Knitting-rosemaler

Rosemaling fit for a King?

2011-08-22T10:54:00.001-05:00

Specifically the King of Norway. I've been asked to paint a panel to by hung at Norway Hall in downtown Duluth. They are sprucing up for the King's visit. So I have been painting this for the King Of Norway. He is expected to visit Duluth on October 17th.

So here is my panel. It is one of 4 being done in different styles by 4 rosemalers in our local rosemaling society, The Twin Ports Rosemaling Society.

I think the colors are truer in this one, but the glare is worse. I wish I knew how to get rid of the glare when photographing rosemaling.

And here are a couple early photos that I took before it was finished.

My rosemaling teacher was originally chosen to do this panel in the Telemark style, but she is facing cataract surgery and called me a few weeks ago and asked me to do it. I was honored. Mine is certainly not as nice as what she would have done, but I hope it will brighten up the Norway hall.

Kauni effektgarn Thistle design and The Knit-a-Journey retreat

2011-02-04T11:09:00.001-06:00

January/February update:

I started on this sweater using Kauni effektgarn, which I bought in December at my local yarn shop. This yarn changes color from tan to beige to cream to off-white to grey and back to tan, with very long color repeats. I started with two balls of the same colorway, but started at different points in the gradual color change. This is the effect it gives. I have now bound off the shoulders and am cutting the steeks for a v-neck and armholes. This yarn is very "sticky" so I'm probably not going to sew the armhole steeks. I am picking up around the neck opening to do a corrugated border around the rib v-neck. I'll try to post some more pictures as I make more progress.

The bits of maroon yarn are the scrap yarn that I put the bound-off stitches onto at the base of the armhole (13) and v-neck. The pattern said to bind off 4 for the v-neck and when picking them up do a K2tog and ssk with those 4 stitches. But the design has a center stitch, so I thought it would be one stitch off if I did that. I think maybe I should have done 5 or 1, but I did 3. So in picking those up, I tried to fix it so the center stitch is on top and I did a dec 2 putting the other two behind it. If it looks odd, I'll take it out and try something else. I often have to redo the necklines of my sweaters (see many previous posts). So that's where I am with my knitting now.

Adding one more picture after finishing the neck opening and cutting open the armholes. It looks so much better this way.

In January I helped host a retreat for listeners of Susan Dolph's Knit a journey podcast. Three knitters from the Twin Cities area and one from Tennessee came for the weekend. Most of them stayed at a lovely Victorian B&B about 1 mile from here. I had them over here for supper Saturday and Sunday evenings. We went for a hike in Hartley Park on a very cold, but sunny day. We visited two local yarn shops, we played games and sat and knitted and chatted. It was a lovely weekend.

Here are a few photos from that weekend:

Breakfast at the inn, listening to the owner recount the history of the Mathew Burrows Inn.

Atop Rock Knob in Hartley Park on a day when it was 5°F. Betsy, Allison, Laurie, Susan.

A dessert that looks like it has raw wool on top, but it was spun sugar.

Sitting around the fire knitting at the inn.

Sitting up in the third floor sitting area of the inn. Me, Betsy, Lisa, Susan, Allison.

Lisa, Susan and Betsy on the shore of Lake Superior.

2011 is here!

2011-01-07T10:03:00.001-06:00

I didn't keep up with this blog last year, in part because I really did do more painting. I also kept knitting and spent more time outdoors as long as the weather was nice. Now that it is in the single digits outside (-15 to -20C for those not in the US) it's just too cold to be out more than I have to.

Here are two pictures of my living room decorated for Christmas. I tried to come up with something different this year for the mantel.

Here's a close-up. I made some of those paper trees for my dining room table and then decided to do some more for the mantel, because I really liked how they turned out and they were so easy!

For the first time, I knitted some Christmas gifts - 4 hats and some fingerless gloves. And I did some rosemaled plates for Christmas too.

Here are a few of the items I painted last fall.

And here is the sweater I finished last fall. It is made from Bergere de France yarn that I bought in Falaise, Normandy, when we were there in May. Pictures from that trip are on my website.

There, that wasn't so hard and didn't take too long. Maybe I'll try to keep this up better this year. (This would be more likely if I got comments from those reading it.)

I did do a better job of keeping up my travel blog last year, which is linked at the top of this one.

Happy New Year to all who are reading this!

I hope 2011 is an exceptionally wonderful year for you!

Some more rosemaling

2010-06-15T10:56:00.002-05:00

Here are a few sketches I did last spring in class.

These two are basically the same design, but with different colors.

And then the mangletre that I painted in the class I took last week.

I really had no idea that I was painting in the same colors as the sketch I had done in class 3 months ago. I have a place to hang this at home next to the cupboard where I keep my iron. Do you know what a mangletre is? It's Norwegian.

Summer update

2010-06-08T16:45:00.004-05:00

While I didn't resolve to blog more often this year, I had planned to try to write a new entry every month, but that hasn't happened. It's been an unusual year with my mother passing away in February and lots of travel.

I have been knitting, though and did finish the Knit Picks kit that is pictured above. It is one of Knit Picks "historical" sweaters. The inspiration for the design comes from traditional Norwegian sweaters, but my Setesdal below is actually much more like the traditional sweater. Still I think it's a nice-looking sweater. I made a few changes, but nothing major. I've worn it once or twice, but it is a pretty heavy wool, so I don't expect to wear it again until next fall.

There's more information about this one on my Ravelry project page if you want to know more.

I have been to Taiwan and Normandy, France in the past two months. There are pictures from Taiwan on my travel blog, (link above on right) and the Normandy pictures can be found here.

I'm currently working on a lace shawl, but did buy some yarn in Falaise, Normandy, France for another Norwegian-style sweater.

That's my June update.

The Setesdal is finished.

2010-03-04T17:16:00.004-06:00

I have had a lot of stuff happen in my family this past two months. But things are settling down again and I'm knitting again. I finished the black and white Setesdal-style sweater.

It was warm enough out on our deck to sit out here yesterday. This is where I did the picking up of stitches for the placket. The light here was great. Then I knitted the placket and started on the collar. I finished up weaving in the ends and tacking down the inner facings today and wore the sweater to my yarn shop. I prefer taking pictures outside, so took this when I got home again.

And I have started a new one. This one is a kit by KnitPicks. I bought it because the price was right and I liked the sweater. So far I have one cuff and half the sleeve done. Doing these one after another is helping me hone my skills and remember the things I did wrong the last time.

Here is the cuff and sleeve so far. Well, actually it's a little longer than this, as I took this yesterday morning.

That's it for this time.

Setesdal pullover and some doodling with paint

2010-02-05T10:38:00.003-06:00

I'm going to try to update this blog once a month. So here goes for February.

KNITTING

I started a Norwegian style pullover early in January. My knitting group at my local yarn store decided to all do Norwegian sweaters starting in January. Since this fits right in with my resolution for 2010, I thought this was a good time to start a Setesdal style sweater. I've wanted to do one of these for a long time, but was waiting until I felt my 2-color knitting was up to the task.

Here is what I have of it so far. It's going pretty quickly. I'm sticking to the very simple, basic Norwegian shaping, which is very little. More modern Norwegian and Dale designed sweaters are much more complicated than this, but I decided to see how this would go with very little structure. I'm not adding steek stitches, but will cut at the sides for the armholes and at the neck for the neck opening. It will have a placket.

