that time thing...

‘Member I mentioned the bit about your iPad usage and how much I disliked it? Thought about it and took same iPad to my workroom and turned on the stopwatch feature every time I went in. I wanted to record the actual time that I spent on this garment, ‘Floral Mesh’ (that’s mesh, not mess!) I included thinking, calculating and pondering times as well as all the putting together and finishing, for a total of 15.25 hours!

Things I relearned this time:

1. You can start lacing on either side…every third row means there is no direction!

2. Half the garter bar and the small piece is ONLY 149 sts!!! I always expect it to be 150 sts!!! Why can’t I remember that!

3. Keep checking your yarn supply. My cone is on the floor behind the machine and you know, out of sight, out of mind! I started with a full cone and almost ran out on the next to last row of the final piece! Fortunately, I have my machine positioned so the tension antennae whacks back, hitting the wall when the yarn runs out, usually leaving enough yarn in feeder to allow you to stop without loosing everything!

mesh floral...

I’m focusing on the sleeves now. I’ve found I want them longer than I used to like. Several reasons:

1. When they are longer, you can pull them down, keep hands warm, use like a glove to open doors or press the walk button.
2. When tieing around my non-waist when it’s too warm to wear, much easier with longer sleeves!
3. When I’m done with garment it’s easier to find new person to take over with sleeves that will fit regular people!

Also, I’m experimenting with width of cuff and forearm section. Because I’ve added about 4 inches, sometimes you might want to fold the sleeve up/back and it needs to be wide enough to do that but not so loose that it flops around when down. So, here’s another reason I like that Franky seam, it looks good and is fairly flat from either side.

On this one, I took the increase down another level. Just brought out a new end needle, just to work position, and let it knit! Wow! Who knew? Easier than heck and it works so well! I let the second-to-edge stitch lace  instead of having to least two plain stitches at the edge. I like the look of the seamline without the extra knit stitches on either side, more of the lace pattern!

This turned out better than I thought it would! I love the mesh sections of the stitch pattern. It is actually transferring to every other needle  with a yarn-over between, then two plain rows. The third row is every other stitch transferred the opposite way and it adds a little mini-cable look on either side of the lace holes to the fabric.

My next button-front lace hoodie is going to be just that mesh! Red, maybe… 

the holy grail...

In my ongoing quest to produce the perfect button-front lace hoodie with pouch pockets, I began with another long swatch of various patterns. This time, I’m using Bonita (from Knitcraft, a 100% mercerized cabled cotton, 500g cone, a good solid 4 ply weight, great stitch definition, usually knit at T8 with a stockinette gauge of 28 sts and 40 rows/4 inches) an old all-time favourite cotton. It didn’t have much in the MAO-fav colour range but I did use it over and over. Great yardage, pretty cheap price and very good wearability certainly out weighted the lack of colour options and, of course, you know, it is no longer available. But I do have a stash. 

My plan is to use the light blue, again not my favourite - it has a rather dull tone that almost looks a little dirty (in my mind anyway) but I could over-dye it a little darker if I’m really not fond of the finished product or, give it away! 

The last time I used Bonita was in Tumbleweed, from #53 - it was lace carriage at T6, gauge of 26 sets and 44 rows, washed and dried. The final garment has a fairly firm fabric, maybe because of the larger areas of plain stitches. I wanted a little more drape and softness this time, so am using T7.

In going though my existing stitch patterns, I found this one, already programmed out. 60 rows by 60 sts! I’ve never used it before - I did swatch it like a thousand years ago and probably thought it looked like curtains or something, but life changes and all that and I can look at it with a new eye, maybe. Anyway, whatever the reason, I swatched it here. Hummm, after the wash and dry, the mesh part did look very interesting, almost like it scrunched up and has a neat texture. I’ll give it a shot!

Made the sleeves first. Because it’s such a large stitch pattern I wasn’t sure which I liked better, the large flower going up the centre or offset, with the smaller motif centred. It’s a matter of setting the first needle position either at 0 or half way, 30 (right or left, doesn’t make any difference). I figured the sleeves don’t have to match anyway. I actually preferred the small flower centred but then promptly forgot about it when knitting the body, so ended up with the large motif going up the front. 

 No big deal, I can always make it again in another colour and change it! Maybe find someone else who might 
like that dusty rose…

sweater weather...

At last! We’ve had a long, hot summer! I know you’ve missed me and I’m sorry to have been silent for so long. Didn’t really mean to but between the weather and computer and software issues, what more can I say? 

The good news? I have been knitting, not a lot, but bits and pieces, here and there and I’m definitely ready for Fall! I’ll be known as that lady who wears those button-front, lace hoodies - she has one is almost every colour, you know! I’ll try to catch you up…

The ‘natural’ one turned out great. The new stitch pattern added - it won’t replace the Me-cozy design in my heart but it’s nice. I’m still totally hooked on the Franky seaming method and, in my search for the best way to do it, on this one, I changed up the increase method slightly. In the antique gold one, I moved the edge stitch out one space and filled in the empty needle with the purl bar of the inside stitch. It made the edge quite tight and hard to pick up just the half outside edge bit, so on this one, I simply hung the purl bar of the outside stitch onto a new empty needle. It works and the resulting seam looks good and it was okay to pick up. 

