Tag: shawl

Photographing Yikes

I have to be quick here because I spent all morning trying to photograph a couple of shawls. OMG they are hard to do. After taking 34 pics I am settling for what I got.

That was after I spent way too much time deciding I needed a haircut first, then I should cut my nails, make some bread and clean my apartment. OK, none of that got done. I did get some photos.

This is a shawl I knit for Shelridge Yarns in Lyn’s new Silk/Linen (pink) and again in her Touch Fine lace weight wool (purple).

I do need a hair cut!

This shawl is built in 3-Tiers. With lots of different stitch patterns done in recipe style with schematics for which stitch patterns I used where.

How goofy is that!

Anyway the pattern is finished and I’m sending it to Lyn for a final OK and then I’ll publish it. I hope the photos are OK because it was painful to do these.

Cheers, Deb

Any Gauge and Gauge-Free patterns by Deb

Deb on instagram

The In-between

After finishing a large project, what do you do?

Walk away from knitting for a bit? No, no, no, of course not. You cast on something else.

I was thinking about a small project, but what jumped onto my needle was a shawl. Not a small project, sigh.

It wasn’t actually as straightforward as that. I had some navy, hand-dyed sock wool and cast on for socks. A small project, at least small in size, to carry around.

The yarn had cashmere in it, and after I knit the cuff, I thought maybe cashmere is sort of wasted on socks, so I ripped it out and here I am.

This is the Magic Symmetry Shawl, knit starting at the side with 3 stitches with increases worked on the leading edge.

This usually makes an asymmetric shape, but this is going to be symmetrical when it’s done, wider than it is tall. To my mind this makes it so much easier to wear.

I figured out a new stitch to add to the pattern. Doesn’t this show off the contrast colour?

I thought I would knit eyelets in the contrast colour rows. I  worked [Yo, K2tog] and found I liked the wrong side better. So now I knit the right side row and on the wrong side row work [Yo, P2tog]. So happy with how this looks.

It’s not such a large project after all.

Cheers Deb

Gauge-free and Any Gauge patterns by Deb

Deb on instagram

Crescent FAN Shawl update

Designs sometimes have a forward/backward two-step dance to them. First step forward was knitting the blue and then gold bands for the shawl. When I realized that this crescent shawl shape was too curly, I ripped back. Yes, a large step backwards. Moving forward, I fixed it and I really like the overall shape.

Once I had it this far along, I decided that the V shapes where too small. I wanted to knit more texture stitches across the rows.

So I ripped the gold out one more time. Yes, one more time stepping back. I made the texture stitch shapes larger at the base. Now, after knitting this section again, I finally have it just like I want it. The shapes are like FANs so I changed the name of the pattern. Why not? Nothing is written in stone yet.

The gold yarn is 80/20 fingering by Shelridge.com and stood up really well to three knits. Yay.

I’m knitting the last band of colour as you read this. There is no stopping me now!

The pattern is off to the testknitters and I’m contemplating knitting another one. Hmm, what to choose this time? DK weight? Yeah, that would work.

Cheers, Deb

Gauge-Free and Any Gauge patterns by Deb

Sometimes frogging has to be done

I didn’t block my shawl, I just put it on a really long cable and … it’s definitely too curvy.

So here we go. Rip, rip, rip. Turn away if this is too painful!

While I was merrily ripping away, I decided to take the stripes out too. More ripping but now it’s done.

I thought about the adjustment and here we go again. It’s so difficult to knit with your fingers crossed!

I’m liking the sharp colour change and I’m happy with the curve now. Totally worth the frogging. But … I would like wider wedges. I’d like more texture knitting and a little less garter stitch. So back to ripping again. Let’s see if this yarn can take it. Onward.

Cheers, Deb

Any Gauge and Gauge-Free patterns by Deb

Shawl knitting time

I have been thinking about knitted shawls for about a month but had projects to finish first. Knitting a shawl was the carrot in front of my nose, to keep going. Now that they are done I can indulge myself and start a shawl.

I have been teaching knitting for decades and thought I would take one of my shawl workshops and move it a little sideways. I need a challenge and taking something that is working and pushing it in a slightly different direction is fun, as well as frustrating when it doesn’t work out as expected, but that is still fun, believe it or not.

So here I go, a crescent shaped shawl beginning with a garter tab.