This is the body and lower part of the sleeve. I'm ready to start the patterning at the top of the sleeve. I pulled designs from Setesdal Sweaters, by Annemor Sundbo, and made up my own pattern from there. The traditional Setesdal sweaters, which are named after the valley of Setes in Norway, were worn by men and had embroidered wool fabric cuffs and plackets. I'm not going to do the wool fabric. I want this to be a comfortable everyday sweater to wear in the Duluth winters. There is some more information on my Ravelry page.

ROSEMALING

I signed up for another class in Rosemaling. It meets one day a week for 8 weeks. It started yesterday. I didn't have a project to work on, so spent the time doodling on paper. Here is what I did.

And here:

I was just trying to get back into the feel of handling the brushes and thinking about my designs. I practiced with a round brush, a filbert and a liner.

New Year's Resolutions

2010-01-07T15:03:00.003-06:00

I actually made some New Year's Resolutions this year. I don't do this every year, but when I have done it I've been pretty good about accomplishing those resolutions. So in 2010 I resolve to:

1.) Become more proficient at two-color/Fair Isle /Nordic knitting. This means that I will continue to practice these techniques. When I finish one project I'll start another 2-color project. Always before when I finish one, I decide to do something different like cables and then much later go back to two-color knitting. I think by doing it this way I'm not getting much better. I also think one way to improve my stitches is to stop and rest my fingers frequently.

2.) Complete some rosemaling project every month. If I can't get a plate or bowl or something done I'll try to finish 4 ornaments or small things. This way by next Christmas I'll have some ornaments to give away.

3.) Get more exercise--hopefully some every day. I haven't come up with a specific goal for this one, so I don't know how well this will work out. I got lots of exercise yesterday in the house going up and down the stairs. I was cleaning, doing wash, working on the computer and doing the stairs a lot. I was exhausted by dinner time. This is why I need to get more exercise every day--so I don't get exhausted.

I'm not going to resolve to be a better blogger, because if I do the other things something might have to go and it might end up being the blogging. But on the other hand I might have more to blog about, so maybe I'll keep it up better than before.

I have started my first Nordic sweater of the year, but there's very little to show so far.

Instead I'm going to post some belated Christmas pictures. I put the tree in a new location this year and my two nieces Nina and Laura were here to help decorate it and I think it is one of the prettiest trees I've had, so here are a few pictures of Christmas at my house this year.

And here's my dining room table.

Alpaca raglan sweater and a new plate

2009-12-07T14:05:00.003-06:00

I've been both knitting and rosemaling this month. Someone asked me to paint a plate for his wife for Christmas. I agreed with some reservations, but the plate is finished and I'm glad I did it. It didn't take as long as I thought it would and it got me back into rosemaling again, before I put the paints away for the holidays. It was good to get that table cleared off finally this morning.

So first, here is the current state of the Alpaca sweater.

I bought several skeins of Alpaca in April 2008. The seller had a lovely scarf done in grey, tan and natural. I wanted to use those colors, but for some reason I bought black, two shades of grey, 2 shades of brown and the tan and natural. Then the next year I bought some more, because I didn't think I had enough to do a complete sweater and it was too much for a scarf and hat. (These are undyed. They are the color of the animal.)

I did a gauge swatch last year thinking I might use it for the Ivy League vest, but decided not to. When I started again this fall, I did another gauge swatch, and this time tried a color pattern I found in a book by Alice Starmore. I liked that, so started the sweater out that way. The part that is below the armholes is the pattern from her book with a wider area of natural. But at that point I realized I didn't have enough of those colors to finish the sweater and would have to incorporate at least one more color. So I added in the brownish-grey. At this point I used the construction method of the Dale of Norway Sapporo raglan sweater that I did a few years ago. I liked how easily that one went together and it is comfortable. It's a bit tricky getting the first rows and the decreases going right, so it's easier if the pattern is simple-thus the plain stripes. Now I am hoping I'll have enough of the light tan/beige to finish the yoke. If I do it will be just plain from here on. If I have to add in another color--well I'll cross that bridge when I get there-if I have to.

And second, here is the plate I just painted. It's 18", so one of the biggest I've done. I needed to talk to my teacher about pricing and discovered Friday that she was teaching that day, so I went in to the class. I've missed several classes over the years I've taken from her and she has always said I could make them up any time, so I knew it would be okay to show up for the last class of the year.

It was helpful to have her advice for finishing the plate and she also helped with some of the outer linework. I really need to practice that more, so I can do it myself. I'm going to make a New Year's resolution to paint more next year. The design in this plate is inspired by one by Marlys Hammer, from whom I took a class last year.

This is probably my last post here before the holidays.

So Happy Holidays to all!!

See you in 2010! We are going to have to think when we write the date next year and stop before we put 2 zeros down. I'll bet most people will be writing 200 and then squeezing a 1 in between the 00's.

I went to Angora

2009-11-17T10:01:00.004-06:00

Clearly, the process we started in Michael's back yard is going to take a very long time to produce wearable results. (See previous post)

So I decided to go to the source and skip the part where I do it myself. I went to Angora. You may or may not be aware that Angora is the old name for Ankara, the capital of Turkey. The Angora goats, cats and rabbits all originally came from this part of Turkey.

I went there with my husband and have some pictures I plan to put on the web, but that part hasn't been done yet. You can see some of them on my other blog. Ceci's Travel blog

Our hostess took us to a village about an hour and a half outside of Ankara. It's called Bey Pazari and resembles an Alpine village. We did lots of shopping there buying things made right there in the shops by the people selling them. I took pictures and even a video of weavers operating looms. We also saw hand-made jewelry. And in one shop there were some dolls. Since I collect dolls I had to take a look and bought one more. This one is helping to wind a ball of yarn from a skein of Angora. I think she needs a partner. She is wearing a shalwar, a loose fitting baggy pant. I was told this was a traditional costume and later saw some women demonstrating in a restaurant wearing this type of garment.

And in the same shop I found this beautiful shawl made of Angora.

It's not knitted, but I'm not sure what the technique is. I need to do some research.

And I finished the sweater that I started in September.

This was a free Ravelry download. It's called Mystique and was written by Patrizia Steadman. I had to shorten the sleeves, as I would have run out of yarn, but I think the shorter sleeves work fine with this sweater, which is designed to be worn by itself.

The blind leading the blind

2009-10-07T11:16:00.003-05:00

If you have come here looking either for information about the visually impaired, or about washing fleece, go back to your search results. This site won't help you with either one.

Truly none of us knew what we were doing. We are competent knitters who have never processed fleece before. We meet every Tuesday for knitting and fun. This Tuesday we had been "invited" by one of our members, Michael to partake in the fun of washing some fleece. Most of us had never even seen raw fleece before. Some years before Michael had acquired two Angora goats, who live in Montana and are tended by her nephew. Once or twice a year she gets the fleece from the two goats "Scruffy" and "Mr. Clean." We were soon to learn how they got their names. Though I'm not so sure about Mr. Clean.

After a some fortifying coffee and yummy home-made cinnamon rolls we headed out to the back yard to get started. We were met there by piles and bags of dirty fleece.

Here's a close-up. Lovely, hunh?

Michael's husband had set things up for us. (We were told he had to work that day. Likely story!)

We donned gloves and started by pulling the vegetable matter out of the fleece. This was a bit tedious. We threw piles of matted fleece in the trash bin, thinking it was beyond hopeless. Here Iris, Jody and Ann are diligently working at the piles of fleece.

When we had a pile ready, we put it in a bin and added hot water and a squirt of soap.

