2023 Not in Pictures

With a finishing spree at the end of the year, I have not got photos of all my finished projects but I wanted to get 2023’s round up posted on the last day of the year so I can start 2024 with all my exciting plans.

Looking back at 2022’s round up, I started 2023 with four projects and two of the projects are the same as they are the long term blankets. Which means that in 2023 I finished all (non-blanket) projects started before 1 January 2023. This is my biggest aim - not to have old projects. The number of WIPs at any time is less important.

I finished 25 projects, which is fewer than previous years and the yarn used is slightly lower than last year. I made nine hats; six pairs of socks; four cardigans/jackets; three shawls; one baby blanket; one baby jacket; and one tea cosy. I also started nine projects that were eventually frogged. Looking at my plans at the start of the year I did start all the items mentioned but some were more successful than others. The Tunisian project was one of the frogs and the Advent shawl is waiting for a decision. I made five and frogged a sixth hat from Kelborne Woolens.

I knit 8022 meters and crocheted 959 meters into completed projects. The yarn in that I purchased was very low as I only want to purchase yarn if there is a definite pattern I want to make and I need yarn for it. The two yarn purchases I made this year were to support small businesses. I have not counted all the yarn I was given when my friend downsized. Although I have been using a lot of it I did not want to feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of it.

I am happy with my yarny achievements and am ready to cast on all the things.

A Cheeky Advent Cast On and a Bag to Put It In

I have been working away on my WIPs and haven’t wanted to add more but I was feeling at a bit of a loss around the start of the month because I didn’t have an Advent project and the post office had lost my Advent yarn.

Rather than choose a pattern specifically designed for Advent that would take away from my time spent on WIPs, I chose a small project and worked a few rows each day. I calculated three rows a day would get it finished on the 24^th but some days I worked two rows and some days four rows depending where I was in the pattern.

I chose the Clayoquot Toque by tincanknits and the yarn was some hand spun from Primrose yarns that I was given when my friend moved and it was very appropriate that I could give it back made into a hat.

 

 

I also made her a project bag out of fabric she had also given me when she moved. I tried a new-to-me pattern for the bag. It was not a hard make but I wish I had thought about the measurements before I started as I had intended to make a bigger bag.

 

What is the WIP Situation?

I haven’t written about my WIP achievements as after I finished the socks it seemed to be all knitting and no finishing. And as we are getting close to the end of the year I was wondering if it was even worth talking about projects. But as I have been quiet for so long it is about time they got a quick mention.

When I laid out my WIPs before the challenge there were 12 active ones. I snuck in a cheeky little (but not so little) cast on just before the challenge started as I really needed an easy project for vacation. There were a few projects that would be frogged but I didn’t want to do that straight away as I feared the satisfaction would deter me from completing projects.

The socks were finished quickly as they had their own deadline and then it was knit, knit, knit with nothing to show for two months. Do I work on projects in order of starting, closest to finished, most wanted? At the start it was a mixture of the latter two but one day I calculated how many rows I needed to knit each day to finish the edging on the shawl (my oldest non-blanket project) and it was doable and as I got going I realized I could actually finish it by the end of November. Which I did; blocked and ends sewn in. I won’t be any showing it yet as it is a gift.

While the shawl was blocking it was time to frog. A project I didn’t really like; a cardigan that was coming out too big, and another cardigan which I didn’t have enough yarn. I was sad about these two projects because they were so pretty.

 

I then tackled the three crochet hats. One was frogged and the other two were quickly finished. This did mean that I had no car projects and I had to start a hat on Sunday when I was a passenger. 

 

 

This month I have mostly been working on the cardigan I want to wear at Christmas. I realized that I should have been working on it most of the time because Christmas is just around the corner. But I was hoping that I could have finished another cardigan but sewing in the ends is taking forever.

Of the 13 projects at the start of WIP along, I have completed 4 and frogged 4. Not bad going. Now back to the Christmas project.

