Raglan prep - stuff to be made for others

The first item has come off my list, allowing that two weeks before the event is a little early to be making the baked good bribery items.

Last year seemed to be a blanket year for the bumps of my acquaintance, while this year cardigan patterns have caught my eye. I've one more pattern I'd like to make up, but alas, I have a shortage of bumps. This one though, will be given to a mini someone at Raglan, and is sized for wear-ability over the winter.

The pattern is Baby Sophisticate, and is made primarily with Drops fabel. I actually ran short of yarn for the collar, and made up the difference with a Lidl purchased solid colour, which I'm actually delighted I did; the different colour really makes the collar pop.


The second item I needed to complete was a piece of Viking wire weave jewellery for a barter exchange.

This is made in a double weave with 0.4mm silver plated wire, which my fingers greatly objected to at first. It's a wonder I try any delicate work at all sometimes, so determined are my hands to refuse to work with it.

The necklace is shortish, being made to sit just below the gap in the clavicular notches when worn.




And because this is very worth mentioning, this is the first time I've managed to successfully manufacture my own end caps! Ok, sure, they're not absolutely perfect, but they look solid, rather than the gap-y monstrosities of my previous attempts. It's almost like I had a class in this stuff coming up or something... 

Raglan Prep - first post of...many

Raglan preparation this year breaks down into three categories:

• Stuff to be made for other people
• Stuff to be prepared for classes
• Stuff for myself

Though that last one tends to be endless and is subject to heavy prioritisation. Things... are not going well, not least because leaving component parts in other peoples houses does not lead to progress. But there's time yet!*

So far I've been cutting out multiple hat patterns so I can have several "and here's one I made earlier" stages available for construction demonstration at my class.The trick with these will be to assemble them with as little handling as possible, so the fabrics don't disintegrate along the edges in the time between now and the event.




On the knitting front, the first of the gift items has been delivered, a little socky purse that I actually developed the pattern for myself.




They were made from the same yarn (malabrigo, my favourite) and to go to the same recipient of the Aragorn socks I made earlier this year, and which even came to a Professor Elemental show with me.

* Famous last words

Knitting for Bumps

The local weather here has not been kind to me of late. I don't generally do well in warm weather or local heatwaves (unless you count basking and dozing, but that's not going to get the sewing done). However, some of my crafting being time dependant, I've still gotten a few things finished recently.


First up is the Blue Jean Baby (blanket) from Ravelry. The pattern isn't currently available, but thankfully I had it saved from a previous version. The pattern calls for colour changes as you go through the rows, but I used an autumn coloured themed ball of King Cole Shine, and I'm delighted with the result.




The second blanket was Breezy Baby Blanket, also on Ravelry, made up with Tivoli and Hayfield DK yarns. I promise you, despite the riot of colour, there is actually a pattern of colour choices in there. Perhaps I should have planned the stripes out a little better, but I do like the randomness. Here's hoping the recipients like it too.

As you may also note, I think I may have discovered the trick to getting Suzie to pose for the camera. Finished knitwear seems to be irresistible to her...

Getting back to it

Sometimes, you just need to give yourself a mental kick to get things going again. Sometimes, that even works. Thankfully, tonight was one of those sometimes.

I've had trouble getting my discipline on the last week or so, so today, I re-jigged my schedule and set my determination to be sure I'd get things done this evening. So far this has included putting my hair into one of my favourite hair masks (pampering is important too) taking pictures of some recently finished items, and even better, starting on the next project!

Firstly, I got my first Victorian hat finished. I became very happy with the glue gun on this one, so there's very little sewing involved. I used a single layer of buckram and just one round of millinary wire, which I think may have been too light for the velvet I used, so the edges don't curl up quite as much as I'd like. 

The trims I'm not entirely happy with either. There's just something missing, but I don't know what. I figure when I see the trim in a shop, I'll know. But until then, this is my first Victorian style hat, and I shall wear it with pride. Though given I missed the Victorian Field day (stupid sinuses), I'm not yet sure when that will be.