After a measured (not) amount of soaking Michael and Jody dumped it out on the grass, thus assuring a soggy wet spot in the middle of the yard.

Can you tell from the photo above who is the smartest in the group? Yeah the one who knew to wear rubber boots. On the other hand perhaps it is me. I had the foresight to bring a camera and designate myself the official photographer, thus keeping a safe distance from the mud.

Second or third washing. It's getting cleaner.

Half an hour and more washings later. Still cleaner.

Add another 2 Tablespoons of soap, Iris. Perfect!

Ann and me, transferring the fleece to a clean bin. "Hey give me back my camera!" By this time we had several bins going. We had decided to skip the first tedious step and just throw the unpicked fleece in the hot water.

At this point someone suggested we should let it soak longer.

Time for lunch!

Now we are in familiar territory.

Michael knows how to cook and the rest of us knew just what to do with her lovely buffet.

Squash bisque, grapes, chicken salad, croissants, cheese, crackers and tapenade. (Now you know why we agreed to do this.)

All too soon, it was time to return to the fleece.

When it looked like this we decided it was done.

Here is what the first batch looked like spread out on a screen to dry.

We had several batches going by this time. Michael spinning the fleece before setting it out to dry.

Michael and Jody are pleased with the day's accomplishment.

Would you have thought it would come out this white?

Michael's husband showed up later, no doubt feeling guilty about having been "at work" all day and set up some window screens because the one we had set up wasn't anywhere near enough space.

And for comparison, this is what we started with. Actually this is one of the piles we didn't process. Michael is already planning another "luncheon" for next spring.

Michael and Jody carded some of the cleaned fleece and they say it is beautiful. I don't have pictures, so you'll just have to take their word for it. I'm interested in finding out how it spins up, because I came home and looked up websites that gave detailed instructions and exact temperatures necessary to process Angora. It sounded very complicated and I doubt I would have had the confidence to try if I'd read those first. So--I hope to have an update some day on what happens to this fleece next.

And Michael, check with me before you schedule the next "luncheon." I want to be there. I'll bring my camera again.

Three more finished projects and a new one.

2009-09-28T15:54:00.003-05:00

I think I need to come up with better titles for my posts--next time.

So it's been a busy month. I've been working on a number of things, but I do have some photos of finished knitting projects, so I'll start with those.

Here's a shawl I started in Indiana in July. Jim dropped me off in West Lafayette at my mom's after the family reunion and drove home. I forgot to get my knitting bag out of his car, so had to buy a new project. I bought this at River Knits, the yarn shop in Lafayette. The repetitive nature of this pattern made it a good one for traveling.

Then I picked up this twisted rib and cable pullover that I had started last winter and put aside for most of the summer. I had the back and sleeves done, so did the front and put it together and here it is.

It hasn't been cool enough to wear it yet. We've had a very pleasant and warmer than normal month of September. Today it is cooling off though, so perhaps soon. I did wear the shawl once.

And this one is finally almost finished. I am putting on the 5 coats of polyurethane now. I'm using the same stuff we used on our floor earlier in the year. I did the border and then "antiqued" it by wiping a little yellow ochre all over it. I'm pretty happy with how this turned out and am trying to decide where I can use it.

And I am currently working on a new pullover using yarn I bought in St. Paul in April. I got 8 balls of this Sublime on sale at Borealis Yarns. It is so soft. It's merino and silk, I think. I should check that I guess. I just love working with this yarn. This pattern is going very quickly. I now have 7 1/2 diamonds finished, but I took the picture a few days ago when it wasn't so far along. It will have long sleeves.

It's a top-down design (obviously). I found the free pattern on Ravelry. It has a little lace pattern at the side seams and the diamonds down the center. The rest is a 3 X 1 rib. The lace designs break up the monotony of the rib. I do the rib for a bit, then pay attention and do the lace pattern, then more rib, etc. It makes the rows seem to go by quickly. Also this is the first time in a long time that I have worked with yarn this heavy. It's a DK weight, which is a bit heavier than the sport wt, that I did the twisted cable sweater in. Although I think all of these were done on #6 needles.

You can find more details about these projects on my Ravelry projects pages.

I have also completed a sock, but since it's only one, it doesn't count as a finished project.

We are headed to Ghana October 20, so I may update my travel blog next with photos from Africa!

Well, that's my September update.

Oh wait, I was at our Scandinavian Fest on Saturday. I wore the merging colors vest and got lots of compliments on it, which was nice. But One woman looked at my nametag and recognized me from Ravelry!! That's the first time that has happened. I know people in real life who are also on Ravelry, but this is the first time anyone at a non-knitting event recognized my name (and possibly the vest) as someone she'd seen on Ravelry.

Gauge Swatching

2009-08-27T12:46:00.003-05:00

I almost always make a gauge swatch. There are several different reasons that I do this, which I thought I would share here.

Sometimes I buy yarn without a specific project in mind. The yarn in this first swatch is some I purchased in Osaka. It was inexpensive and I like finer yarns. I thought I'd make myself a one-color sweater out of it. After getting home I started looking for patterns for sweaters using finer yarn. I didn't find a large selection, but did think that some of the ones in Ann McCauley's book, Together or Separate would work. So I bought the book, which I knew I liked and tried swatching the yarn for one of the sweaters. The twisted cable stitch was the pattern I thought would work. But it didn't. I'm not sure if it shows well in the photo, but the yarn was just too fine and hard for this stitch. I try to remember to add tags to my swatches so that when I go back to them later I will know what size needle I used.

I gave up and tried adding the teal yarn, which I had on hand and tried a stitch motif from another book. This I liked much better and so I kept looking for more 2 and 3-color patterns that I thought would work with this yarn and ended up designing my own sweater, which I blogged about earlier, so that's all I'm going to say about that here.

This next swatch is made from the yarn that was recommended in Ann McCauley's book for that twisted-rib sweater. It's Nature Spun sport. I made a swatch with that yarn to check the gauge, but also to practice the pattern. I'd never done the twisted or Bavarian rib stitch before and I wanted to get the hang of it before casting on for the sweater. I started with a #5 needle as called for in the pattern, but switched to a #6, because it was coming out a little small. After doing the sleeves I am still afraid they are coming out too small, but it's a rib stitch so will stretch. Maybe it will be okay. I haven't finished the sweater yet. This is in my Ravelry projects page.

The next photo shows two swatches made from the same ball, but in different patterns. I decided to do the Voyager Lace stole as a KAL and thought I'd use this yarn, but was not happy with the result, so I used the Louisa Harding cotton that I had on hand as well. That turned out nicely. This yarn was just too fine for that project. Then I did a swatch for an Estonian Lace stole. I may go back to that one some day. When I swatch for a shawl or stole it is more to practice the pattern than for the size, which doesn't matter much. It is helpful to me if the author gives a practice motif for a swatch.

The following swatch is made from the Louisa Harding cotton, that I ended up using for the stole. I think there is a photo of that one further back in the blog. I was much happier with the stitch in this yarn. I also undid the provisional cast-on (the blue yarn above) and worked the picot edging--again for practice as that was another technique I had never done before. This one is also in my

Ravelry projects.

This next swatch was done for the Ivy League Vest I made from a pattern by Eunny Jang. This time I was working on checking the gauge, but also working out what colors I wanted. I had a grey in there, that I think doesn't show in the swatch, because it was actually stitched over. All the balls looked nice together, but in the stitch pattern, I didn't like the grey with the other colors, so changed it to a different color--more of a taupe-brown, which shows up on the right side of this photo.

My vest on Ravelry.