 

Women Hating On Women

It has been quite a while since I wrote anything. I have been knitting away on my WIPs and it is not very exciting to write every week – “been working on my WIPs, not yet finished”.

There have been a few thoughts running around my head about the yarn industry in general but the one I want to write about today has been bubbling under the surface and has come to the forefront when people have been mean about YouTube vlogs.

Yarn crafts are predominately a female hobby. My mother and others of her generation would knit and sew our clothes as it was cheaper than buying them. At some point this changed and crafting is for fun not money saving. I feel like this cost change occurred when women of my generation continued to work after marriage and family.

Whenever it changed from money saving to purely fun it still remained a women’s thing. I am not dismissing men here. There are plenty that knit and sew but this post is about how women treat women. Which I’m sad to say is not very well. We’re not talking critique or criticism but just downright nastiness for the fun of it.

Not only are the participants predominately female but the small business side of the industry is also predominately female. Mainly because having participated in the craft, they now wish to have a go at designing or dying yarn. Also with YouTube you can show off your work, whether as a hobby or your business or if YouTube is now your business. These all have relatively easy entry points and can be started from home so make it very favourable for women.

So why are other women hating on them. Why do they feel this is an OK thing?

As the entry point is easy, it also means that standards can be low and we should be critiquing badly written patterns and badly dyed yarn. But what I also read is:- Designers should be paid, designers should produce a free pattern, they shouldn’t even have bothered to write a pattern for this. If something is just not to your taste then don’t bad mouth other women who are trying to get a toe on the threshold of the industry. (Another post for another day is the oversaturation of the industry.)

YouTube is an interesting phenomenon and many of the popular YouTubers (in any genre) never imagined that when they started out they would become so popular. This does encourage others to give it a try and I imagine some of them expect to be big from the beginning. Especially as you hear about so many making a living from their videos – I hear about this a lot in the gaming industry.

The beauty of YouTube is that you don’t have to watch it or there is something for everyone. And in this case there is something for every complainer. Picking on YouTubers is becoming a popular hobby especially right now with everyone producing Vlogmasses. You could just not watch them or say that person isn’t for me instead it is picking apart the content maker. And as with patterns it is mostly women picking on other women. And it is unnecessary. It is to the point where watchers are picking apart the person and their home life and they shouldn’t be doing what they are doing and I don’t like their voice and what they spend their money on and how does their husband put up with them.

So let’s stop this and support women. Give a big hoorah to those who are brave enough to put themselves out there for our consumption; whether it be YouTube or selling their yarn at their first show or nervously posting their first pattern on Instagram.

September Was For Socks

This year it seems to have taken too long to knit a pair of socks. To change that I decided that in September not only was I going to start two pairs of socks but I was going to knit a sock a week. I did achieve that but it was at the expense of other knitting. (WIPs anyone?) And in each case it was easy to finish the first sock in one week but I had to push myself to finish the second sock in the same time frame. It is an exercise I will probably repeat but when I have fewer WIPs.

The theme for September was Art and Music and true to my own limitations I chose two patterns already in my library.

The first pattern was Flying Dutchman using some older yarn in my stash – I nearly wrote a separate post about this project as I purchased yarn to go with yarn and still knitted socks!

The light colour is a variegated yarn from Candy Skein and was the colour of the month in June 2016. I really liked it but couldn’t think what to make with it, so in September 2017 I bought the blue yarn to go with it. But I still didn’t make anything with them, until now. I know I only used about half of the blue and third of the variegated but I’m much happier having used them then waiting even longer for the perfect project. I thought this pattern was illusion knitting but it is all stocking stitch requiring turning the work every couple of rows. It wasn’t hard but I printed the pattern and crossed off each part so that I wouldn’t get lost if I was interrupted.

 

The yarn used for the second pair isn’t quite as old as it is one of the many skeins I bought in a closing sale in 2021. The pattern is SmokyMountain Rain and is named after a song and the yarn is from Oink Pigments.

