didn’t take and you know what? Isn’t that apostrophe in the wrong place! LOL!

 

what am I?

So, I was away, had a nice holiday and I come back and there’s, like, a bunch of messages, some asking for the minion hat pattern and they, like, wanted it for last weekend (I do feel really bad that I wasn’t able to get it to them in time), someone else was asking frantic questions about integrating shape files with stitch patterns, an OPP, BTW…and then a nice lady from PEI asking me about programming a lace pattern into her Brother 970. Seems she reads this blog and in the past, I offered an apology and a ’how to fix this’ (with a little help from Alice from ND) (see ‘hanging my head in shame’, Mar 21, 2012) about entering memo info into the Brother 970 CB1 box.
Basically, if you follow me, you know I’ve admitted to being somewhat biased in favouring my Silver Reed/Studio machines, but I have tried to provide the proper information for making my patterns and designs on Brother machines as well.
So, my PEI knitter writes (I know she is a good, accomplished knitter and won’t just be blowing me off) that she’s tried to enter a punchcard pattern, #18, into her machine, not to holey, blah-blah- blah, she includes a scan of the fabric (of course, it’s an OPP) she is trying to emulate – turns out the original was hand-transferred. I do not know what #18 punchcard looks like.
Then she says:
I thought I had the programming correct, following Page 44 of the instruction book and putting in N beside every lace row and 2 beside the 2 stockinette rows. However, when I finished and tried to enter it to knit, up pops a snide little "this is not a lace pattern" note on the screen, even though I indicated using the lace carriage. My original pattern was numbered 910
(sidebar: the  CB1 gives you the next number, starting at 900 for your own entered stitch patterns)
- should I give it a different number -  I can't see how to do THAT in the book!(no, you shouldn't) and I’m thinking, cripes, I thought she did a ton of knitting! My new entry pattern is at #950 and I’ve only really used this machine to test out lace patterns – gosh, does that mean I’ve done 50 lace patterns on this thing? sounds about right… Maybe it's not possible to adapt a punchcard lace pattern to the 970? Could you point me in the direction of an electronic lace pattern like the "Berry Crush".
I first send her a note asking if she still needs help because it’s happened in the past that I answer some involved question and they’ve already moved on…yes, she is still interested and awaiting my solution. Damn, maybe I should have just hit delete…I do some more unpacking and tidying up but this is starting to bug me – I do not have the answer off the top of my head and if she followed mine and Alice’s and the Brother instruction manual’s advice and still can’t get it…I know it means a trip to the machine (in the basement). Just before New Year’s I had a problem with my hot water tank and there is a bunch of stuff I had to move to get at the tank and it is laying on the floor, blocking the 970. (heavy sigh). Get the stuff put away  and gain access to the machine.
I take a closer look at her swatch, see it’s similar to SR#15, electronic, a 12 st X 28 row repeat and mess about with that. Enter it in DAK and print it out so it has big enough row numbers to read and go down the  2 flights of stairs and enter it in the CB1 box . It looks fine but when I go to air-knit it (no yarn, just passing the carriage) the lace carriage is screwing up and it’s not hitting the sensors properly to advance to the next row – drat! I can tell it’s because the sponge bar needs replacing – the needle butts are basically all over the place and the carriage is sitting too low to contact the sensor properly. I do not have a new sponge bar. Maybe if I cast on and knit for real it will work. Back upstairs, get yarn. Go back down, forget instruction manual. Up, Down. Forgot something to write with. Up, down. At least I’m getting some exercise…I remember she said about the punchcard thing, so I’m thinking, if that’s her problem, my SR pattern isn’t going to solve it. Back up, find a Brother punchcard lace stitch pattern in an old book  that is 8 st X 18 rows (#623) – the photo looks like exactly what she wants! Armed with the manual, the new stitch pattern printout, the punchcard book, the 970 Stitchworld book, printout of the blog, and pen, back down to the machine, saying to myself, ‘why the heck am I doing this??’ I can’t just let it go, I have to solve this!
BTW, the brother instruction manual IS the crappola!! You have to go to page 33 for pattern creation, page 36 for modification and then you need to jump to page 44 for memo info input AND the example they give you has nothing to do with lace!!! WTH? so, I’m pulling up a built-in lace pattern and trying to see how that memo information differs – Ar-r-r-r-g-g-gh! 4 hours later, I have it!! 