I did have a Plan B in the back of my mind, I was maybe going to over-dye this one so I had it hanging around without buttons, just in case I might change the colour. I even wore it out once, buttonless! I needed the pockets, what can I say!

Though I had several options for buttons, when our lockdown finally ended, Fabricland finally re-opened, I went to check out their buttons, probably just to go somewhere. Nada! At least, nothing better than what I already had. Finally made the choice, sewed them on and life goes on! Next! 

killing it...

Time, I mean! You know how you get that report on your device saying how much screen time you had in the last week? I hate that! OMG! How could I be wasting that much time! I wish I could get a thing that measures my productive time, like the minute I enter my knitting room, the clock starts ticking and I`m racking up good points! Big sigh! By the way, I never take my device in there! Anyway, that is some of my motivation for machine knitting lately!

I found some more 2 ply cotton – this one is Honiburd in natural, aka off-white, ecru or ivory. Personally, I think it should be called cream as it has a slight yellowish undertone, one of my best colours or non-colour, if you know what I mean.

 I do love that Me-cozy lace stitch http://knitwords.blogspot.com/2021/04/deja-vu.html. Maybe you can tell because I`ve already used it on three button-front-lace-hoodies but I`m trying to branch out – who knows, there may be another new favourite out there!

Using the leftover yellow from Holey Moley, I made another long swatch, trying out several different stitch patterns. I still prefer the all-over patterning as opposed to one that results in vertical or horizontal stripes. I do like the second one down but the third one – it was an 8-st X 16-row built-in, that I added a few extra holes to every alternate diamond - is a new one and I`m feeling adventurous!

trials and tribulations...

Did you miss me? Sorry I haven’t been posting much but it’s summer! And here in Thunder Bay, we are having a real summer. Most years, a hot summer day might be a high of 22 to 24C (70-75F) but this year, it’s off the charts! I enjoy a warm evening where you can have dinner out on the deck with a sweater or poncho handy but, oh my, we’ve had HOT! 

I still get some knitting in and I’ll continue to tell you about that, but I also have had some ‘blogger’ issues which I’ve tried and tried to solve. Last month I got a message saying that ‘feedburner’ or whoever was sending out my blog subscriptions was quitting in July. I'm hoping it's the end of July but we'll find out! I wanted to have an alternative ready before I told you about it and it’s been a struggle to figure it out – long story short, I think I’ve got it sorted!

So, if you’ve been getting an email of my current blog post and you want this to continue, you’ll need to re-subscribe. Just click this link http://knitwords.blogspot.com/  – it will take you to ‘Needles to say…’ and at the top right hand side of the page, you’ll see the new box to enter your email. Do that and click ‘subscribe’ and then say you’re not a robot. That’s it! They will send you an email to confirm and that’s up to you. Hope you do and I promise to get back to telling you stuff about my machine knitting!

whoops...

The ‘antique gold’ wool that my sister chose - had a full cone, 500g plus a very small partial, total of 578g, (less 60g for the two cones) so I figured I’d have plenty of yarn. The charcoal lace wool hoodie
https://knitwords.blogspot.com/2021/04/deja-vu.html that I made for myself back in April weighed 530g, finished, and since Janet’s will be a little smaller and a bit shorter, I thought I was golden. 

Decided on using the Tumbleweed https://knitwords.blogspot.com/2010/05/knitting-machine-lsd.html stitch pattern and hems (published in Knitwords #53) – I think I forgot to tell you that I over-dyed it to match my olive green Day Dress, but oh well – it used to be beige and is now a pretty green! 

So, back to the present! I was carefully measuring and weighing and recording my progress with each piece. Then, all that went out the window as I made the hems to each piece as it was finished. 

Now, instead of taking my own advice and having a Plan B, it was done, right down to the final two side/underarm seams and there is only about 2 metres left – not enough for the seaming! I could take the smart, safe way out and do the seams in the old way but I’ve become obsessed with that Franky seaming method,  https://knitwords.blogspot.com/2021/03/she-likes-it.html    even to experimenting with increase/decrease methods. In the past, I’ve always said that I like to /have two stockinette stitches at the edge, one to be taken in the seam and with the Franky method, I’m hanging only half of the outside edge stitch for the seam so two plain stitches at each side make the seam too wide, especially with a very holey lace pattern like the me-cozy diamonds. 

So, on this one, I have done a simple increase on the edge stitch, picking up the bar/heel stitch of the edge and putting it on a new needle. Anyway, head like a rock! I had intended to show how minimal these seams are, so I still wanted to use the Franky method. Ha! I found a ‘close’ match of ‘cinnamon’ in the same wool and figured I would try it out, if it didn’t work, I could still resort to the old way where the seam is on the inside and the colour isn’t so important. Darn, picking up that edge stitch was so hard, I had to keep going. If Janet notices, I’ll tell her it’s a new design feature, like the coloured piping up the leg of those old jogging pants! :) 

Final weight, 516g…so, back to that hole theory – more holes, less yarn, maybe that’s true…more research required…