 

So far I haven’t cast on any socks in October although I could find plenty of patterns in my library that fit the technique – cables. The main reason for not casting on is that we were away at the end of September into October and I didn’t want to think about which pattern I was going to knit and which yarn to use etc. And as I have all those WIPs to finish I was happy working away on them.

Do I Have to Talk About My WIPs?

Of course I don’t – this is my blog after all. But it is that time of year again – finish all the things. And I certainly have started all the things. Ever since this yearly Make Along started and I finished a really old project, I have managed to get my projects under control by the year end. Even finishing most of them.

The good thing about my current projects is that only one is more than a year old and it was started as a year long project. (We’ll just ignore that it has passed the year mark.) The bad thing is that I cannot picture when I will finish most of them.

I hope you are sitting down. I have 14 WIPs. So many that it is written in digits and not words. Of course I can get that number down. Because it includes two blankets which are long term projects. Yay, only 12 to finish in just over three months. Here they are in all their glory, except if you diligently follow this rant you will note that you can see only nine. Did I miraculously finish three projects in between sentences? No. I thought the number shown here was bad enough that I didn’t get the three out of the car. (Three in the car!, I know but there is a reason for that.)

Let’s talk about those first. I really thought I had finished a hat, so started another from scraps and then when I was given yarn I started another on a drive so that I wasn’t scrabbling around for scrap yarn. And then after assessing hat one I decided it wasn’t long enough and that needed to be rectified on the next vacation. These three hats will be finished or frogged by the end of the year. Nine projects to go.

Another two easy finishes is a project that needs to be frogged and the pair of socks that I want to finish by the end of the month. Seven left.

There is a jacket that needs seaming, which will just take a couple of days if I sit down and do it without interruption and a cardigan that is easy knitting apart from the bands that need to be picked up. Although once all the knitting is finished there are a lot of ends to sew in, maybe another couple of days. Now we’re down to five.

I really want to finish a cardigan for Christmas, it isn’t very far along, and is cables and lace so doesn’t qualify as easy knitting but if I make it a priority after finishing the items mentioned above. I could finish it.

Which brings us to four projects. One of those I don’t have enough yarn to finish but I haven’t decided what to do about it yet. So if I start the New Year with three unfinished projects I wouldn’t be too disappointed.

Now back to the knitting.

 

Podcasts

Although podcasts started as an aural concept, the term is now used for video casts as well. The downside of this, is when talking about a podcast you don’t know if it is visual or aural.

Recently I have come across discussion on podcasts, the first was on Ravelry and was mainly about which podcasts people watch/listen to and why, and what they like/dislike generally about podcasts.

The other one was on Reddit and mostly revolved around the monetization of video podcasts. And in a world full of clamouring for pay-the-designer, I find it interesting that in other areas crafters do not want to pay producers.

The monetization of podcasts occurs in a couple of ways – through YouTube advertising (YouTube is the only platform with which I am familiar) and through direct sponsorship of the host. With the latter there will be (or should be) a heading in the video saying it contains sponsored content. This means that the YouTuber gets something in return for talking about a product. This may not be directly related to the subject of the podcast. For example a booktuber I watch occasionally is sponsored by a jewellery manufacturer and a knitting podcast is sponsored by a skincare company.

My google-fu was not being very helpful with this topic as there were plenty of articles about how to be sponsored but very few on how people got paid. I was interested in if YouTubers got paid in product or dollars or both. Personally I feel it is only worthwhile being paid in product if it is something you would be using anyway. And I can certainly understand the feeling of having made it when you are contacted by a sponsor. But don’t sell yourself short – the world and their spouse are sponsored by Skillshare and it is now off putting to find every video is sponsored by them.

