Braids made easy!

So, I just made the fabulous Bird-in-Hand Mittens. I loved this pattern and after I finished the first one, I wanted the second one immediately. However, once I cast-on for the second mitten, it lagged at only an inch long for like 3 days. Why you ask?

The knitted braid! On the first mitten, I did the braid twice and when I reached the third braid, I ended up doing a purl round instead. It’s just that every time I went do do one of those braids, it took me like an hour to make it around. Definitely fidly knitting.

So. There I was on my second mitten, contemplating how I can make the mittens match but get to the “fun” fair-isle parts of the mitten faster. Suddenly, I had it! A slipped line of crochet stitches. The best part is that you can join the braid seamlessly!

Here’s a tutorial:

First, you’ll want to have the line of stitches that you want your braid to be on top of. I marked that in my mittens with this little green string like this:

First, insert a crochet hook into the side of a stitch and pull up a loop. You’ll have one loop on your crochet hook.

Next, staying on the same LINE of stitches, insert your crochet hook through the fabric, one stitch over from where your current loop is coming from. Remember that one stitch has two legs to it.

Behind/underneath the fabric, hook the yarn.

Pull the yarn up through the fabric. You’ll have two loops on your crochet hook.

Lift the right most stitch over the stitch you just pulled up, and off the crochet hook (much like if you were binding off). It looks just like the braid does! And it’s so much quicker, especially once you get a rhythm going!

So how do you do the seamless join?

Well, once you get around, you’ll have one loop, right at the base of where you started.

Insert the tip of the crochet hook right into the heart of the first stitch that you made (in between the two legs).

Cut the yarn in the back (with about 6 inches left for working with) and pull the string up through the fabric so the end is now on the right side.

Now, you’ll basically be duplicate stitching to create the seamless look. Thread the yarn on a tapestry needle and pull it under the two legs of the stitch directly to the left of the stitch though which you pulled the yarn through the heart of.

Finally, put the yarn back through the “heart” that you pulled the working yarn up through.

Weave in the end and push and pull the yarn as necessary to even out your tension.

Voila! You have a seamless braid!

I hope this was helpful!

I’m honored to announce…

I had so much fun at my knitting group last night! We’re a fun bunch. Last night there was Elli, Leigh, Kalani, Huan-Hua, and Kathrina, all people who I would not know if it were not for knitting (I like being able to go and turn off my job, turn off schoolwork and turn off stress). It was great. I was working on my last bird-in-hand mitten and professing my love for the pair.

At one point, I was explaining how much I love them and that if it were possible, I would marry these mittens. Of course, someone mentioned how such ambiphilia (love having to do with mittens and gloves, a word I made up just now) was illegal in most states. *laugh. (I know, that was a bad joke.)

Then… I kept messing up the chart and the colorwork. I missed some increases on the thumb gusset, clearly because the company was so great. In expressing my frustration, I whined, as usual. I also exclaimed that obviously I had gotten married too soon. Then, in a bit of perfect comedic timing, Leigh piped in that we should have lived together first. It was funny. Probably in a way that only knitters can truly appreciate.

Anyway…

Another reason why I like having real live knitters to talk with is because we can be crazy together (like above). Last night, we talked about how sometimes, we stay up really late because we want to finish a project. Last night, I was seriously contemplating staying up to finish the mittens – particularly because I had an 8 am meeting that I knew would involve a freezing transport to and from. But I did the math and I would have had to stay up until like 3 am… and with an early meeting, that was just not a good idea.

So, I went to my meeting. And then I came back and had 2 hours before meeting number two. So I knitted on the mittens a bit and got to the last thumb. And then I came back and had 2.5 hours before an inservice training session thing. So I knit some more. I pretty much finished the pair! And I got to wear them to my inservice thing and brag to everyone. It was great. One girl even said that I could walk into American Eagle and buy them for like 20$ (she meant that as a compliment).

The Details:

Pattern: Bird in Hand Mittens, By Kate Gilbert.
Yarn: Cascade 220 in two colors carried by my LYS that matched my jacket.
Needles: (and therefore size) – 3 aluminum
Time to knit: First one didn’t really get fair amounts of work until about 1/10/07. While it is true that I started them before christmas, Christmas knitting and some test knitting prevented me from doing anything productive on them. The second one I finished in about 4 days.
Mods: I did the braids a little different on the second mitten (much easier in fact). Look for a tutorial later today or sometime tomorrow.

Again, I’m going to be posting a “helpful” post on these mittens next, so be sure to check it out! In the meantime, now that I have some mittens, I’m now back in the knitters club.

Brrrrrrr…rrrrrrr!

Isn’t funny how things repeat themselves?

If you’ll remember, last year, around this time, I was cold… and I only had one sock. Now it was a nice, warm, sock, but it was only one sock, nonetheless.

This weekend, the temperatures are supposed to drop into the single digits. And while I have a kicking, fantastic bag… I don’t have any mittens. I’m on probation in the “real knitters” club…. knitters are not allowed to have cold hands…

So, I’m working on some mittens. They’re pretty!

Isn’t it nice? No mom, you may not have them.

The pattern is the Bird in Hand Mittens from Kate Gilbert.