This shawl is worked in 2 or 3 parts. The first part is easy to work in garter stitch.

The experimenting starts with the second part of the shawl. I am working  different textured patterns. You can’t see them, of course, since the needle is too short to spread it out. You’ll have to take my word for it for now.

I’m not sure about the general shape. My concern at the moment is that it might be too curvy. I need to block it even though it’s only half done. When the needle comes out, all will be revealed. Yikes, this makes me kinda nervous.

Cheers,  Deb

Gauge-Free and Any Gauge patterns by Deb

Did you get value from your pattern?

Did you ever buy a pattern and wondered what you paid for? What makes this pattern special?

I’m knitting the Lanterns shawl by Softsweater (Sylvia McFadden).

The leaf pattern is gorgeous. I worked it with the twisted knits and twisted purls (don’t worry, there is an untwisted version). This was a challenge. The trick, I found, is to work the twisted knit row on the loose side so the twisted purls on the next row are easier to work. It doesn’t take long to get the hang of this. The final blocking will really show this off.

The leaf section is done. But that’s not the special part for me.

The edge stitches are really well thought out and charted. I’m quite sure the beginning and end of the rows took time to develop. She even did a video of a different stitch she used. That’s customer service. But that’s still not ‘it’ for me either.

What I paid for, and it was a very small amount of $ but I won’t go into how much patterns are undervalued in our industry, was the 10 or so rows right here.

This is the transition from the leaf pattern to the chevron pattern. It’s elegant, don’t you think? It’s a thing of beauty. I’ve stopped knitting here so I can just appreciate how she made these patterns flow, one into the other.

As far as I’m concerned this is what I paid for. A little bit of knitting elegance. When I pick it up tomorrow I am starting with a smile of appreciation on my face. Thanks Sylvia.

Cheers and happy knitting, Deb

Any Gauge and Gauge-Free patterns by Deb

Cabin Fever No-Sew patterns by Deb & Lyn

Symmetry vs Asymmetry

How attached are you to symmetry? When I try to work asymmetry into my own designs they seem to work hard to revert to something symmetrical. I’m trying to work against this tendency. Sometimes it works.

The other factor in favour of asymmetry is that my mind and maybe yours, is restless and easily distracted. The thought of working too much of the same thing is not appealing right now.

So I’m working on a scarf or shawl in 3 sections where I, and eventually you, will be able to change it up.

It starts with triangles that begin small and get larger and larger, worked join-as-you-go to your desired depth of scarf, in this case about 8″/20cm deep.20200517_091914

Then there is a straight centre section worked on the bias. This is a simple 2 row repeat so you will be able to play. I tried 3 different stitch patterns: stripes, eyelets and the daisy stitch. Do you have some other favourite stitch patterns that could work?

I didn’t do this for long as you can see. I made the first section very long. I was afraid if I kept going I would have to wind this scarf around my neck several times as if I was a giraffe. But hey, if that’s a good look for you, go for it. I took the scissors to my prototype, snip, snip, first two triangles are gone and now it’s a much better shape for me.

Then for the final section I worked a scalloped edge which can go on forever, OK not forever but certainly until you run out of yarn, stitches or patience.20200517_092104

 After surgery, my scarf is 66″/168cm long and weighs 125g.20200517_110131

What do you think? Would you like the option to make both ends match? Where do you stand on the symmetry/asymmetry question?

Deb

Any Gauge and Gauge-Free patterns by Deb

Cabin Fever No-Sewpatterns

Gauge-Free FREE beginner scarf

Does this idea of Gauge-Free really seem weird to you? What do you mean you can just pick out some yarn and start with no stitch counts and no idea of a gauge you need to get? How can you knit the correct size? Any yarn at all? Any needle I think is reasonable? How can that be?!

If you are knitting at home more than usual during this time and want a stash diving  project, give this a try: Gauge-Free Triangles Scarf/Shawl. This is one of the workshops I teach and I’m offering it Free here for the duration. Knit GAUGE-FREE or, as I call it, knitting without a safety net!