And I have one more that is still unfinished. I am trying to decide what to do with this yarn. It is a cotton-Filatura di Crossa. I was planning to make a summer short-sleeved sweater for this summer, but the summer is gone and I haven't gotten around to it yet. I played around with patterns to see what would show up in this yarn. I also played around with knitting back wards on a small section of it, so that's the reason it has that separate 1" section.

And finally I have one I did years ago. I had bought this blue and white cotton yarn, which I think was a kit, in Holland. But when I got home and tried the motif in a swatch, it just didn't work for me. The single column of white stitches forming the stem got swallowed up by the blue. I then tried to see if I could do them by duplicate stitch, but didn't like that either. The whole thing is lumpy. I chose a different pattern for that yarn and made a completely different sweater with larger blocks of color.

So for me there are lots of reasons beside checking gauge to make a gauge swatch. Sometimes it's just fun to play with a new yarn even though I'm not ready to cast on for an actual project yet. You can also use the swatch to find out if you will have enough yarn to complete a project, but I haven't used one in that way yet. I do use them to check how the finished fabric will behave in the washer.

Boy that was wordy for me! The next post will be shorter, I promise.

I finished the vest and finally have photos

2009-08-18T11:05:00.003-05:00

This is going to be a short update with pictures of the finished Strickwear, merging colors vest.

It was cool enough today to wear a turtle-neck and wool vest out on the deck. I don't have a shirt that is exactly the right color for this vest. Here's the back.

And behind me, you can see our newly painted deck railing. Last fall we had the flooring replaced and this summer we sanded and painted the railing ourselves. I really like the new look.

That's it for today, but I am thinking about doing a post on gauge swatches. My thoughts on an already much-discussed topic.

Two nearly FO's -- One Rosemaling!

2009-06-29T10:35:00.005-05:00

I attended a two-day class in rosemaling taught by VGM Irene Lamont of Eau Claire, WI. last Thursday and Friday. I practiced for several days before the class, because I hadn't done any rosemaling since last summer or fall.

I have a couple photos of my unfinished floorcloth. I painted it in oils, which is the first time I've ever painted in oils. I have done all my rosemaling in acrylics before this. It was a little hard getting the paint to work on the canvas and it was an adjustment for me getting used to working in oils. I can't say now that I like them better than acrylics, but I can see that for some applications and styles they would work better. With more practice I could get used to them.

Here is what the floor cloth looks like now. After it is thoroughly dry I'll "antique" it and paint a border.

And the other nearly Finished Object is my merging colors Strickwear vest. I have completed the 4 pieces. They just need to be seamed together and then a border knit on the neck and bottom edges. I'm amazed at how the two backs came out the same size even though one is knit on the diagonal. This pattern is well written.

Okay, I have to pack now. We leave Wednesday for our trip to Indiana , Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. These two projects will sit until I get back mid-July.

Update for the start of summer

2009-06-19T14:36:00.003-05:00

I should be updating my travel blog, as I have done so much traveling and have so many pictures, but it is just for that reason that that seems so daunting a task and I am trying to find time for my home hobbies, now, so here's an update on those.

First, Knitting: I have three pieces done of the Bavarian twisted rib cable sweater, by Ann McCauley, that I started last winter after finishing the Nordic one.

I got kind of tired of doing these two cable patterns over and over, so put it down and picked up the Merging colors vest designed by Candace Eisner Strick. I bought this kit in 2008, then spent hours and months winding the yarn by hand. You need 4 balls of each of the 4 colors. Here are two pictures, one of the yarn and pictures of the design and one of what I have done now. This is going fairly quickly, even though I do have to stop every 2 to 4 rows and change the color of one of the strands. It seems to be coming out the right size and the front and back that I've done seem to match up where they should even though one is done on the diagonal.

I took this photo when I thought I had enough yarn balled. I thought I needed 3 balls of each color. When I got ready to start on the vest, I realized I needed 4 of each color, so had to go back to balling more.

The vest so far:

You carry 4 strands together and knit with a size 6 or 7 needle. The weight of the 4 strands is close to worsted weight. You change the color strands one at a time to get the gradual change from aqua to purple.

Gardening:

I spent several days after I got home from Poland, Rome, Boston, Washington DC etc. working in my back yard garden. I even planted some tomatoes, lettuce, radishes and beans this year. This is an experiment. I don't know if they'll get enough sun to do well, but I am trying them this year. We'll see how it goes. The lettuce and radishes are just up. I saw them this morning.

This is taken from the deck looking down on the back yard. We had the pavers put in for the driveway beyond the black fence and arbor last fall. the boxes on the right next to the garage are filled with new topsoil and that's where I planted the vegetables. They only get sun until about noon, which may not be enough.

And here are the tomato plants, the day I put them in. The lettuce and radishes are in front of them.

And finally here is one of the pots on the front porch.

I got out my paints yesterday and did some practicing. I was going to put something in here about the rosemaling, but I don't think I will afterall, as this is already long. I am taking a class next week, so I'll update then-maybe. :-)

I finished the sweater

2009-04-04T12:12:00.001-05:00

And here's the back:

New button band is much better

2009-03-31T08:31:00.003-05:00

See how much better the second one is? Now I just have to buy buttons, decide where to put them and how to do the button holes and work the second band.

Unfortunately my plans to do that today may be affected by the blizzard we are having. March is living up to its reputation of going out like a lion. We could hardly have asked for more difficult, wintry weather today. It would be a good day to stay in and knit, if only I had the buttons I need.

Button bands are always tricky

2009-03-30T10:26:00.001-05:00

At least for me. I can never get them right the first time. I usually expect I will have to rip out the first attempt. I did this yesterday and then ripped it out last night.

You can see that it is a little too long. I measured the front of the sweater. It was 20". My gauge is 8 st/inch, so I picked up 160 stitches along the front. (Oh yeah I cut it down the middle first.) I thought I wanted some pattern in the band, but after trying it on, decided I don't. It detracts from the other patterns. In rosemaling you learn that a border should complement but not overwhelm or detract from the main pattern. I think this is detracting, so the new one will either be plain or have just a little white in it. I picked up 144 stitches the second time. Hopefully that will be the right size. I do the side without button holes first for obvious reasons. (Remember the photo is backwards, since it is taken in a mirror.)

I also decided to do the front bands before the collar.

And in case you want to see what else I am working on, here are pictures of the project we've just completed in our house. Hallway renovation

Working on the collar

2009-03-25T09:27:00.001-05:00

I've never done a collar like this on a full-size garment. I have done them only on doll sweaters. I did this much in the car on the way down to Indiana from Duluth, but when I tried it on, it was all wrong--way too wide.

So I ripped it out; went back to where I started the bound off stitches for the front neck opening, because I didn't like how the decreases looked and went higher than I did before, but it still looked too big on the needles. so I knitted one more row around adding decreases in the front and back (k2, k2tog around the back and shoulders). Then I bound it off rather tightly. Since it will be a cardigan that wasn't going to be a problem. I tried it on and now I think the neck opening is the right size, so I'll knit the collar separately and sew it on.

The yoke is taking forever.

2009-03-09T09:06:00.001-05:00

I'm not sure why but this step seems to be going very slowly.

I don't have a plan yet for the collar. But since this is going so slowly, I guess I have plenty of time. I keep thinking it's too big around the opening, but when I lay it out like this it looks okay.

So that's where I am now.