To enter the memo information, put '2' on row 8, 14 and 18 and 'N' on all other rows and it will work and it will recognize it as a lace pattern. So, the trick is, put a 2 on the even numbered row that is the end of the transfers, will indicate you are then going to knit 2 plain stockinette rows with the main carriage – the 2 plain rows look like they are entered in the stitch pattern but they are the 2 rows it take the lace carriage to get back to the left side after all the transfers are made - the stitch pattern does not advance when the main carriage is used. SO, the upshot is, any Silver Reed fashion lace stitch pattern can be used on the Brother electronic, as is, and you can add the memo info as above.
With a small feeling of satisfaction, I email Gill the good news – this morning, she messaged back:
EUREKA!!!!!!!  I did, and it did...knit, I mean! Can't thank you enough for that. The C.B. behaved like a dream and all is well.
Hope this helps someone else!
-your public machine knitting servant, MAO

BTW-by the way

CB1 – control box one
DAK - DesignaKnit

PEI-Prince Edward Island

OPP – other person’s pattern
SR – Silver Reed
WTH – a little more polite than WTF

All the best for 2014!

I did get my Christmas knitting done! or at least the most important one. Here’s Rhiana on Christmas day with her doll and my outfits. She loved them - not sure whether the doll cared or not! Forgive me the poor photo - I got a new ipad mini for Christmas and obviously need more practise with it!
Anyway, what I did was a basic re-make of ‘Red Riding Ruffles’ from KW#52, Spring 2010 (at right) – I always liked that hoodie and she did too, -in fact I was able to lengthen the sleeves for her to get a bit more mileage out of it – that was easy, because the sleeve was knit down so it was a simple thing of opening the sleeve seam long enough to rehang the cuff edge and add another 2 inches – and she wore it until earlier this year - I think her Mom had to finally take it away!
This yarn was slightly lighter/thinner – Sirdar Crofter Baby Fairisle Effect DK, 50g/179 yds – I picked it because of the colour (0150), so totally her and also, when I was at the store, because it has a suggested gauge of 22 sts to 4 in/10 cm, I thought I might be able to make it on the standard gauge. But, after swatching at T10 on the 4.5mm gauge machine, I thought the fabric was quite firm and I knew it would take a lot more yardage than with a gauge of 22 sts. So, back to plan B – mid gauge which was what my original design was. I did have to re-gauge, but I use the knit radar/KR10/11 so no big deal and I wanted to add shortrowed gores to it, more like my ‘Swing Jacket’ from KnS#188 – I knew I wouldn’t find a doll zipper so was already planning on using buttons and the bands from the swing jacket.
I added 7 gores, from the underarm point to hem (hold 20 sts, KWK, 3X; return 20 sts, KWK, 2X – 10 rows total at bottom edge), at  middle of fronts, side seams, middle of half of backs and centre back. Rhiana will be 7 yrs old in March and on the slim side, so I used the size 8 for length but used the size 4 for the chest and sleeve widths. For the doll, I had the old Michael’s 18 inch doll that I had bought to use as a model for the magazine and I measured it up and made a pretty close  version in that it was sideways with the gores and same style sleeve and hoodie that had to fit the doll’s head – I think it turned out pretty good – I made lots of notes so I could write it up if anyone was interested…7 balls and I have a small swatch leftover!

I’m off on holiday – talk to you again in 2 weeks or so!

progress...

after 9 minion hats, I changed it up a bit and made Hello Kitty for Rhiana and a MineCraft hat for Nate – I may never knit another earflap hat – but you never know! got news from the North Pole that Rhiana is getting one of those 18 inch dolls for Christmas – now that’s something I always thought I’d never do, but here I am planning a ruffled cardigan for my favourite little doll and a matching one for hers! Between pieces for my KnitStyle 192 project and a couple pairs of circular socks for my snow shovellers – boy, they deserve to be paid this year!!

I loved  Google’s knitting  picture for the first day of winter!

Happy Holidays!

my favourite minions...

