I'm a Knitter. The capital K means every day, everywhere. I started designing as co-owner of Cabin Fever with my sister Lyn. We have published over 160 patterns and 11 books. I'm also working on a new set of patterns for Any Gauge or Gauge-free knitting so you can dive into your stash and cast on for a Top Down sweater that fits, or an accessory to use up those odd balls of yarn.
We came home for 10 days and now we are off again. I’m testing out several projects to see what works in the car and on our tour of Newfoundland.
I cast on a sock for my grandson who loves rainbows and all things colurful. I think these hit the mark.
This is Timberyarns wool and the colours are so wonderful. I’m using double pointed needles and knitting these in the Irish knitting method that Yarnharlot uses. I figure it’s good to mix up different knitting methods but as a car knit? We’ll see.
The other project for the car will be my Reversible Ribbon Wrap/Scarf (which is a free pattern on my ravelry site). It’s a backup project since it will work anywhere I go. I’m not any further along than last time since I was setting up the other projects. It should get some love over the next couple of weeks. I snuck another colour into the project bag since I thought this needed a bit of a colour lift. I’ll keep you posted.
I have one more project, because can two projects be enough? It’s a matching Musselburgh Hat for my little guy. This I can pull out any time and do a little bit.
I, of course, spent way more time thinking about what knitting projects to take and very little on clothes, priorities, right? Off we go. It should be great.
Summer is ending and it’s time to look toward autumn and, dare I say it, winter.
An autumn essential for me is a good sized scarf. That’s what I’m knitting now.
Would you like to join me? I’ll be knitting this for a month or so. I’ve published the pattern with an interim photo, because obviously it’s not done yet LOL, in case you want to knit along with me. It’s Gauge-Free and modular, oh, and the pattern is free.
As you know, if you’ve been following me, I’m stuck on sleeve island (where did this term come from???) on a couple of sweaters, so for relief I’ve started this new idea for a Wrap/Scarf.
So far I have 2 triangles made and a tiny bit of Triangle 3 up on the top right of the photo.
It’s a two colour wrap made with triangles that join-as-you-go. Triangle 1 begins on the left of the photo, in the Main Colour, with increases worked along the top edge. Work as far as you wish then change to the Contrast Colour for the bottom section of Triangle 1.
An Eyelet Row is worked when changing colours which makes it reversible!
The depth of Triangle 1 determines the depth of the wrap/scarf.
Triangle 2 begins again with the Main Colour and joins to the Triangle 1 stitches.
Then count the number of ridges of CC colour in Triangle 1. I have 35 ridges in green. Count 35 sts from the far end and put in a removable marker. Join up Triangle 2 to Triangle 1 until you reach that removable marker and then change to CC. This is going to give you a zigzag of the CC colour.
I’ve added some modifications, of course! I’m doing Modification 1 which is to vary the width of the CC sections. I’m knitting each CC section 5 sts narrower with each triangle. Then I think I will either add in a different CC colour or just widen them out again. I’ll decide when I get there. I like to mix it up as I go along. You’re surprised, right?!
I’ve posted this pattern on my debgemmellmods ravelry group if you want to join me. I’d love to see some other colour versions.
It’s mid-August and 12 degrees Celsius in the morning when we get up. That’s our signal that it’s time to go home. It’s been a terrific summer. Tomorrow we travel south.
I got quite a bit of knitting done through a rainy spring, a couple weeks of hot weather and family time. In the meantime I did a major bit of maintenance on our cabin. It needed to be resurfaced since it was leaking a lot around the door and windows. We refaced it with plywood and put battens up at all the seams. I think it’s looking pretty great.
I’m quite a bit further along on my Just For You V Pullover green version. I think I’m very close to the bottom of the body. I’ll do a proper assessment when I get home.
I am almost finished one sleeve of the striped version of the V. Just the ribbing left and then I can finished the other sleeve. I find sleeve knitting sooo boring. It shows me that I’m missing watching TV (which I don’t have here). That’s the perfect evening activity – TV watching and sleeve knitting. So more of that when I get home.
I was knitting the sleeves two-at-a-time but to mix it up, as I said – really bored, I switched to double points. Anything to convince myself to keep going.
I started the second triangle of my Reversible Ribbon Wrap. I am about to finish this second triangle with the green. That will be the first of the zag of green zigzag. Stay tuned. It will become clearer as I go.
I will start the green with an Eyelet Row which is what is making it reversible.
Earlier in the month I went to the Algoma Fibre day in Desbarats, just east of Sault Ste. Marie, ON, and bought 2 cakes of Briggs and Little Country Roving. It is 5 strands of unspun wool. I’ve been wanting to try knitting with unspun wool for a while but not at the gauge with 5 strands of wool. So I split the whole cake up.