But while I wasn't doing much, I wasn't completely idle. My hands are allergic to idleness I believe. So I knit. Something easy, fast, with a simple pattern. And that was Clapotis from knitty.com. And given the sudden, yet seasonally appropriate change in the weather, as well as the corresponding seasonal breakage of the workplace air conditioning, I'm glad to have it done.

And last, but very much not the least; the most important project on my list.

You see, the green fabric I used in my recently completed Florentine dress didn't come from a shop. It was given to me by a friend looking for an exchange, and became the incentive I needed to enter the Realm of Venus costume competition. In exchange, this friend asked for a Tudor style shirt. She picked out a cotton voile for it to be made up in, and I'm planning a little surprise in the making of it that I hope she'll be happy with. Ok, sure, there's nothing much to show yet, but at least I have something to work on for A&S tomorrow.              

The other day in work, I found myself in a dilemma. I'd finished my knitting project that morning on the bus, and now lunchtime had rolled around and I had a pattern and an unwound skein. What on earth was a crafting obsessed girl to do? Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you:

How to Wind a Centre Pull Ball of Yarn using Office Supplies {1}

The yarn I'm winding is these pics is Jitterbug "Raspberry". To be honest, this is the second ball of yarn I've wound this way as, typically enough, the first time round I didn't have the camera with me. Lesson learnt, I hope.

So, to start with, I snipped the threads holding the skein in place, and after separating the start of the skein, I wrapped it around both knees. It's important to maintain tension on the skein while you're winding it, so you'll need to spread your knees enough to maintain that tension.
Note: The skein in going just around my bent knees, it is not going under my legs.



And this is where the office supplies come in. Using a couple of plastic cups, trap the start of the yarn between two cups.








With the yarn trapped, start winding! I starting straight on to build up a little grip, that started winding the yarn at an angle so it would stay tidy. The important thing here is to make sure you wind the ball good and firm, so as long as you're doing that, how you're winding shouldn't matter too much.






And voila, one wound ball. I tried to get a pic of the inside of the cups, which have compressed slightly with the pressure of the wound yarn, but it's not come out very well, so I'll spare you the eye strain. The tail lying to the front on the ball in this pic is from the end of the skein, not the promised centre pull end.




But remember that trapped yarn from the set up? Just gently pop the cups up from the centre of the ball, and there it is!

And this is my finished centre pull ball of yarn. For the last ball I wound, I had wanted to start a pair of socks, and given that I like knitting two socks at the same time, I was also stuck for a weighing scales to seperate the ball into two equal parts. Winding the skein like this meant I could use one centre pull and one outer pull to knit each sock, which, inceidently, were the Kiertoradalla from my previous post.

Happy Knitting!


{1} Yes, I was on break when I was doing this.

I have very much been bitten by the knitting bug. There's something about the colder weather coming in that brings it out. This week saw the completion of two pairs of socks. The first were the Skew socks I mentioned a few weeks ago, and the second were from a pattern called Kiertoradalla, available on ravelry.com.

These socks were delayed by a week after I made a mistake in the instep, and by another step when the kitchener stitch heel join (no one said there would be grafting!) got mucked up. It took me a week to both work up the nerve to correct it and be bugged enough to want to do it.

The top picture shows the mistake I made. The bumps in the centre line of knitting in the picture shouldn't be there. When done right, grafting, or kitchener stitch, is invisible from the lines of knitting around it. Clearly I was not having a good day.

I dislike kitchener stitch. Every knitter has a different mental block and mine is on this stitch technique. Even using the nelkin designs instructions, which are the best I've found, especially with the cute little printable chart, I cannot always get my head around it, as the evidence shows.

The picture on the bottom is the amended stitching. Still not perfect, but it's close enough for now. And they're very comfy socks.  

The Kiertoradalla are also slightly off perfect, though I have to mention, this is most likely my own fault as I started with a needle size bigger than the pattern called for because I didn't want to wait until I could get to a yarn shop. The result is socks that are comfy and warm but a tiny bit loose. I'm hoping some wear will help break them in to my foot shape. Impatience, thy name is Debbie.





In more niddy-noddy news, I picked up some pure turpentine on friday, meaning I could finally get around to making my own beeswax polish. After all, if I'm willing to go to the effort of personalising my niddy-noddy, I may as well go to the effort of a special finish for it too.


