Last week, after dawdling for months, I finished a shawlette. It’s destined to be a sample for my Lace That Grows class. Check out these features:
- Using three wedges of Trellis Shell – rather than the usual two – means the shawlette has enough coverage to sit securely on your shoulders.
- Separating the wedges with a repeat of Snowdrop Lace – rather than a plain knit stitch – offers a decorative touch.
- Placing beads in the edging adds drape and bling.
It only took a single skein of Knitting Notions Classic Merino Bamboo. But the knitting took months because it had been my “back burner” project, the one I worked on when I didn’t feel like working on anything else.
I’m pretty darn happy with how it turned out. If you want to see the shawlette in person, consider taking Lace That Grows!
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As I said last month, I don’t often play with beads. But that might change. After all, I now have the right tools – a little travel case, lined with batting so the beads don’t rattle and roll:
And a beading tool:
The tool is, quite literally, just a little scrap of wire. Most knitters use a teeny tiny crochet hook. And someday I’ll try beading with a crochet hook, just for comparison purposes. But for now I like the wire trick, in large part because it lets me load up a bunch of beads at a time.
Laura Nelkin gets credit for the travel case idea, though hers are way cuter than mine. And many thanks to Jennigma for the wire trick – without it, my shawlette would still be unfinished and I’d be shopping for a tiny crochet hook! |
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Remember that sample sweater I started last month? To practice knitting a “simultaneous set-in sleeve” design with stranded colorwork across the yoke? Well, it’s done:
And, as hoped, I learned a ton by knitting this little sample. Namely, the approach works – but when applying the approach to a full-size sweater for DH, I want to make some refinements to the sleeve cap shaping and to the patterning.
On the sample, I noticed some weirdness at the top corner of each sleeve cap:
See that funny blip? It’s a selvedge stitch from where the top portion of the body is knit flat. Logically, it belongs to the body – but thanks to the way the cap stitches are picked up from the body, visually that selvedge stitch belongs to the sleeve cap. So that’s where it’s going to go on DH’s sweater, with subsequent sleeve cap increases taking place outside that stitch. (Ditto the other three selvedge stitches from the top portion of the body, of course.)
Speaking of the sleeve cap increases, I’d like to try varying their rate. The original approach suggests increasing four stitches (one at the beginning and end of each sleeve cap) every other round. But I figure that working the first few increases every round will give the sleeve cap a nicer shape. We’ll see.
On the sample, I used lifted increases... which, in retrospect, was a silly thing to do in stranded colorwork, as it distorted the pattern a bit. Next time, I’ll use backward-loop increases.
Also silly: centering the patterning on the body and on the sleeves, but allowing the patterning to “touch” at the sleeve/body join:
Next time I’ll use a divider pattern, most likely one of those in Selbuvotter.
So far, I’ve knit DH’s sweater almost to the bottom of the neck opening:
Once the base of the neck opening is in place, then I get to knit in the round – and choose patterns from Selbuvotter to use across the yoke. I can’t wait!
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Threaded stitches, or ...?
Have any of you ever worked “cross through” or “thread through” stitches? They’re kind of like cable crosses – except instead of crossing one group of stitches over another before knitting them, you pull one group through another group. You can get some neat effects, especially if you elongate the stitches by wrapping them multiple times on the previous row. One example is Indian Cross Stitch in Barbara Walker’s A Treasury of Knitting Patterns.
I’ve received a request to create symbols for stitches of this sort at Stitch-Maps.com. Before I do, though, I want to make sure that I’m creating the right symbols: unique, distinctive, meaningful, all that good stuff. Towards that end, I’ve started a conversation on Ravelry to gather feedback. Currently, we’re considering symbols like  and  , with abbreviations like “1/1 left thread thru” and “3/3 RTT.”
If you’ve worked with stitches of this sort, or simply if you want to have a say in the matter, could you please take a moment to chime in? Thanks much!
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Last weekend I taught at Black Sheep Gathering in its new venue, the Linn County Fairgrounds. I was too busy to take any photos, but I did have a chance to chat with a few people. And by all reports, the new venue is a winner: everyone liked the spacious, clean, well-lit buildings. That said, the Black Sheep organizers faced an unfortunately common problem: students trying to sign up for classes at the last minute.
On the surface, that might not seem to be a problem. After all, why not add students to classes that aren’t already full? Here’s the “gotcha!”: when too few students sign up in advance, event organizers are often forced to cancel classes weeks before the event. They have to do this when the projected income from sign-ups won’t cover the costs of renting classroom space, paying instructors their teaching fees, and reimbursing teachers for their travel expenses. Then, people try to sign up on the day of the event... only to find that classes have long since been cancelled. It’s frustrating for everyone.
I’ve seen this at a number of venues, not just Black Sheep. Sadly, it hits local yarn shops particularly hard. So, if you don’t mind... when you see a class you want to take, sign up for it in advance, okay? (Yes, yes, sometimes plans change, but most event organizers offer a refund if you ask well before the event; check their return policy.) Who knows? Your sign-up might just be the one that lets event organizers give the class its final go-ahead.
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