Ready to join up

2009-03-02T14:23:00.001-06:00

...the pieces, that is. I have reached the point where the 3 pieces will be joined and become one. The advantage to doing it this way is when I am done there will be very little seaming up. I have another raglan sleeve cardigan that was done in 5 pieces and then sewn together. The tops of the sleeves didn't match the top of the body, so I had to rework the back and the top of at least one sleeve. The next raglan I did was the Sapporo ski sweater designed for the Norwegian ski team in Sapporo. That one was joined at the underarms and done in one piece from there up. It's a little tricky just where you join them up as there are lots of stitches and it's tight under the arms, but as you go it becomes easier. I just need to figure out how often to do the decreases, so that I have a neck the right size when I reach that point.

So here are the pieces. The right sleeve actually needs a few more rows. I stopped because I thought it might be getting too long, but have decided that the left one is just right, so I'll make the right match it and then join them up.

You can see the steek in this picture, which is of the front of the sweater. It's kind of messy looking, but none of that will show when it's finished. This way the 'jog' you get when you knit in the round is cut out and completely gone when you finish the sweater.

I haven't decided yet if this will get buttons with button holes, or with loops or clasps. I think they will be pewter, but I'm open to suggestions.

Finished the boring "lice" pattern

2009-02-26T15:19:00.002-06:00

I worked on this some while I was traveling and got far enough that I can start on the big pattern. I have a few rows done. I revised it a bit. I'll put the new pattern in here. It's been fun to do. This is 1/4 of the pattern, so it gets repeated back and forth 4 times on each row.

And here's a picture of what I have so far of the body. This shows the center back as that looks better than the center front, which has a steek and will be cut later.

One sleeve done

2009-02-04T09:24:00.001-06:00

So I frogged the border back to where I'd made the mistake and reknit with the sport weight yarn. Then I did the first sleeve. The sleeves and body will be joined at the yoke and worked together from that point. I am working now on the second sleeve. I did get the fingering weight yarn, which I may use in the next pattern part, but for now I like how this yarn is turning out and don't want to change anything yet. I'll have to experiment with both yarns to see which works better for the next part.

Here's what I have this morning. I'm rather pleased that the two sleeve hems look so similar. I don't always get the sleeves matching. (Note to other knitters: No one ever notices these things if you don't point them out.)

And now I am going to go paint my hallway.

Ripping back already

2009-01-28T12:00:00.001-06:00

I'm already going to have to rip back much of what I knitted last night.

Here's what it looks like now before the ripping begins.

I waited 2 weeks for the white yarn. It came in yesterday while I was in the yarn shop. I bought it and started using it right away. I didn't look carefully enough at the label to make sure it was the right weight. Even when I felt it was a bit heavier than the other yarn, I still thought it was just due to a variation in the yarn. Later after I had knit many rows I looked at the label and saw that it was sport weight and I had wanted fingering. Grrr. But that's not the worst of the problems and is not the reason I'm going to rip back.

I also messed up the pattern. We were watching TV last night and I was happily knitting away on the 3-color pattern. It was going pretty well for a 3-color pattern and I was making good progress. Then suddenly I noticed that I had shifted the pattern at the point where I started with the 3rd color. I think if you scroll down to my gauge swatch 2 posts earlier, you will be able to see that this is not coming out right. I considered just changing the pattern, but I don't like it as well, so I'm going to redo it. It's less than an evening's work, so very small in terms of the whole sweater. And if I don't do it, I'll always be unhappy with how this border looks. That's why you rip out, so you don't wish later that you had.

Well that's it for today. I need to go back up to the shop and get the right yarn. I hope she has it. I'd better call first. Fortunately it's less than a mile away, but I don't have other errands I need to do today, so wasn't planning on going out at all.

_________________________________________________________

Well, I'm editing this to add that after I called I found out they did not get the fingering weight in. Now I have to decide if I'm going to rip back and try again with this yarn, which was working pretty well, or rip back and put it aside again until I hear that they have the right weight in.

I have a design for the rest of the sweater

2009-01-15T16:35:00.001-06:00

I knit the cuff of the second sleeve--started it last night and finished up this morning. Since I had to stop at that point, because the next row should have the white color in it, which is the color I am waiting for, I decided to spend some time designing the rest of it.

I went on-line and found a free demo of the Sweater Wizard. I really wasn't sure what that program would do, so thought this would be a good way to test it out to see if I do want to buy it. So I down-loaded the free demo and entered the numbers for my size, stitch and row gauge and needle. I think the program did fine printing diagrams and stitch numbers. I could have calculated the stitch numbers required just as easily myself. What is harder is to get the decreases for the raglan sleeve and upper body. Unfortunately the program gave me different numbers for the decreases on the sleeve and the yoke and I want to join all the pieces at the underarm and work the yoke in the round as one piece, so I want the decreases on both pieces to match up. I will have to figure that part out I guess. I will also work the body in one piece in the round with a steek for cutting down the middle to make it a cardigan.

I used my stitch and Motif maker (it's linked in the previous entry) to come up with some designs.

Here's what I am working with at least for now. I may tweak them before I actually get to that part of the sweater.

This is the 2-color border that will go in the sleeve and around the hem of the body and maybe in the yoke.

This one I took from a Gjestal pattern that I have.

And this is the main pattern that will go around the body just below where the sleeves are joined.

And here is the next pattern that will go on the yoke above where the sleeves are joined. Does it look wavy to you? It's an optical illusion.

I used the dark blue to represent the teal color yarn I am working with.

The star pattern that will go in the center back and front, I took from Alice Starmore's Book of Fair Isle Knitting. The rest of that one I made up. It may be too irregular, but it will be a bit like knitting complicated lace patterns where you have to watch each stitch. It's only for 27 rows, so I think it won't be too tedious.

Anyway that's where I am with this sweater now.

Designing a Sweater for Fingering Wt. Yarn

2009-01-14T14:56:00.003-06:00

I've been knitting some things, but just haven't felt it was of enough interest to post here on the blog. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to keep doing this. It just doesn't seem to be my thing. I need feed back. If there are only 2 people reading this then it's not worth my time.

I bought this Diaketo Diagold yarn in Osaka nearly 2 years ago with the idea of making myself a sweater from it. I've looked for patterns using fine yarns, but not found much. I bought a book by Ann McCauley. I like the book a lot and will definitely make a sweater or more from it. The book is Together or Separate. But I tried doing a gauge swatch for one of the patterns that had a similar gauge to this yarn and it just wasn't working. I decided this yarn needed to be used with another color. I had this other teal colored yarn that was also a hand-wash wool. I thought the 2 would work together.

This photo is my gauge swatch. I have only one skein of the teal (300 yds), so I thought I could also add in some white, which I would have to buy, but that didn't seem to pose a big problem.

The lower pattern above came from a book on Setesdal sweaters

Setesdal Sweaters: The History of the Norwegian Lice Pattern

by Annemor Sundbø

and I used another pattern from a pattern booklet I have, which I bought in Norway. It was published by Gjestdal.

I worked that pattern with 3 instead of 4 colors in my swatch:

I was happy with that, so decided the sleeve cuff would be these two patterns. I cast on 72 stitches for a sleeve on #2 needles and did the 2-color part. I ordered the white yarn, but it will be a couple weeks before it comes in, so I will put this sleeve on a holder and start the second one and then wait till the white yarn comes in. In the mean time it would be good to design the rest of the sweater.

The sleeve so far:

Here's how the sleeve cuff would look with the facing turned under:

And that's really as much as I have now. I'm up to the part where I need the white on this one.

