I have a Cushion!

We went to the city to pick up youngest son to spend the Easter Break with us and while we were there (and the shop's were open too. And absolutely EVERYONE was on the road!) I went to Spotlight and bought a cushion insert! Oh joyous day! Huzzah!!

Back, with flap opening

Front, and looking so pretty!

So I am pretty stoked with that! Pretty, pretty, pretty!

And other than that worrying at the back of my brain (The cushion's not finished until it has a cushion insert! Must get cushion insert!!) I have been busy with my Alcott Vest. I am getting closer to the first stage of actually finishing the vest, by completing the knitted body. 

See the lines of colours? They are my steek stitches. I have three, two armholes and the v-neck. When I've reached the length I want I am going to bind off the shoulders together and then...I am going to CUT the middle of the steek stitches and pick up stitches to do the rib stitch rows around the armholes and the v-neck. How awesome is that??

I must confess I am both excited and worried and really hope I don't screw it up.  But I really want to master this great technique so I am boldly going where I have never gone before!

Has anyone out there master any craft techniques that both excited and scared them?  Tell me I'm not the only worry-wart out here!

See you all later!

Dx

Achievements!

I have actually finished stuff this week!

Isn't it pretty? But the back is nice too!

See? I used some of the yarn I used in the front to make the lines every 15th ridge of garter stitch so it lined up with the squares on the other side. Made it real easy to line up and sew together too so, bonus! Also, the first pic is with the flap edge tacked to the other back so it wouldn't stretch when I washed it and the second pic is with the tacking taken out. This is where I'll be able to shove the cushion insert...when I get one! I was really peeved when I found that the insert I had was too humongously huge to fit so now I'm itching to get one so I can bask in the gorgeousness when it's a proper cushion!

But this is not all! I have been puttering along with out any urgency on a fair isle pattern I got from  The Knitter, Issue 56. It's called Alcott by 

Mary Henderson and I ordered the yarn from

Jamieson & Smith so I got just what I needed. I've

 been really enjoying this. It's challenging but

 not too hard and I've reached the part where

 I'm knitting the steek stitches for the v-neck 

and the armholes. Imagine! I'm going to have

 to cut these suckers later!! But this is how it 

looked just as I started the steek stitches.

Isn't it nice? I love the interplay of all the colours. It's just so captivating! 

Needless to say, while I'm knitting this, I'm not reading much. But while I was doing the cushion back I started going through my collection of the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs. I love these books!!  And when I say I read through the series again...this is the series so far!

  

  

 

You know,..just a few. 

I love the characters. I love the premise. I love that when my husband asks me what I'm reading (he's not a reader for pleasure) I can say "It's about this mechanic who can turn into a coyote who is in love with an Alpha Werewolf, her garage used to belong to a powerful fae metallurgist who can handle iron and also a vampire from the local vampire seethe. Oh, and the mechanic is a christian." The "wtf?" look on his face is priceless. But the books really include all that stuff. I love "What if..." stories, where the unexpected becomes the everyday! 

I've ordered the next one for my birthday in May. I hope I continue to like it. I hate it when an author betrays its readers in an attempt to keep the tension mounting. 

But now I'm doing the fair isle it's probably just as well I've finished the series again. I wasn't really very useful while I devoured the books. I could quite happily sit in one spot and do nothing but read for hours and hours. Not really a good idea. But a lot of fun!!

So there we are. Let's see what I'm doing next week.

Wanna see??

See you later!

Dx

Wow. What HAVE I done all week??

...Truthfully?...not a lot.

I've been chugging away with the backs of the cushion I'm knitting with the domino knitted front piece. That's been mindless but pleasant.

I've read three books while I knit it, one my brother bought me. And I liked it! Even a bigger score! From the Dr Who History Collection. Now I have one I'll have to look into how many more there are! Sadly, it doesn't take much to activate the OCD collector in me!

So here's the pretty, pretty front!