One article I read while trying to research the monetization of YouTube said that “supporters are anti the idea that their YouTube heroes might be selling themselves out.” And this is the conversation on Reddit that I found amusing or even baffling, watchers do not want their entertainment to receive payment. Especially if that payment (i.e. sponsorship) is not directly related to crafts. So many want their entertainment to be free; meaning we do not want to pay the hosting platform and we do not want to pay the content provider. And we want to complain about the videos you do create because saying you don’t like a certain YouTuber and then moving on is not good enough. We have to bring them down.

YouTube is entertainment. There is a vast choice of entertainment out there. If you don’t like the concept or a particular channel then move on. If you want all your entertainment for free, use your local library but don’t forget to complain about what is available and what isn’t available. And if that isn’t enough then you can always complain about the fundraisers on PBS and NPR.

I appreciate the work podcasters (aural and visual) put into their content. And if it costs me a couple of minutes of ad watching I will gladly do it to be able to continue to listen to or watch people who are expending a lot of time and their money to entertain and educate us.

More Socks

I have finally finished the second pair of socks that I started in June; just in time for the new season of Sock Knitters Anonymous.

As I had previously posted, there were so many options for June and I sensibly narrowed it down to just two patterns. The first pair took me just over a month and this pair took me 2 ½ months. When I knew I was not going to get them finished by the end of July I decided that I had plenty of time to finish them by the end of August. I finished them on the 29^th. Not quite the 11^th hour but running close.

I do not know what the yarn is as it is one of the stashes given to a friend and then given to me. But it is really pretty and goes well with this pattern. The pattern is Esther by Stephanie van der Linden and was published around 2006. The written pattern is a bit strange in places which I think is a combination of being translated and starting off as a German pattern. As an experienced knitter I was able to decide how the heel should be worked and the pattern centered. 

 

The 17^th year of SKA is starting off with a bang.  My aim is still to try to choose patterns that I already own or are in my queue or library. And for September I already have many choices. The pattern I am starting on the 1^st is not a beginner pattern and there is another pattern I really want to make. If I can get the first sock finished quickly, I can start a second pattern, otherwise there will be other opportunities to cast it on. It is rare for a sock pattern to fit a theme and/or designer and not also to fit into a technique.

I Thought I Wasn’t Making Shawls

I have a finished project at last. It certainly has been a recurring theme of lots of knitting but nothing to show for it. Considering the number of projects I have on the go, this was a relatively quick knit – two months in total including blocking.

(A quick note about my WIPS, it feels like I am getting ready for the WIP challenge in the last quarter of the year.)

I was given two balls of Rowan Fine Lace way back in 2019 because they were my colours – pink. In 2020 when I saw a new pattern –Flowers in the Air – I knew my yarn was perfect for it. But it still took 2½ years to cast on! It is a paid-for pattern but really inexpensive. The pattern is charted and written and is relatively simple. There are options for beads which, although pretty, I decided not to include. The other thing that was surprising for me is that I decided to bind off when I came to the end of the pattern and not keep working until I ran out of yarn. It turns out that was a good decision as the shawl was quite wide already. I used 1¹/₃ skeins and the shawl is as light as air.

Although I said I bound off when I came to the end of the pattern, I actually worked four rows of stocking stitch before bind off so that it wasn’t straight after a lace row as I knew the edge would roll. I modified the edge stitches to make them looser, even so when blocking I could not shape it into a true triangle; another reason why I am glad that I didn’t make it bigger. I just need an occasion to wear it.

 

Half-Way Through The Year

I am not going to do a round up of my accomplishments over the past 6-months. I feel like a mix of Sisyphus and Penelope; I am not finishing things or I am frogging them. (Although I do have a finished pair of socks to show.)

I had a quick look at last year’s projects and the year to date, and it’s not a comparison I want to make just yet. So let’s talk about the socks, which true to the theme took way longer to make than they should have.

For June, the featured designers were Cookie A and Evelyn Clark and the themes were patterns more than 10 years old and cables. I have patterns that fit every category, so what to knit and where to start? Of course I had to make a Cookie A pattern as I have her Sock Innovation book, I also happened to have an Evelyn Clark pattern in one of my books and, of course, plenty of patterns with cables and plenty of old patterns.