I think the body of the sleeve above the 3-color border will be done in a lice stitch with the white. There will probably be another border near the top and I'm thinking of joining the sleeves to the body and using a raglan construction.

I have the Stitch & Motif Maker software, which I use to print up the design for the color work. I'd love to have a sweater design program, but I think those are a lot more expensive and for as much as I would use it, I'm not sure it's worth it to me. I just do this for myself.

Any questions? comments?

I've been tagged

2008-10-20T13:53:00.011-05:00

I was tagged by knittingchick. The rules state I’m to list 6 (or 7?) quirky facts about myself. I did that once before and can’t think of 6 (or7?) new things to say, so instead I’m going to list 6 (or7) quirky things I collect. So here they are in random order.

1) Polish pottery. This is the traditional Bolesławiec pottery made in Silesia, southern Poland. The factory is not far from Wrocław, which I have visited several times, but I’ve never been to the factory. It’s abut 50 miles outside the town, I think. I used to buy the mugs one or two at a time from the department store on the square in Wrocław. The last time I was there, they didn't have much, but they are becoming popular in this country. The thing is now they are much more expensive.

2) Tin boxes. I just acquired these without really looking for them. A couple were gifts and some I picked up from my mother’s or grandmother’s stuff and I’m not even sure where the others are from. I keep sewing notions in some of them, but since there is no logical reason to keep any item in any particular box, I never know which one contains what and have to open several to find what I’m looking for. I use some in the kitchen too and for those I do know what they contain.

3) Art refrigerator magnets. We have been buying these in art museums. We only buy pictures of paintings we have seen in the museum. We have a bunch of VerMeers and lots of other artists too. They come from many different museums. They are mixed in with tile motif magnets as well. I’d separate them, but we only have one refrigerator.

4) Cups and saucers. The first ones of these (shown in the photo) were part of my grandmother’s collection. She had some lovely china cups and saucers. I picked out 4 of those that I liked. I have added blue and white ones, which I still use occasionally. They go with my collection of….

5) Blue and white porcelain. My mother-in-law got me started on this collection 37 years ago. She gave me a lovely flow blue platter. It is still my prized blue and white piece. Over the years I’ve added to the collection from almost every country we’ve been in. We have two long plate shelves in our family room that display much of this collection. This cupboard is between the kitchen and the eating area of the family room. I opened the glass doors to make it easier to see the contents of the cupboard. I see I need to realign the cups on the left.

6) Paintings by VerMeer, the 17^th century Dutch painter. We don’t have enough wall space to display all these, so have chosen to let them hang in the museums where we have seen them. This collection is almost complete. There are 35 or36 known paintings by VerMeer and we have seen all but one of them. This is really my husband’s collection and there are some he’s seen that I haven’t, but I’ve seen most of them with him. The one he hasn’t seen is the one that was recently discovered and authenticated (after 10 years of study.) It was purchased by Steve Wynn of Las Vegas. It hangs in his home and is not on display to the public. We keep hoping some day he’ll put it on display and we can go see it. We do have a poster of The Milk Maid in our family room.

7) Dolls. I have 5 of these dolls by Joan Rydberg. She calls them the Wise Women and Men from Wadsworth. Each one is sculpted by hand and is unique. I also have 2 American Girl dolls, and a baby doll, that I played with when I was a child, a Raggedy Andy doll that my grandmother made and a Raggedy Ann that I found and bought to keep him company. She only came with underwear, so I made her a dress and apron. I’m not sure these all count as a collection. Probably only the 5 Wadsworth dolls count, but I thought I’d just list the others anyway.

Now for the tags: I'm to tag 6 more people, so here you go:

My sister, Kathy is building a house near Olympia, WA.

My friend Kathleen is remodeling a house near Olympia, WA.

Lisa has gone a little crazy making jewelry and decorating in Texas.

Carol in Iowa and I share an interest in painting stuff and decorating.

Mary Ruth in Virginia has an amazing talent for beautifying her home.

And Janet in NC has already voted! She and I share an interest in knitting, among other things.

So here are the rules again:

Link to me in your blog

List 6 quirky things about yourself OR

List 6 things you collect

Link to 6 more blogs and pass on the tag.

And remember playing is always optional. And you can change the rules if you want to.

Fall Colors

2008-10-03T16:17:00.001-05:00

I've been so busy I haven't had time to update this blog in ages. Well, it just hasn't reached the top of my list of priorities. I've been knitting, rosemaling, traveling, and all the other stuff I do when I'm home. But today I went out and snapped some photos of the fall colors in my yard.

I love how these shrubs turn red in the fall, so here are a few colorful photos I thought I'd share. I pass these shrubs every day on the way in and out of the house, so I do get to see them every day and appreciate them.

Here is the pot I planted with painted daisies and petunias in the spring. They have done well all summer. We've had sufficient rain this summer, so I have only had to water these a few times.

And here is the corner just below the steps, where I have 3 different Heuchera planted at the base of this shrub. The shrub is Viburnum Alfredo. I think that's the right name. It turns red every year in the fall and has red berries.

In the summer it has white flowers, which are also pretty. These shrubs have done very well for me. It's funny to see the pictures I took of them the year I planted them, 2002. They were so tiny!

A couple F.O.s and a new challenge

2008-08-03T13:14:00.001-05:00

An F.O. is the opposite of a UFO (unfinished object) some knitters acquire many UFOs, but I don't. (See note in side-bar)

I have finished the stole that I wrote about in my last post, and I even wore it to the Opera last night. That sounds so much more elegant than it really is. We went to see Samson et Dalila at UMD last night. It was quite good, with a semi-professional cast. It was sung in French and most of the French was not bad. But here in Duluth, and especially at a university event, no one really dresses up that much.

And before that I finished this camisole. It was made from a kit that I got in April for half-price. The original price was way too much, but it wasn't bad at half-price. This one had to be reworked a couple times, so it took me longer to finish than it should have. I won't wear it that much, because we don't get much warm weather here and it doesn't seem to lend itself to wear under something else. I may try to find a gauze blouse to wear over it though. I have worn it twice, already, so that's really not bad.

And here is the finished lace shawl that I completed in May and gave to my niece, Nina. That's Nina and her grandmother (my mom) on their birthdays. Nina's is May 14th and Mom's is May 13th, so we had a joint celebration for both of them.

Now for the new challenges: The yarn at left is some Alpaca that I bought also in April. I was working up a gauge swatch to see if I could decide what to do with it. I considered a vest, but felt I didn't have enough to complete the patterns I was looking at.

So instead I bought some more yarn and worked out this gauge swatch. I will be knitting this for the Ravelympics competition. This, for anyone not on Ravelry is an knit-along, where you have to knit the object during the olympics. You are allowed to make a gauge swatch and be ready to start during the opening ceremonies, but not before.

Here is my yarn. My local yarn store (Yarn Harbor) in Duluth is sponsoring this event, so she generously offered us 20% off our purchases for the event. I am going to return the grey yarn, and try a light tan. The grey wasn't working for me-- too dark. Oh this pattern was published in last fall's issue of Interweave Knits. It is called Ivy League Vest. There are several others doing this same vest for the Ravelympics. And there are quite a few on Ravelry who have done this before, so I had lots of pictures to look at. They all look like they turned out great. I hope I'll be happy with mine too. The object is to complete it before the closing ceremonies. I'm not sure I can do that, but I'll try.

A cotton lace stole

2008-07-10T13:32:00.000-05:00

I have been working on two knit projects. I just finished one, but don't have a picture of it yet, so I'll make this post about the other one.