And here's the first half of the back. I'm now cranking away on the other half and then trying to figure out whether I'll try and do a I-cord cast-off around the whole thing to tie it together...

But we'll see!

See you later!

Dx

Domino knitting and a little bit of Art!

I finally finished the cushion...front. There's no way I'm doing domino knitting on the back. For this I wanted something simple and mindless. I am happy with the colour combinations of the Domino part though.

 Isn't it pretty? Wonderful kaleidoscope of colours and gradients!

All in all I'm pretty pleased pleased with the front and I decided I'd do a simple back so I can just put a pillow in there without a zip or buttons or anything...and for some reason the picture wont turn the right way so here it is anyway. A nice plain grass green wool in garter stitch and at every 15th ridge I knit using one of the 5 colours I used on the front.  I'm liking it so far.

But while I've been doing this I've been fiddling with my art supplies. I wanted to do a picture showing a sort of analogy for depression. So this is what I came up with.

Then I added a wash of ink, really black at the bottom of the well and getting lighter as it reached the top. And remembered that I'm really not very good at adding paint.

It still seemed a bit blank so I added colour with some pencils.

All in all I quite liked the effect...except for the paint effect. What I really wanted is some kind of paper with an ombre effect that would go from midnight blue to light sky blue. But apparently such a thing does not exist. Because I thought perhaps I could cut out the section I don't like and place the picture over another sheet of paper with the effect I want. I've done it before and it works quite well, especially once framed.  So I painted the effect I wanted using some art paints I had lying around.

And then I got to the business of cutting out the middle. I tried using a scalpel at first but I'm no better at that than I am at painting so I used a pair of really slim, pointed scissors. They worked much better! And eventually I managed to get it all cut out.

So now I had to attach the picture onto the painted background. I used some mod podge I also had lying around and a brush and then proceeded to nearly ruin the whole thing by almost making the cut-out picture stick backwards to the background. But after that small panic passed, I was pretty pleased...

I'm really pleased with it all told. I think it shows how I feel anyway when I'm particularly depressed. It's so dark down in the bottom of the well that it's hard to remember that there is still beauty and hope to be had,...that this feeling wont last forever, which is kind of what I was trying to suggest with the falling blossoms into the well. That this too will pass.

I'm waiting for it to dry now to see if I need to tidy up any details and one day I'd love to get it framed in a nice thin frame. I think that would look nice.

But, yeah, that's what I've been up to. So now I'm off to my knitting again. I think I've used up enough of the artist to keep it quiet for the next year, anyway.

What do you think of the picture? 

See you all later
Dx

But some experiments don't work, so...

You just have to bite the bullet and move on.

Speaking of my last post...

...I looked at it some more and decided...I really didn't like it...so I...

...unravelled the whole thing down to one starter square! See? There it is, right at the bottom. And THAT became my new starting point!

I decided not to tinker with this and just knit it the way it is supposed to go, generally speaking.

I used 5 different sock-yarn colours from Moda Vera Noir 4 ply range and decided to do a square 9 squares high and 9 in width. That should get a nice shuffle between the different variegated yarns involved and as I ran out of one colour I'd just bring in a new one from my collection. There is one yarn that isn't Noir, a pretty Patons Patonyle I had a bit left over of, so I thought I may as well use up the last little bit. It fits in quite well!

  

But watching it grow is SO absorbing! I'm enjoying this much more than my first attempt. All the different colours and patterns are really quite nice with no big blocks of colour sounding any discordant notes. And it's very relaxing.

Both a nice mindless knit while at the same time not boring at all! I find myself having to make myself put it down! To stop telling myself, "Oh, I'll put this down when I get to this point in the decreases...oh look! I've nearly finished the square, I may as well finish it...Oh, I'll just pick up the stitches I need for the next square so It's ready when I..."

You get the idea?

Here I've got 4 squares width...

...And now 5 squares...

Doesn't it look lovely? I love running my hands over it and feeling the lines running diagonally across it because of the decreases down the middle. 