I split the 5 strands into 2 strands + 2 strands + 1 strand balls. Between the 2 cakes I got 5 big balls of 2 strands of wool.
Lyn, of Shelridge Yarns, my sister and neighbour here, offered to help me try dyeing this wool.
We had to change the balls into skeins in order to dye it. We found out how very fragile unspun wool is. We tried winding the balls onto a swift but it kept breaking. So I ended up keeping the swift stationary and manually winding the wool around the pegs to make the skeins. No pulling that way.
Then the dyeing began. First cold water bath and add dye.
Then it got heated up slowly to a simmer and then set aside until it was room temperature again. Then it could be washed and then laid out to dry.
Now I have all these balls of semi-felted wool which I think will knit at about 4 sts to the inch. It feels much stronger after the heating and cooling.
Yay. Something new to try. Have you knit with unspun wool? How did it go?
It’s even hot here in Northern Ontario but I have made some progress.
The green V is getting some love.
Shelridge 80/20 fingering
That’s another 4 inches, at least. Ha, in my dreams.
I have started extra wiggle room for my hips starting above my waist, working increases on either side of the back only. Now I will work increases on the front and back, every inch or so, to get an extra 3-4 inches around the hips. It gives me something to keep track of which seems to help it go faster.
The V sleeves here are both 6.5 inches long. If this was one sleeve I would be almost done! OK, so keep on truckin’.
Waxwing yarn co.
I started a new wrap.
Shelridge 80/20 fingering
I have finished one triangle in two colors and started on the second one. It will look something like this.
Maybe this drawing, where I’m trying to show where the green will go, will help? OK, maybe not.
Anyway, it will become clearer as I get a little further on. So far, nice easy garter stitch. Good for watching video podcasts, car knitting, etc.
You have probably seen it but if you haven’t, I published the Just For You V Pullover pattern, even though I haven’t finished the sleeves!
It’s available for free at Debgemmellmods store on ravelry.
No one seems to have minded the “no sleeves” thing but I am knitting them now, two at a time. I heard it builds character to finish things. I’m not sure I need more character but here I go anyway.
Waxwing Wool Co.
This is how they sit on my lap when I knit them both at the same time. I work them on two circulars.
This is a video of the last time I did this.
Have you tried it?
There is no way around the fact that knitting in fingering weight wool takes a very long time!!!
I’m afraid I have not made any further progress on the green one, or anything else.
The kids and our grandson were up for a week and lots of board games, group meals and general busyness ensued. Not much knitting at all. Summertime at the lake, wouldn’t miss it for anything.
I am making some, progress that is, on several fronts.
I’m at my summer camp in Northern Ontario. I had big plans to build a new bunkie (an outbuilding for sleeping) this year so my son and partner could have their own place but maintenance has to come first. I have been cutting brush. It was about 4’ high. Now the mosquitos are less bothersome and I can see the lake. Yay.
I have also made progress on both my sweaters.
This V-Neck Pullover is a joy to knit. The green marker is where I was last week. Are you impressed by my progress? I am, ha, ha.
Here is how the twisted stitch design is shaping up at the sides. I’m loving it.
I will post the pattern next week.
The faux Lunenburg I’m knitting is also much further along.
It’s not nearly long enough yet.
I also have my circular saw and screw gun out because the front of my cabin needs to be resurfaced. It takes all the weather that comes off the lake and is now leaking. I’m going to do a sort of board and batten look. Very early days but I can see it’s going to cover the old seams very well, phew.
My job is the woodwork part and my husband is doing the painting. Three different colours of green on it right now, LOL
I hope you are also making some progress on whatever summer projects you have going.
Here I am in July knitting a circular yoke for my son-in-law. It seemed like a good idea at the time but the weather is not exactly cooperating.
This is my second Lunenburg by Amy Christoffers.
Briggs and Little Sport
This time I didn’t follow the rules. I printed the chart in black and white.
This is only a part of the chart. I didn’t want to give it all away since this is a paid pattern.
Now the fun begins. What colours to put where? At one point I started into a red/green area. Oops, looked a little too Christmasy so ripped that back and tried to keep those two colours away from each other.
It was an interesting exercise and I will do it again.
I decided I could make some changes for a men’s version. I think most people are knitting for a woman, themselves I hope.
I knit the yoke 1/2 inch longer and then worked more short rows at the bottom of the yoke. I searched around and found a suggestion for starting them in the centre of the sleeve and making the short rows longer and longer towards the front. It gave me more room to get some extra rows in. The back is now about 1.5 inches longer.
Men need a bit more length in the back for thicker shoulders. I am also going to taper the body so it’s narrower at the hip. I’ll see if this works when it’s done. Here’s a side view.