I cast on the Cookie A. pattern and decided when I had finished the first one I would cast on the E. Clark pattern. Comments on Ravelry said that it they came out big and the number of stitches was at the top end of what I would cast on. And they were way too big so they were very quickly frogged. A sensible person would have just forged on with the first pair started, but no. I had it in my head that in June I would start at least two pairs. (At one point I did consider three or four.) And yarn was wound, so an old pattern was cast on. Two pairs of socks in two months is doable. Except I didn’t expect to take more than one month for one pair and I didn’t take into account that the second pattern has fiddly twisted stitches, and cables. Although I have until the end of July to finish them, August is a bonus month in which to finish all your socks and I think I am going to need that.

Anyway, back to the finished socks. I chose Cauchy from Sock Innovation and used Tranquil Merino from Stunning String. The yarn was a gift but I had put off using it as it is 20% rayon from bamboo and bamboo doesn’t have any stretch. So what do I save it for? a Cookie A design who is renowned for not having much stretch in her designs. I went for it anyway as the yarn and pattern seemed the perfect fit. I hope you agree.

I’m going to show two photos here – pre-blocking and on the blockers. You don’t really have to block socks as they are going to get shaped on your feet but it does make a difference to the pattern and fit if you block them.

 

 

Ten-Day Cardigan in Ten Days

I have mentioned yarn I have received from my friend who is always bring given good quality yarn. She keeps some and gives some away. Sometimes we end up with the same yarn but in colours more suited to our individual taste. Recently she gave me loads of Brown Sheep Bulky. And by loads, I mean more than enough to make a garment so no angst over will I have enough to make anything.

My friend crocheted a cardigan which I really liked and decided to make as well, especially as my Tunisian crochet project was not working out. My friend included a strand of mohair with her project so we are not exactly matching. The pattern was written to be made over ten days and had a YouTube video for each day. I decided to start on a Friday so that I had the first weekend to keep up to date and a weekend at the end if I needed to catch up. I was able to keep up but I’m not sure it is something I would want to do again as it is a lot of crochet. I did two days worth in one day as I knew I was not going to be able crochet much the following day. The good thing about that was that I was able to give my hands a rest for a full day.

Although I said I completed this in ten days, there was the inevitable button angst. I decided to add buttons as it is a bulky garment and I wanted the option of being able to do it up. I made five buttonholes and then was dreading the trip to Jo-Anns to purchase buttons. I was debating asking for input about online button purchasing but in the meantime I went to Michaels to look for something completely different and as I was there I wondered around to look at what they had and came across buttons and purchased a pack of five.

Sewing on the buttons made it an 11-day project.

The cardigan is worked from sleeve to sleeve, with stitches picked up at various points to make fronts, bands, cuffs. If I was going to make this again, I would work from the middle of the back out to the sleeves to make each half the same; I especially didn’t like one of the sleeve seams. I would also make the cuffs longer and tighter.

Having said that, I am really happy with my garment and can see wearing it quite a bit in the winter. 

 

It’s Frog Season

A couple of posts ago I said that I had cast-on-all-the-things but had only finished one. This past week has been the week of the frog. I frogged three of April’s cast ons. Three! 

I had cast on three cardigans and one is nearly finished; I just need some time to sew all the seams.The other two, well...Before 1 April I swatched, including blocking, all three yarns but somehow the other two cardigan were both turning out too big. One of them is an allover lace pattern and I wondered if the size would change as I completed more of the pattern but I did not want to keep knitting and knitting and still have to frog, so I pulled it out and recast on a smaller size at the end of May.

The other cardigan is a bit of a mystery as the gauge of the garment is the same as the swatch but the size was still too big. I’m guessing that I was allowing for more ease than needed. Also as I have a limited amount of yarn I decided to restart with a different pattern. Now I am making a top-down cardigan. This way I can try it on at different times and see how it fits and I can stop knitting when I run out of yarn.