And now 6 squares wide. I've actually started the seventh row now and the end result of a cushion is looking pretty good! And although I love this way of join-as-you-go construction, I'm not sure I'm so in love with it that I'd want to commit to a whole blanket like this!

But all in all, I think the sacrifice of my first idea was a valid choice. This is now something I like to look at and touch. Not something tinged with a little regret.

Have you had to change an idea of something you thought would really work when it wasn't developing as you'd imagined? Any craft has that propensity! Tell me about it and share!

See you all later!

Dx 

A new Experiment!

Domino Knitting!

I've heard of this and there was no particular reason I decided to have a go at it besides the fact that I have a few balls of left-over sock yarn in my wool room and the plain truth that the other thing I was knitting was in a heavier gauge of yarn and I liked the idea of something delicate...like 4 ply. I mean, it's not like I have any lack of sources of sock yarn to fall back on!

Anyway, I found a really helpful tutorial on Pinterest on a blog called Loose Threads all about how to do it to produce beauties like this!

But I didn't like the jagged edge. I wanted a straight edge. So after reading about half the instructions and quickly flicking through the pictures I grabbed the top ball of left-overs, a 2mm circular needle (a really short one!) and dove in!

First I knit the four on the right and worked out how the placements of the decreases worked. I really like the way the slip 2, knit 1, pass 2slsts over knit st make a really neat line in the centre. But I still had a fair amount of yarn left so I decided I'd make a square twice the size to sit next to the smaller ones. I quite liked how that looked and decided to surround this rectangle as I went around.

I mean, how hard could it be?

See? Isn't it pretty? And a nice predictable pattern developing too. Always a large square beside the 4 smaller squares.  I really quite liked this kind of joining as you go along and with the fine yarn it's not too hot to do while it's uncomfortable warm either!  Okay, moving on...

All going along really well although it's hard to know whether to try and match the colours better but I decided in the end to just go with whatever I grabbed next.

And right here! Right here I suddenly realized I may have outsmarted myself. I had discovered earlier that there had to be an order in how you knitted each square or else the line down the middle could end up pointing the wrong way but I didn't thing it would really be a problem...until I started trying to go down the right side of the centre rectangle. To do the little squares with the line going in the right direction I had to some how join THREE sides instead of the usual two.

Pause...Think...Grind Teeth! (buggerbuggerbugger!!)

So I decided that I'd just have to come up with a way of doing that. Not that it was difficult, just a little fiddly! And now I know why there aren't any examples of small and large squares in a straight edged blanket like this!

So, using a single double point 2mm needle I picked up 15sts on the third side and every back row I knit together the first st on the working needle with one from the third side. It works pretty well. It's not quite as smooth a join as the normal one used through out the pattern but it functions and for that I'm prepared to be thankful!

Of course all this is still in progress and my aim at the moment is to finish the large square I'm doing and make a cushion cover with it. And then I'll sit back and contemplate the wonders now at my fingertips of greater and larger things... Like maybe a sock yarn blanket myself. Yes, that might be nice...

Well, one day maybe anyway :)

Anyone else ever experimented with domino or modular knitting?

See you later!
Dx

Blackwork Handwork

I have had a lot of fun keeping my hands busy with little hand sewing projects and Huzzah! my knitting mojo has returned.  I've cast on to knit a pattern I've done before but everything was wrong with the first incarnation of this garment. Wrong size, wrong needles and wrong yarn. This time around I think I have a much better chance of completing something I like.

But first to the projects I've finished!

I love making pincushions and scissor fobs because they are small, easy to carry around and relatively quick to execute. And since I'm always putting my scissors down and forgetting where I put them, these little attached pincushions make them easier to find amongst all the stuff I tend to surrounding myself with mid-craft. Here they are!

 This is a little Biscornu Pincushion I made with the last bit of pale blue aida cloth. I did the design in really dark brown that looks black. I like the clean crisp lines of the blackwork so I enjoyed doing this. The worst part is always whip stitching the two parts together and stuffing it! Even ironing thin interfacing on the back to stabilize the base material doesn't always help.