This is a lace stole made from a sport-weight cotton. I think it's sport weight. I started a swatch in a lace-weight, but that was a little difficult and then I realized it might work well with this yarn that I had on hand. The yarn is Louisa Harding Jasmine. It is cotton, bamboo, silk and polyester. It has a silver thread or speck in it (probably the 3% polyester) It is quite soft, so I think will make a nice stole for summer.

This pattern is worked on both sides--that is the back is not just purl stitches, but keeps the lace design going. I've never done a pattern like this, but the repeat is only 13 stitches wide and is fairly easy to remember, so it's going fine. I don't have to refer to the pattern instructions any more, so that makes it easier to work on and to carry along. I worked on it on our trip East for the 4th of July Holiday.

Here's a link to the free on-line pattern. Voyager lace stole.

I think it is about 1/4 finished. I need to check the pattern again for the finished length, but I'm not that close. I have 9 balls of the yarn and will probably use all of them. I think I'm into the 3rd so far.

I took another Rosemaling class

2008-05-10T22:51:00.000-05:00

I spent 3 days this week in a class with Marlys Hammer, a gold medal rosemaler from Wisconsin. She was a delight to learn from. She paints in acrylics, which is what I use. They behave a bit differently from oil paints and it was nice for me to have a teacher demonstrate in acrylics. Here are some pictures of Marlys and the plate she brought for us to use as a model. She also brought patterns for the plate. I did a practice plate and one similar to the one she is holding, but I didn't do the border. I was quite happy with how it looked without the elaborate border.

Here's a wide view of the room.

and here Marlys is helping another student.

And here are pictures of my plates:

The one below I did as a practice piece. I didn't use her pattern on this one, but free-handed a similar design.

And here's a detail from the second plate.

The plates still need a finishing top coat, but they often photograph better before they are varnished.

Now it's done.

2008-04-25T19:49:00.000-05:00

I did pull out the sleeve yesterday, ripped back to 1" below the armhole and reknit it. I kept comparing it to the other one, which I thought was fine. It seemed to be coming out pretty close. (I listened to Jane Eyre while doing this, which was great.) I sewed it in and, folded the sweater in half to compare the sleeves and now the one that was too big is at least an inch or inch and a half shorter than the other one. Yikes. I thought I might have to do it again! But I tried it on and the shorter sleeve was perfect. The longer sleeve is only a bit too long and may be fine. I actually wore the sweater today. I don't let my new garments sit around. Afterall it is wool and summer is coming. Fortunately I live in Duluth where one can wear wool 10 months of the year. It was perfect for today. I still feel a little ridiculous taking my own picture in my bathroom, but it's the only room in the house that has enough natural light that I don't need the flash. And the sweater just looks so flat if I lay it down to take a photo. And I don't own a dress dummy, so I had to resort to taking my own picture as best I could. Oh and my husband is out of town. So you get a funny picture of me in my bathroom. :-0

The Freya is finished - well almost

2008-04-24T14:00:00.003-05:00

So I got this sweater done and sewed up, but now I see that I must redo one sleeve. That same first sleeve that I already redid the top part of. I think you can see in the picture how that sleeve is just too big. Other than that it seems fine.

I'll post a better picture after I get the sleeve fixed. It's a gray, rainy day here today, so a good day to put on an audio book and sit and pull out a sleeve.

Rosemaling

2008-03-28T09:05:00.001-05:00

I have just finished an 8-week rosemaling course. It met on Thursdays for 8 weeks. I missed two weeks because I was traveling, but I did do some painting.

Here are the things I painted in this class. Rosemaling is Norwegian folk painting, that is normally done on wood. It can be done on other surfaces, but wood is the most common one. I, however don't feel I'm good enough to paint on a lot of wooden objects. I am still practicing and learning, so I do a lot of painting on paper. sometimes if the design turns out well I scan it and make cards from it. So during this class I painted many designs on paper as well as 3 wooden plates.

I paint free-hand and my designs are my own. Many rosemalers, especially at the level I paint trace designs or sketch out designs before they start, but I'm just too lazy to do it that way. This is a 6-inch plate.

This is one I did on paper, scanned and added the outer color on my computer, to use as a card. This is the extent of my photo-enhancing skills.

This is a 7-inch wooden plate.

I did these three yesterday. The teacher had left a sketch on the board from the previous day's class and I used that as inspiration for this design, which I did three times with the same colors, but slight variations in the design. I cannot do 2 identical designs.

Finally, this is inspired by a painted sketch done by Norwegian rosemaler Nils Elingsgard.

Back to the Freya

2008-03-07T10:45:00.000-06:00

I am making progress on this Elsebeth Lavold design, which I thought was called Freja, but now I see it is spelled Freya. I think it's pronounced the same either way. Here's where I am with it now.

I have completed both sleeves. I had to rework the top of the first sleeve, because it was coming out way too long, but it seems okay now and I did the second one the same way. The sleeves are fairly skinny, but I tried them on and they will be fine, I think. Then I picked up the stitches of my gauge swatch and did the cable motif to practice it. I had never done this type of cable with the starts and stops, so I thought it would be good to see if it was going to give me problems before I cast on for the front. I did it twice to be sure I had it.

I love the charts for cable knitting. I haven't used charts for cables before, but I find it so straight-forward. The symbols on the charts are very logical. I had to read the definitions the first time, but then was able to follow without referring again to the definitions except for the decreases. Those I had to check again, because some are done on the back (reverse) side and those require some thinking. I think I have it now. This has been fun and I hope it turns out nicely when I am done.

Mystery shawl - clue #3

2008-03-03T08:24:00.001-06:00

Here's what the shawl looks like this morning. I finished clue 3 over the weekend. I'm sorry this isn't a very good picture. I'll try to get a better one after the next clue.

The pattern this time got pretty complicated in the middle and was hard to follow, so I added vertical lines with different colored markers to the printed pattern. This helped me remember where I was on the pattern. That helped a lot. I have used 2 markers one in each side of the triangle. When I put in the life lines they go through the markers, so I drop them on the next row and put in new ones. I forgot one of the new ones the last time, but that explains why there are 2 next to each other on the right side in the photo, in case you were wondering. :-)

Freja

2008-02-29T14:17:00.001-06:00

Well, since it is not taking me all week to finish the "clues" for the shawl I needed another knitting project. I started this sweater called Freja. It's designed by a Swedish Woman named Elsebeth Lavold. I bought her book Viking patterns for knitting, which has this pattern in it. I also bought the yarn the shop recommended, so this is a totally new project, not from my stash. My stash currently has 2 different yarns in it. I was looking for a cardigan to use one of the yarns from my stash, but found this instead. I'm clearly not a skilled stash builder. I've heard others say they don't know how a knitter does not accumulate a stash. Well I don't know how anyone keeps buying stuff they won't be able to get to for over a year. I don't know. I'm just different. I normally have only one project on my needles at once and I don't have a significant stash. Here is the first sleeve of this sweater and part of the second. I decided to start with the sleeves, because that's a good way to check the gauge. I did swatch, but I find that is often not enough.

I had to rip back a few inches and rework the top of the sleeve, because the cap was clearly coming out too long. I think my row-gauge is longer than hers. She doesn't give any measurements for the sleeve cap, just says to keep going until you have 26 stitches or something like that. Well, by the time I had only 26 stitches my sleeve cap was way too long, so I riped back to about the mid-point and started decreasing 2 stitches each row instead of 2 every other row. I was afraid the sleeve seemed too skinny, so I sewed it up and tried it on. It's okay. The photo in the book shows a skinny sleeve, so it's supposed to be that way. I tried it on over my turtle-neck shirt and it's going to be fine. This yarn is Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool- a blend of wool and silk - duh. It actually feels a bit like cotton.

