Knitting – Measured Threads

March 25, 2016March 25, 2016

WiPs and FOs

I finished a WiP (work in progress) yesterday, Hyrna með krónuprjóni is finally finished after 7 years (approximately 6.75 of those years it was in a bag). Now it is a FO (finished object). I will submit it to my Weaver’s Guild UFOFF (unfinished objects finally finished) Challenge Exhibit in a week and it will be on display in the guild gallery for a while beginning in May.
Here is a pic of it before being blocked.

After soaking in a little warm water and Eucalan wool wash, she needs to be shaped and pinned out to dry. I folded it in half for blocking to save space (along with my back–bending over and pinning it out takes a while) andto keep the symmetry.

Wet blocking is a transformative process that softens the yarn, lets the stitches settle into place, stretches out and shapes and opens the lace. When it is fully dry and you unpin it, the shawl keeps it shape.

Have I said how much I love Old Shale lace?

Socks in progress. The pink pair is waiting patiently to be removed from the machine and have the toes grafted closed.

They will be part of the basket my study group is putting together for a raffle at the Weavers Guild of Greater Cincinnati for the Fiber Arts Fair we are having on April 30. If you are interested in buying fiber art or making fiber art (members will be selling used equipment a tools and extra stash yarn) come to the Fair at the Guild House! I will have cowls, sock and some towels to sell.

I also finished up a pair of clogs for my 13 year old son. They were a collaborative effort. I bought the yarn, my daughter did most of the knitting. I finished the knitting, sewed them up and felted them. Here they are pictured with my size 8.5 foot.

He has outgrown two pairs (grown 8 inches in the last year), here is the first pair I knit Pair 1 and a post when I was working on his second pair. (for some reason I didn’t take a pic after they were finished) so the new ones are bigger than his size 10 feet to have a little growing room.

March 10, 2016March 10, 2016

Get Your Crank On

There has been lots of discussion lately on the CSM forums about the learning curve in using a circular sock machine and the difference between user error as opposed to machine problems. One way to minimize user error is to have a checklist of things to do when you are getting ready to stand or sit at the machine and make a pair of socks. It can help you eliminate some of those little things that go wrong. I put together a list of things that I have been trying to do to keep my head in the game and minimize the problems I cause myself. There are lots of things to check and watch for, and if you miss one of them, you may have to start the sock over.

Here is my checklist to hang by the machine:
(You can pop it out by hovering over the top right hand corner of the Google doc and clicking on the square with the arrow. Then print it or download to edit as you need to for your own way of working.)

March 6, 2016March 6, 2016

Camo Socks

I have begun breaking in my 72 stitch cylinder and ribber dial and can now make nice men’s socks sized small (shoe size 8-9) and medium (shoe size 10-11). I knit these for my son in his favorite color green that is called “Camo”. His dad wants a pair now too, so it’s a good thing I have more of this yarn. I think they will be very popular! These socks have a 1×1 ribbed cuff and a 3×1 ribbed leg. I am working on a pair with a 2×2 ribbed cuff and leg. It requires a different type of cast on and I almost had it the other day, but when I took the ribber off, I saw that I had missed one stitch on the back half of the cylinder.

I may need to save up for a larger cylinder and ribber dial for large men’s socks, but will get some advice from the other crankers at the Crank in next month at the Cape on whether I should get the 80 or 84 stitch combination.

Do you like my sock stretchers? I got them yesterday at the estate sale of a weaver. There was quite a lot of yarn, books, and weaving tools, but I spotted these and snatched them up first thing. They are vintage men’s stocking stretchers. Before there was such as thing as superwash yarn, the wool socks would shrink when washed and needed to be stretched out as they dried to maintain the size. (Since I use a superwash wool/nylon blend, I don’t have to worry about that, and they can even be machine washed on gentle.) I think they are a great way to feature my men’s socks and will look good when I get enough inventory to have a booth at a show.

March 1, 2016March 1, 2016

Hyrna með krónuprjóni

My local weavers guild has started a member challenge called UnFinished Objects Finally Finished. (UFOFF). Last week I dug a shawl in its bag out of a box on my yarn storage shelves. No pattern or notes were with it. Today I located the book and made a copy of the chart and translation page for the instructions. A few years back I was in a lace shawl knitting phase. I had finished a lovely shawl from a book called Þríhyrnur og langsjöl / or Three-cornered and long shawls by Sigridur Halldorsdottir. The book was in written in Icelandic but came with a translation of some of the text in the book. The patterns are all charted.

The first shawl I knit from the book was called Hyrna Herbogar and it was fun, but tricky.

For my second one, I chose a simpler pattern based on Old Shale lace called Hyrna Með Krónuprjóni (or HMK as it will be referred to from now on). Here is the photo from the book. Mine will look different since I chose a striping sock yarn called Noro Kuryeon in natural colors.

Based on my project notes in Ravelry, I began working on HMK March 16, 2009 and sometime in May, 2009, put it down. From the posts in the Three Cornered Knitters group on Ravelry it appears that I had figured out I was going to run out of yarn for the second time. The post says I had 34% remaining to knit and only 32% of my total yarn remaining (checked by weighing it in grams on a digital scale before and during the knitting). Then there was also a post that said I traded some handmade soap for the some Kuryeon Sock color 149 that another Ravelry member had leftover when she finished her socks. The yarn came pretty quickly after the trade was negotiated, but I never picked HMK back up to start knitting again.

How did I know how far I was you ask? I am a geeky knitter and I like to make spreadsheets for shawl patterns to keep track of my yarn usage and percentage completed.

So to document how far the shawl was when I picked it back up to finish, here she is two weeks shy of 7 years after beginning.

Fortunately all my stitch markers were still in place. Based on the number of stitches in the first section of the chart, I figured out I was on row 13 of the 32 row repeat. Then I remembered the spread sheet and counted the total number of stitches on the needle to figure out the actual row I was on and it matched with that row of the repeat. It was a simple knit 3, purl to the last 3 stitches, knit 3. Then I went on to row 14 on the chart and was a stitch off when I got to the center. (The chart is only half the shawl, then you mirror it for the other half as you knit.) Fortunately the stitch markers helped me narrow down that the mistake was in the section closest to the center. I read my knitting, compared it to the chart, and figured out that about 6 stitches away from the center and 3 rows below, my needle had caught a strand and I had knit it as if it were a stitch, increasing by one stitch in that section. It was an easy fix, I just dropped the unneeded stitch down the 3 rows to where I had caught it and can now knit on! I have 168 stitches on the needle (started with 384) and I am on row 76 of 130 and 21,512 stitches out of 26,128 total to be knit therefore it is 82% complete. Each row decreases as I knit, so it should go pretty quickly. I will update my progress on Instagram if you’d like to follow. #UFOFF

December 19, 2015December 19, 2015

Cleveland Sucks Socks

These Cleveland Browns Socks were a bit painful for me to knit as a die hard Cincinnati Bengals fan. But, my love for my son (also a die hard Bengals fan) outweighed my distaste for the Browns. His girlfriend is from the Cleveland area and is a Browns fan, and I wanted a Christmas gift to give to her. Fortunately, the Browns have had a dismal record this year and the Bengals beat them both times we played them or I might not have been able to overcome the loathing enough to do it. (Mom did say she put a curse on the socks to keep them from beating the Bengals in the future). They lost to Pittsburgh once this year, but maybe the socks will bring them the luck the need to beat the Squealers Steelers in their January 3 game. I actually hate Pittsburgh more, so sorry Juliann (my sister-in-law) there are no Steelers themed socks in your future.