This one I like because of the nice effect with the sage green blackwork lines with the golden-yellow french knots in the centre of the flowers.  It's not that complex a design and I think that's one of it's appeal. It translated into a really nice scissor fob too.

 And this last one I decided to make a Pin-Keep. I never knew this sort of thing existed until recently and I kind of made up the design myself. Not the blackwork design. Just the actual Pin-Keep itself. No doubt I've done this wrong but it kind of works the way it's supposed to so I thought it worth the experiment.

I'll have to look up to see if I can find a pattern for these. It's a handy little thing and I'm already beginning to be overwhelmed with pincushions. Blackwork is a wonderful form of embroidery that builds a great design filled with clarity and clean lines.  It was also a nice interlude after intensive knitting. So as I take up my knitting again, I put aside my needles and threads, fine weave cloth and embroidery hoops until next time.

Whenever I pick it up again, it's guaranteed to be fun!

See you all later :)
Dx

Cross Stitch - the Other Obsession!

I've been on a mission to complete as many cute pin cushions as I can while giving my hands a bit of a rest from frenetic knitting...not that I'm not still knitting, just not so much like a machine!
I've been tooling around on Pinterest and there are so many beautiful patterns and projects! I love small motifs, both in cross stitch and black-work because they are so simple, are relatively quick to complete and have huge impact visually because they are so small and cute!
Also I wanted to use an organic cotton thread called Scanfil which has a large selection of lovely colours. Since it's a bit heavier than regular cotton I find it quite suitable to do fine cross stitch and black-work with.
Anyway...I have finished all but one of the designs I downloaded. Here they are in order of completion!

Roses and Bees

This one taught me a few things. That sewing together the two sides SOUNDS easy...but not necessarily in practice! Fortunately I'd followed the pattern and it had this backstitch square sewn around the design and you thread through that so you get a neat edge on the completed item. Very clever :) The brass ring is so you can attach it to your sewing basket or something. A ribbon might have been better but I didn't have any and the rings were just sitting there, so...

Birds and Flowers

These are on even weave fabric and it never occurred to me how tiny the gauge would be until I was pretty much past the point of no return and my eyes were hanging out of my head!  When I downloaded the picture of the design it was hopelessly fuzzy so I drew it all out myself and as close to the original design colours as I could. When I didn't have a colour I needed in the Cotton thread I just used DMC instead. All at 1 strand thickness.

 

Ladybirds and Flowers

...And straight after tiny gauge, back onto usual gauge! Don't ask me what gauge that is, all I know is the previous pin cushion is 6cms square and this one is 8cms square. So, a bit of a difference. I think both designs cover a 50 x 50 graph square. 

Ladybirds and Bees

Back to sort-of tiny gauge. Not quite as bad as the Birds and Flowers one but still pretty small. All Scanfil cotton. I was pretty pleased with this one too. But because of the large piece of base fabric I used that I didn't trim down, folding the edges in was a bit of an irritation!

Ladybirds and Lily Bells
 And my nemesis! The design had lovely white flowers on a pale khaki background. I didn't have any base fabric darker than the cream stuff I'd used on the 8cm pin cushion so I though, "I know, I'll just sew the background the colour I need so the white flowers don't disappear into the cloth. Brilliant!"
Most. Frustratingly. Slow. Design. EVER!!
You don't realize you've  become used to finishing a piece in a specific period of time until you hit something that defies every attempt to hurry it up! It does look very attractive, as a finished project...But I would NEVER do it again!!

Florals and Swirls
And this is my latest finished one. Pretty, cute, little (About 6-7cms square) and finished! I have one more design that I had to redraw out because I couldn't see all the squares to do and it is under way as we speak. But I'm pretty proud of my collection. I'm not really sure what I'm going to do with them all but I have a similar problem with the vast amount of finished knitting projects I have so why should this obsession be any different? Hope you enjoyed my little brag show. See you next time :)
Dx