I think you can see that there is quite a difference between the front on the right and the back on the left of the photo. I’ve separated the sleeves and am now working round and round and round and round. Yes, it’s going to feel like I’ll be doing this forever!!! Maybe knitting for someone 5’11” inches tall in the summer wasn’t one of my best ideas?!
Meanwhile, I mentioned on my last post that I needed some progress markers and several days later my sister made me some. Thanks Lyn.
Hempton by Hemp for Knitting
Now I do feel like I am getting somewhere on this Twelve-Point Circular Yoke.
I also have finished the body of this V-Neck Pullover. Yay. It’s all wrinkled because I stuffed it into a small project bag. Blocking it here at camp will be interesting: cold lake water and the sun.
Cedre by Waxwing Yarn Co
It seems like summer has arrived in Northern Ontario so progress may slow down. I heard someone say that they had several projects on the go so worked on a different one every day. That sounds good to me so that’s my plan going forward.
I wish I had some of those progress marker things to put in my knitting. Knitting lots of stockinette stitch can seem like you knit and knit and knit and never make any progress at all. I have 2 projects that are all stockinette.
I really enjoy exploring different ways of constructing sweaters, especially the no-sew variety. I am not much of a fashionista. Did I use that word correctly? Anyway, I’m not a fashion designer, I am a knitting construction engineer. It does lead to lots of plain knitting since I don’t always consider decorating my latest construction with something interesting. I think the construction itself is interesting enough. Does that make sense?
I have been working on a combination of stash busting and making my designs a little more appealing to the eye.
I added stripes to my latest Twelve-Point Circular Yoke to jazz things up and to use up the last of my Hempton hemp/cotton blend yarn. I wrote it for helical knitting, as a stash buster, but now I am knitting 6 round stripes and, wow, I love this one.
I have part of the last Hempton ball left. I have a Hiya Hiya interchangeable set of needles with double the tips and cables, since I inherited my mom’s set to add to mine. So after the sleeve split, I was able to knit a teal stripe on the body and then a teal stripe on both sleeves, look at what I had left, and do it again. Alas, that’s it for the teal. Good stash busting though!
I’m also at the same point, the point of no more stripes, on the V-Neck Pullover. Again, using up the left-over balls of Waxwing wool. This pattern is written but there is no finished pullover yet.
I have made it to the hip shaping. For this pullover, I knit the Body straight to the narrowest part of my torso (which is now above my natural waist, sigh), and can work some increases for a little extra wiggle room.
Now I’m counting rounds between the sets of side increases. That’s OK. It gives me something to track how much progress I’m making. I work 4 increases in one round, one on either side of the imaginary side seam at both sides, knit 1″ worth of rounds (9 rounds), work one more round with 4 increases, and then 2″ worth of rounds (18 rounds). I repeat the increases and 2″ worth of rounds for the desired length of the pullover. I can usually get around 12 to 16 extra stitches for my hips on top of the generous amount of ease for the body. All good.
The break in the stockinette stitch knitting is working on my V-Neck Pullover with the twisted stitches. See, I can add in some visual interest if I work at it.
Once I split for the sleeves, I also added this stitch pattern as a panel under the arms. The twisted stitch panels make knitting this very much more interesting and I love twisted stitches.
I’m not very far along so nothing to look at under the arms yet but it’s going to be great.
I’ve finished the charts. I did them by hand and photographed them so I hope they show up well enough. I’m putting this pattern out for free so I haven’t bought a chart program. Sorry.
It is suddenly summer here after many days of rain. We are enjoying the sun and getting out on the water. I hope you are having a lovely summer. I know Ontario is having a heat wave so maybe not too much knitting is getting done.
I’m so excited to be here in Northern Ontario. I look forward to it every year. I especially like being outside most of the time. Once we are here at our cabin, it takes several days to get everything sorted: empty out all the stuff we store over the winter in the cabin, clean up after the mice, do some laundry (mouse related), set up our water, grocery shop, etc. Now the weather is heating up, it’s a pleasure to be here.
Here’s a video tour of me in my happy place.
As you can see my V-Neck Pullovers are progressing well. I’m loving the stripes.
Waxwing, a rustic fingering weight wool
The difference in the two fingering weight sweaters makes my knitting very interesting. The rustic wool by Waxwing is somewhat more forgiving. I’m using it to try to get more practice not looking as I knit. It’s sort of working. Can you do that?
This green one is in Shelridge 80/20 fingering and because it’s a superwash the yarn is lighter and much smoother.
The pattern for this one is sitting for a couple more days as I work myself up to doing the charts for the twisted stitch pattern.
I love twisted stitches so I’m enjoying this no end. How do you feel about them? Love twisted stitches or not so much?
Deb Gemmell: Top Down, Gauge Free and more 