The trick to knitting Gauge-Free is getting started in the right spot. You need to start where you can get to the size you need, regardless of your gauge, and measure it with a ruler (tape measure).triangle workshop height measurement

 

Here’s a beginner project, the GAUGE-FREE TRIANGLES SCARF/Shawl that totally works because it starts at the corner of the first triangle.

gauge-free triangle scarf workshop

It’s a modular, join-as-you-go project. You can use any yarn with any needle you think is reasonable. You can knit a scarf with all your odd balls or have a more thought-out plan of two colours. You can knit every triangle a different colour or knit stripes (as soon as you work stripes you have a right side and wrong side, keep that in mind). You can knit this as a large rectangular shawl (or is it called a stole?) if you make ‘Triangle I’ about 12″-14″/30-36cm deep or even deeper and then go on from there for as long as you need it to be. Add a stitch pattern or two?

If you make many scarves you can sew them together into a blanket.triangle scarf blanket

The options are endless.

Enjoy,

Deb

Any Gauge and Gauge-Free patterns by Deb

Cabin Fever No-Sew patterns

 

 

 

Mosaic Shawl for retreat

We’re getting ready to Retreat. We are Elizabeth, Lyn and myself, all finishing up our shawl samples for our Cabin Fever Retreat. It’s coming up at the Fern Resort really soon. So this is my last shawl sample. I had a student in one of my classes say that there should be a sign on the wall by the classroom door saying, “This can be addictive, Beware”. Shawls have been that for me.

Here’s a snapshot of the shawls and samples going to the retreat:

Asymmetric Shawls by Elizabeth, don’t they look like fun? 

Lyn’s still working on her Crescent shawls. She has a really great crescent cast on edge to show everyone.CF retreat crescent shawl

My adventures into Triangle Shawls has taken me far and wide.

The last one is using Mosaic knitting. Mosaic knitting is worked with 1 colour (variegated) across 2 rows working knits or purls and slipped stitches. Another 2 rows are worked with a second colour (black) in stockinette stitch or garter stitch.

My first foray into mosaic shawl knitting was to work (RS) [K1, Slip 1] with the variegated colour and (WS) [K1 (variegated, Slip 1 (black)]. The black is worked in 2 rows of stockinette stitch. The variegated colour is bumpy against the black stockinette stitch.20191013_154400

Next I tried working the variegated as (RS) [K2, Slip 2] and (WS) [P2 (variegated), Slip 2] so that the coloured yarn is now in stockinette stitch. I worked the black in garter stitch this time (knit on RS and knit on WS). The colour becomes recessed and although it looks OK up close the colour seems to get lost against the black.20191013_154429

Onward. This time I worked the colour as [K2, Slip 2] again but on the WS I worked [K2 (variegated), Slip 2] making the colour bumpy against the garter stitch black. Much better don’t you think? I’m very happy with this and will continue until I run out of black, which is soon.20191013_154442

Can you see the changes?20191013_154655

We’re excited to get going. There are still spaces available if you want to join us at the Fern Resort on October 25.

Thanks for reading,

Deb

Deb’s patterns on ravelry

instagram

 

One Little Change

I find it amazing that sometimes one little change, that you think is insignificant, can make a big impact.

I am still working on a triangle shawl system for the class I’m running at the Cabin Fever Retreat at the Fern Resort on Oct 25-27. We’re presenting 3 shawl shapes: crescent, asymmetric and triangle.

I’m going to present a recipe for working triangles with long tails. There will be lots of room for knitters to add in their own ideas. No two will look alike. Here is one with lots of texture changes throughout: garter stitch, stockinette stitch, reverse stockinette stitch and floating seed stitch.20190930_091752

If you are a shawl knitter you know that the picture you have of the finished shawl doesn’t always look like that on the needles. Actually shawls usually look like a great big mess, even to knitters. So once again I pinned out the current colour block shawl I’m working on to have a peek.20190927_104537

These two shawls follow exactly the same recipe. You might notice that something went wonky with the centre line in the Colour Block one. It’s definitely leaning.

The shawl on the left has an increase before and after the centre marker in the usual way. The only change I made to the Colour Block was to work only one increase at the centre, before the centre marker. That’s it. Only one increase instead of two. It changed the shape of the shawl. It is no longer a triangle!

One absent increase has made this a totally different shape. Makes you think doesn’t it? What if you added an extra increase somewhere else, what would that do? What if you switched which side the centre increase was worked on, what would that do? What if …

Gotta go, my fingers are itching to cast on a new one. How about you?

Deb

Any Gauge patterns by Deb

Cabin Fever patterns and BOOKS

Deb on instagram