I have never knit an earflap hat – well, actually, I don’t think I’ve ever machine knit any hat. So, where does one start?  A few weeks back, I mentioned that Valery, a newbie mk-er from San Diego had told me she was knitting earflap hats and they were selling like hotcakes every time she took them into her workplace. She gave me her pattern source, which was a bulky machine pattern from the San Diego mk guild site (Knitten Buds) and I used that as a starting point (thanks Valery and thanks Knitten Buds!). Went to Michael’s and Wal-Mart in search of minion-coloured yarn – it should be a bright, lemon yellow, I think – suitable for the mid gauge machine.
When I checked on-line, minion hats are mostly crocheted, and since I’ve spent most of my machine knitting career trying to get the crocheted-look on the  knitting machine, felt it only appropriate that I do that again. The eye is the big challenge because it is a circle and knitting a circle is not the easiest thing. If you haven’t seen the movie (Despicable Me 2), the minion is a small cartoon character, bright yellow in colour like a big jelly bean on legs, with one or two eyes, wearing goggles (that’s the way I see them anyway) over the eye(s) and dressed in denim overalls with black hair varying from a single tuft to individual sparse strands.
So, back to the circle for the eye/goggles – I thought the chain cast-on would make the outside nicely so incorporating my ‘outlining the patch pocket’ idea – did the chain (35, 42 ns) in gray, knit 1 row and then took it off on waste yarn. Using white yarn, cast on ( 5, 6 sts) and shortrow a circle, hanging a chain stitch from the edging on every row, graft it together and Bob’s your uncle! a minion eye! For Nate, I used a brown button – he and minions have brown eyes. Rhiana, she wanted 2 green eyes to match her own.
I made the original pattern – it turned out too small of course, but gave me the general idea. After adjusting stitches and rows, the size was okay, but I didn’t like the top of the hat being gathered into a circle so I reworked it using the ‘decreasing evenly across the row’ several times that results in a spiral top – this is good – probably not what you’d do if you’re wanting to mass produce but I’ve got the time for my grandkids! (and a mid gauge garter bar! nah-nah-na-na!) I did the earflaps in a denim-look yarn  to simulate the minions’ jeans and added hair – put a tuft on Nate’s and for Rhiana, I unraveled some black WCD from a steamed Boondoogle swatch that had some lovely kinks for curls…
anybody want the pattern? here's the link to the PDF… 
https://documentcloud.adobe.com/link/track?uri=urn%3Aaaid%3Ascds%3AUS%3A041462a5-a915-4d62-a343-9f0225812913
  

comfy notes for Cindy

I was going to title this, ‘notes for anyone wanting to raglanize Comfy’  but I’m not totally delusional – heck, if no one knit the original…

band pulls up at bottom

Anyway, making the ribs – it is a right side facing band, hence the RTR thing after the band is knit – the band needs to be turned to match with the side-away lace pattern and I do like the row of garter stitch ridge you get from the RTR, adding a nice detail between the rib and the lace – it also hides the gathering – oh, I forgot to say, you’ll need more stitches in the rib to match the width of the lace pattern, due to the A-line shape – it was okay in the original version to use the same number of stitches for the band as for the lace fabric, because it was a shorter, boxy cut, but on this one, I added about 10% for the bands so they wouldn’t draw in, especially on the hemline. Also, on the front bands, have 2 end needles on the ribber to make a nice finish at the outside edge of band – this one shows same distribution  overall and notice how the band pulls up at the end – to prevent this, I remade the band (see below left) and put more stitches for the hem and neckline (12 sts) instead of 9 as in first one…

BTW, the neckline will be hung at the left end (right side facing) to attach the buttonhole band, so, space the holes from the right end of the band in order to have one in the neckband area and it be at the left end after the RTR. Make the buttonholes so the B stitch from the diagram is on the centre non-tuck stitch – just because I had to make 4 bands doesn’t mean you should have to! And I probably don’t have to remind you to cast on with waste yarn for the ribs before going into the main yarn…
Now, when you’re knitting the lace and shaping the raglans, I still used the 6 to 5 decrease from the ‘Rich Raglan’ pattern and cancelled the patterning inside that area so there are no lace transfers in the outlined decrease –  actually for the most part, I stuck to cancelling the transfers to 12 sts from the decreased area at least - use your own judgment, just to make sure there isn’t an odd single hole where the pattern isn’t allowed to begin a new repeat because that just looks weird.
Other old KW  lace patterns that would suit being raglanized – ‘Borderline’ from No 25 and   ‘Frame of Lace’ from No 17 – they are both knit using cool bands which could still be employed with the new raglan and they both use Yeoman Yarns Cannele – shortened up, 2 cones of 250g will do!! I have  2 cones of a chocolate brown, a pretty jade green and a nice, icy blue…

Oh, I got Vickie’s skirt finished up and in the mail; made 3 pairs of socks for gifts for my trip to Toronto last weekend; found my old tension swatch for ‘In the Tweeds’ and made patch pockets for it; and got a minion eyeball KNIT (more later)!
BTW – by the way
KW – Knitwords magazine
RTR – remove, turn, rehang
MAO – Mary Anne Oger
LMAO – laughing my ass off!