A google search turns up dozen of recipes for beeswax polish. I reviewed a few then decided to make mine with 10g of beeswax, which I melted in the microwave, and 25mls of turpentine. I also added 20 drops of neroli to take the edge off the strong turpentine smell. A stronger essential oil would probably have been better, but well, I took what I could from my stash and impatience, thy name...



I made up only a small amount as I don't anticipate needing a lot of this at any one time. I anticipate the wood of the noddy drinking in the first few coats before I'll have a buffable coating. Just as well I'm not actively spinning at the moment.

Winter is coming. It's time for socks.

Well, ok, it's not quite winter yet, but it has turned into a very soggy autumn. And with the return of the cold weather, my sock knitting mojo has returned. It's very hard to think of lovely thick, warm, woolly socks when the weather is too warm for boots. And in Ireland, that's as warm as it gets most of the time.


The pattern I'm working on is called Skew, published by knitty.com, and my using my very favourite sock yarn, Jitterbug by Collinette. The colours are fabulous and it produces such warm and cosy socks! It may also have been the first sock knitting yarn I used, thus reserving its special place in my affections. The pattern is just starting to get to the interesting part, but thankfully is straight forward enough to still be workable on public transport.



Also, I'm am trying to work through my quite extensive stash these days, with an aim to completing projects without having to buy anything extra. Project one was completed this week, a "sit upon", a simple cable pattern Outdoor Seating made with left over yarn, backed with upcycled oilcloth, as the kids are saying these days. The result is a delightfully fully springy mat, which I can see accompanying me to many an event.

Lo, the cufflinks arrived and the buttons were created. I admit, I did give in and added even more red dye to my solution and gave the buttons one more coat of stain. I'm much more pleased with the result now.

I used a coat of liquid wax to help seal the buttons then fixed the wooden disks using hot glue, applied carefully to the wood, not the heat-sucking-metal cufflink. Honest.



I'm very happy with the finished shrug. I put in on after taking this picture, and I'm still wearing it. It's so warm and cosy.

 
While the shrug project was in stasis for want of a postal delivery, it was time to move on with other projects. One of the next events I'm looking forward to is Mediveal Dead II, hosted by the SCA Shire of Eplaheimr, an SCA event that combines the best of historical feasting and battles with ghouls and zombies. I knew instantly what I wanted to make for my Arts and Sciences entry, and when a friend suggested I attend the Feast of the Dead as a plague victim, I thought it would round out my project nicely.

Using a tutorial online I made up some latex prosthetic boils and sores, which, combined with some more grease paint on the day, should help me look suitably disguisting on the night. The A&S project I'm hoping to make a start on this weekend.






At the Dun In Mara Shire A&S practice last night, I made progress on my needlelace.The lace is destined to become a lavender pillow for my garb box and I have some fine cotton gauze to back the linen with. The outline of the shape is completed now, which means I need to finalise my design ideas for this piece.

When the competition was over, and I had my final update submitted, the first thing I did was to be quite ill for a week. Stupid throat. The first thing I wanted to do was continue with the crafting. I figured I could continue with the work from the costume or I could start something completely unrelated.

So I did the sensible thing and began knitting a pattern called Passionvine Shrug by Andrea Marquis. I finished up the shrug last night and set it to blocking. It argued with me a bit about being stretched out to its full size, but it was worth the fight to see the design "pop".

The shrug is designed to be closed at the ribbing with lapel style pins, to give various style options, so I decided to make up my own closures.

This involved some wooden disks picked up from a craft store and some spirit soluble dyes to make up my own wood stain. I used approximately 4 times as much red dye to blue, and dissolved the dye with some blonde shellac in methylated spirits.





The result was a blue toned purple that I think is as close as I'm going to be able to get it to the yarn without too much fuss.





My final snap shows the buttons with two coats of stain, definitely looking a little on the blue side. I'll leave them overnight to ensure they dry out fully, then give them a liquid wax coating to keep their texture, and in a weeks time when my ebay purchase arrives, attach them to cufflink blanks. And vóila, shrug completeness.