I also frogged the second pair of socks. This was a repeat pattern and my notes on the original project say “a bit fiddly”. That felt like an understatement this time around as I just couldn’t be bothered to work on them. They were frogged and yarn went back into stash. 

 

I still have one more project to frog. I knew I would not have enough yarn to complete the project but I convinced myself that I would just need to add contrasting yarn for the borders. It is pretty obvious that I am not going to have enough yarn to make the sleeves but the project is so pretty that I am not ready to frog yet.

But never fear, I made up for all these non-projects by casting on a load of things in June.

Wishful Knitting

In my last post I said I cast on all the things but only had one pair of socks to show for it.

Of the five items I started, one is finished, one is more than half-way through, one will be completely frogged and yarn put back in stash, one has been frogged and will be restarted, one needs to be frogged. I am going to frog the second pair of socks I started, the pattern is fiddly (which I knew), but I am not enjoying the process and as I have a few other projects that require concentration I don’t need to keep this project on the go.

The other two projects that were unsuccessful are both cardigans and in both cases they are knitting up larger than expected. It is interesting that this is the case for both of them as I did swatch. I didn’t rush the swatching and I made them a decent size. I haven’t had a problem like this before. Both projects are knit in one piece from the bottom up and the only thing I can think is that all the stitches is making me knit looser. I am going to restart one of them and work a smaller size. The other one I will frog and change to a top down pattern.

Although it is disappointing, I hadn’t got very far in any of the projects so I will consider it part of the swatching process and not a waste of knitting time.

Oh, and to add to the disappointment, I started a Tunisian crochet project in the middle of February using yarn from friend’s friend’s destash. I knew I did not have enough yarn but thought I would have enough for the main part of the cardigan and use a contrast colour for the bands. It is pretty obvious that I will not have enough yarn for the body and sleeves, which is disappointing as I am enjoying working on the project and the fabric that is being produced.

To end on a good note, I have finished the hat for May.

 

At Least I Finished a Pair of Socks

As is usually the case when I don’t write a post for a while it is because I have been writing in my head, and then something else comes up but I feel I need to commit the first post to the World Wide Web, so nothing is posted.

My original post has been erased (from my mind) and here, eventually, is a sock post. Which is a post about socks and not a post pretending to be something else.

At the beginning of April I cast on all the things. I’m not really sure why I went crazy but it was a combination of having just long term projects on the needles, liking the challenges in Sock Knitters Anonymous, wanting a selection of non-concentrating and concentrating patterns and the start of a new quarter.

And as 1 April was a Saturday, I was able to start ALL-THE-THINGS. I cast on two socks (different pairs), and three cardigans.

The two sock themes for April that I was interested in were manipulating self-striping yarn and patterns that you have made before. I have a skein of self-striping yarn that I purchased way back in 2019. It is bold red, white and blue and I have struggled choosing a pattern for it as if the stripes are going to be manipulated, I really want them to be manipulated. While I was thinking about patterns I might like to knit again, I realized that a yarn I had got in a swap in 2018 was also self-striping. I was all ready to start but changed my mind at the last minute. I ended up using the gift yarn in a self-striping pattern – and these are the socks I have finished – and used the bold self-striping in a “repeat” pattern.

For the self-striping pattern I chose Margaritaville. This pattern moves the design with decrease and increases and works well with the yarn I chose as it is what is called jacquard stripes as some of the stripes create a pattern; you can see this on the sole. I started them on 1 April and finished them on 30 April. I don’t know why they took so long. Especially as I was away for two of those weeks and, apart from in the car, this was the only thing I worked on – one sock. 

 

New Yarn, New Project

A new yarn store has opened near to me recently and a couple of friends and I met for lunch and a quick look. I wanted to support this store but I did not really want to buy anything so I decided I would buy yarn for a gift. I ended up doing that but also buying a skein of yarn for myself. The yarn is beautiful and could easily become a pair of socks but I cast on pretty quickly a longer cowl.