I’ve finished one mitten… now I need to hurry the H up and finish the other one! I’m feeling inspired by the array of mittens at Saartje Knits. I want a spread of mittens! Last night I stayed up a bit late perusing ravelry and queuing and favoriting a bunch of mitten patterns.

Here’s another photo…

Peak-a-Blue

This is definitely the MOST bad-ass thing I’ve ever knit. Check it out:

This was the first pattern in… the history of me knitting that was worth lining. If I was going to do this, I was going to do this right. And oh, how right it turned out! The knitting itself was pretty fun… the pattern grows in a real cool progression, so it’s a really fun knit. I had to re-knit the gusset (after going 1/2 way and realizing that the stitch count was supposed to increase a bit – oops!) and while it’s shorter than the pattern calls for, it’s perfectly functional. And check out the inside…

I love it, love it, love it. I’m going out to dinner tonight and I cannot wait to bring this and get tons of compliments! You’ll notice that this bag has a nice inside… and a zipper…

Yea, I bought a sewing machine. I know, I know, kind of an expensive impulse buy – but I had some extra christmas money and its one of those things that a crafter should have… and it’s the reason why I haven’t done the steeking thing (which is the one remaining knitting technique I haven’t done – that I can think of anyway).

I had some trouble with getting the sewing machine going. I kept getting the bobbin thread stuck. Luckily one of the RAs I work with has LOTS of experience with a sewing machine and since she owed me, she helped me out. I even sewed the zipper to the knit piece! I’m like a sewing fool now

I know you probably want some more details, but I wanted to give you another photo to drool at.

Pattern: Brea Bag a free pattern from Berroco
Designer: Norah Gaughan
Yarn: 2 hand dyed skeins of Lion Brand Lion Wool
Needles: US 7
Lining: An old skirt that I had from a few years ago
Strap: Thiefed from old Target handbag
Button: From the stash! yay for buttons!
Pattern Mods: The gusset was worked 1 stitch narrower and shorter than the pattern called for
Time: Cast-on Wednesday, Bind off and other finishing done by 4 am last night (yea, I know that was pretty late… I’ll pay for that later, I’m sure).

Want one more photo? OK!

…it’s like I’m nesting…

After knitting a TON of Christmas gifts for people (and looking at 2 other gifts I need to work on), I didn’t really want to do anything except knit stuff for myself. And since I have an apartment and all, I was feeling all domestic. See for your self. (By the way, these were all finished yesterday.)

First up, was a swiffer cozy – a la Green Mountain Mama.

I asked for a swiffer for Christmas specifically so that I could make this cozy. It has buttons! It’s environmentally friendly! It’s a twist on the Mason Dixon Ballband Dishcloth! It’s a recipe for success! I raveled it here….

The best part is that it works! Want proof?

The next thing I made was to solve a problem… when I wash dishes, I tend to get water everywhere. And by everywhere I mean… everywhere. The problem is that when my counter gets all full of water, it pools and then drains right at my feet. Obviously, this sucks. So, I had to make a rug!

Isn’t it great? Want to know how to make one of your very own?

1. Get a pair of US 19 circular needles in long (mine were 35 inches).
2. Collect a bunch of crap yarn that you don’t know what to do with (all feltable, no superwash for you) in colors that seem to go together.
3. Cast on 65 ish stitches.
4. Knit until you almost run out of yarn, then cast off.
5. Throw in the washing machine until desired size is reached.

Easy huh? I know! And look how great it turned out:

I’m really serious about the crap yarn part. Want to know what went in mine? (I had 6 strings going.)

• 3 balls of what remained of a sweater’s worth of brown Paton’s Merino Classic. (I broke it up to knit my dad some brown slippers for Christmas). This was the base – I had two strings of this in the blanket – but since I didn’t have 4 balls, which would have been ideal, that third ball was spun into 2 smaller balls with some random bits of other browns mixed in.
• A big skein of random bits of matching-ish crap tied together to stripe: 3 different partial balls of knitpicks browns, about 6 yards total of yellow (split into 3 different pieces), about 6 yards of orange, and 110 yards of black.
• a skein of knitpicks dye your own merino sock yarn – that I’d dyed into a variegated skein of blues.
• A skein of knitpicks shadow laceweight in a maroon color balled together with a skein of alpaca laceweight (also knitpicks) in an oatmeal color.
• A skein of Blackberry Ridge Woollen Mill lace weight (75% wool, 25% silk) in a green almost tweedy color. This was gifted to me by a secret pal…

I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. Next up, some curtain tiebacks. I was inspired by a pattern in Suss Cousin’s Home knits. As you can see, the ones in her book are super cute, and have a button!

So I was inspired to make my own… I used some Berrocco Suede and look what I came up with:

I’m thrilled with the results. I got exactly two out of one ball. I LOVE how they look. They’re all elegant and functional and …. perfect. I’m sure that I’ll be able to use them for a long time. And I think the button choice is perfect.

So look at that! Three items, for me, well, my apartment anyway. It’s almost like I’m nesting or something. Next up… a baby sweater!  NO… I’m not pregnant.  The baby sweater is for my boss. And the nesting thing is just cause they were things I needed.