I like this style of cowl and I have knit a few by a different designer but this is a new to me designer. You start off knitting flat as you would for a shawl and then join in the round. Usually I would work until I ran out of yarn but this time I finished when the pattern said to. The start is a short piece of garter stitch with stitches picked up along one long edge, which is a pretty standard shawl start. I followed another knitter’s suggestion to cast on with much smaller needles and gradually increase size as this avoids the hump at the start of the shawl. I will definitely do that when I next make a shawl but I am not convinced it was the best thing for a cowl as you want lots of drape at the neck. But I do love the finished item, because I really love the yarn.

 

 

The yarn is Dream in Color Smoosy, colour Burr and the pattern is Secret Skein.

April’s Hat

No, I haven’t made a mistake. I have knitted next month’s hat in advance. As you know, I try to knit a hat each month and this year I started to work through the year of bulky hats.

A few days ago I finished a relatively easy knit. I didn’t want to cast on anything new because I have big plans for April; it being the start of a new quarter. But I did want a relatively easy and portable project. So why not cast on a hat and why not make it the next bulky hat? It’s only me that says a hat a month.

Once again I used YOTH father and now I am ready to start all the things on Saturday.

 

First Socks of 2023

With my new arbitrary system of choosing which sock patterns to knit, I didn’t cast on a sock until February. Once again a pattern in my favourites fit one of the prompts for February.

The pattern is Standing in the Shadow of Love by Adrienne Fong (may she RIP). And in keeping with unplanned stash intentions, I used leftover yarn. Both the yarns were featured in this shawl. Quite often with these types of patterns I will swap the yarns for the second sock but I didn’t his time as I did not think I would have had enough of the pink. I might have but it would have been close.

The pattern is illusion or shadow knitting, I have tried to capture the “illusion” but using a variegated yarn was not the best idea. Nevertheless, I enjoyed knitting them and I like the secret of the design being there. Having a plain foot made for easy knitting plus not having to worry about how they would feel in shoes.

A couple of weeks ago I was going to write about my WIPs but didn’t because Wednesday came and went – apparently I can only write about WIPs on WIPping Wednesday. But as you can see from the last few posts I have been finishing things. And I haven’t started new projects to replace them so the projects are being completed without having to be shamed on the internet.

 

 

Pride Goes Before the Fall and Other Finished Items

I have noticed that I know quite a bit about knitting and crochet but don’t often speak up when questions are asked. I have also noticed that the people with the most affirmative voices are the ones listened to even if they are not correct. This has made me think I should speak up more.

But a big mistake in my most recent finished project has brought me back to earth and reminded me that just because I know a lot doesn’t mean I will remember to use it myself.

I have knitted a hat which has bobbles, lots of them. I don’t mind bobbles but they can be a pain to knit. In this particular pattern, you increase to five stitches, turn your work to purl five together, turn work again and on your merry way.

My bobbles were not very pronounced; I put it down to using thinner yarn than the pattern and then about half-way through the pattern section it came to me – my bobbles were smaller because I had been doing them wrong! On the first bobble I had found the purl 5 together impossible to execute so instead I just passed four stitches over that last one without turning the work. All well and good except the purling of the stitches together creates another stitch which my bobbles were missing! I should have knit the last stitch before passing the other stitches over.

I decided to continue as you can see the pattern. It’s not as pronounced as the original pattern but no one has to know that, do they?

 

The other finished item is a baby jacket. I was given the yarn Caron Latte Cakes which is a good choice for a child as it is soft and washable. The pattern is a free one from Lion Brand. Not difficult but a couple of changes made it better. For example adding neck shaping and picking up all the stitches for the bottom skirt – pattern has you pick up front and backs separately then seam them.

The mother, always knitworthy, was very appreciative.