Tomorrow the next clue for the shawl comes out, so i'll work on that again this weekend before I go back to this. I don't think I'll be knitting tonight as I'm going skiing tonight.

Clue Number 2

2008-02-25T10:38:00.000-06:00

I finished clue 2 on the same day it was posted! I counted and counted stitches on every row. I realized that the center of certain motifs needed to appear above the center from rows before. It was hard to tell where the motif should start, but when I got to the center I could tell if I was in the right place or not. At that point I would keep going or tink (unknit ('knit' backwards)) to where the mistake was made. I tinked 6-16 stitches 3 or 4 times. This was so much easier that undoing entire rows.

So here's what it looks like now.

Besides learning to knit lace I also learned (with the help of very kind people in the knit-along-Thanks Carla and others)) how to increase the size of the chart and print it in Adobe Reader, so that I could write numbers in the little squares. This was very helpful. The chart has long sequences of knit stitches between the motifs. The numbers are different for every row and across the rows, so I sit down and count all these spaces before I begin and write the number in each section. So when I knit they have already been counted and I just read the number from the chart where I've written it in. This is another trick I learned that speeded up the knitting tremendously.

The Mystery Shawl

2008-02-19T15:21:00.000-06:00

The first clue was posted Saturday. I was out of town Saturday, so I didn't download it till Sunday. I got started on it Sunday, but had a lot of trouble with it. My stitch count kept coming out wrong. But I finally think I have it figured out. And I have an idea what was going wrong. I'm not sure, because at the time I couldn't figure it out. But I think I was doing a single decrease instead of a double decrease sometimes. It didn't happen all the time, but I think that was the reason I was off by one stitch at the end of the row sometimes. Now I am examining the pattern row before I start the row--noticing which kind of decreases are in the row and trying to keep a mental picture. Certain rows only have single decreases or only double decreases. Those rows are easier to keep track of. I also blew up the pattern bigger and sat at the table and counted the knit stitches in between the decreases and yarn-overs and wrote that number on the pattern. That way I can just glance at the pattern to see the number and don't have to stop and count over and over. These numbers range betwen 3 and 16. If it's only 3 or 4 that's fairly easy to see at a glance, but more than that it is helpful to have the number written on the pattern.

So here is a picture of the first section finished.

new Doll Sweater

2008-02-08T09:59:00.001-06:00

I certainly haven't been very good at keeping up with this blog.
I will try to add another entry here.

I started this sweater little doll sweater Monday afternoon. I wrote this pattern a few years ago. It was published by Joan Hinds first in a newsletter and more recently (2007) in a small booklet that is available through her web site. Fancy Work and Fashion I decided it was time to do another one of these and to check the directions in the process. I've found some minor errors, so I'll send Joan an errata sheet that she can include with any new books she sells.

I’m going to finish the sweater today(Friday), so I thought I’d add some in-progress pics. In the second pic, I have finished the body and two sleeves. I cut the center steek, which rolled back out of sight. I have not done any of the sewing or assembling yet. The next step is to measure for the sleeve slits, sew and cut them, then bind off the shoulders and do the collar. I’ve transferred the sweater to 2 needles. I used just one of those (16”) needles to knit it. It could be done on 2 circs, but it works on one 16” which is easier for me. I did take some liberties with the pattern. I was running out of the red yarn so I did the last row of the body with green. this may or may not cause me problems with the collar. We’ll see.

Having joined Ravelry and become active there has gotten me back into knitting more. I decided to post some of my patterns, which have been published by Joan Hinds. I am Acanthus on Ravelry and have more pictures there of my doll sweaters and hats. There are two cap patterns that go with this little nordic sweater. They haven't been published anywhere, so I think I may make them available for free, but haven't got to that part yet. If you do buy the booklet that has this pattern in it, e-mail me and I'll send you the two cap patterns.

Okay, here is the finished sweater, but I still need to get some little clasps for the front opening. When I have those I'll put it on my doll and post a new picture.

Mystery shawl

2008-01-16T18:51:00.000-06:00

Well, I joined a mystery shawl knit-along. I may regret this as I have never done any lace knitting before. If you haven't heard of these before, here's how it works, I think. This is my first mystery project. You sign up and receive the pattern in 5 installments. You start knitting without knowing what the finished patttern will look like. This is a triangular shawl pattern. So far that's all I know. It starts in February. Wish me luck.

No photos for this post.

My Norwegian sweater is finished

2008-01-08T14:37:00.000-06:00

I started this last July. It's now January, but it is finally finished. I found that while I was in Paris, I didn't have much time to knit on it, but I did work on it some and took it on the flights with me. (note to self: next time I fly out of France: Do not try to take knitting needles--the French security agents don't like them.)

We arrived home Dec. 1 and I managed to get the body of the sweater finished before Christmas. I bound off all the stiches and even washed it before cutting it. I wanted it to felt and shrink just a little. I don't think it did. It is a superwash yarn, so it's not supposed to felt. It looks a little funny before it is cut.

Here is what it looked like cut open. Now it looks more like the body of a sweater.

And finally this is the finished sweater. I took it to my yarn shop and asked what the others there thought about how many clasps. The pattern only called for one, but I wanted more. They said 3 would be right, so I did what they suggested.

I had to take the picture in my bathroom, because it is the only place in the house with enough light and I didn't want to use the flash.

So that's it. It's done and I can wear it now.

Back to my sweater

2007-08-27T09:34:00.001-05:00

Well, here's the body up to about 12 inches. At 13 inches I start decreasing for the v-neck, but up to this point it's just been repeating the pattern and trying not to make mistakes. The tension is not as even as I would like still, but I fix it up a bit by pulling stiches that are too small or too big and then steam it and it looks pretty good after that.

I had hoped to finish it before I leave for Paris, but that isn't going to happen, so this sweater which started as a "Tour de France" challenge project is going to go to France to be completed--hopefully. It depends on if I can find a sewing machine in France to use for the stitching. It gets cut down the middle where those checker-board stitches are. It is supposed to be a cardigan.

My Old-lady dolls

2007-08-14T20:51:00.000-05:00

I'm still knitting on the sweater and working on my French. The knitting is going slowly, so I thought I'd share some pictures of my dolls. I love these dolls. I acquired the first one Miss Ophelia rose at the Glenshen art fair in 2002.

The next year I bought the second one to keep her company. I named her Miss Lily Pearl. They sit in my diningroom window, where they can keep track of the people walking by, just like my grandmother used to do.

I wanted to get another the following year of the same size. They are about 12" high, but the lady who makes them wasn't making the larger ones anymore. I did buy a pair of smaller ones, which sit in my livingroom window.

Two rosemaled plates

2007-08-13T19:42:00.001-05:00

Just to mix things up a bit I am adding some photographs of a couple plates I rosemaled. I painted these in classes, without any idea what I would do with them, but after getting them home realized that they were the right colors for my dining room. The red one is more recent. It is my own design.

The blue one below is older, done in the 2nd year that I was doing rosemaling, I think. It was done in a class and using a pattern by Judy Ritger, who does absolutely beautiful work. Mine doesn't come any where near doing her pattern justice. I changed the colors too. My painting is a bit better than this now and I ususally paint my own designs, but these are the two plates that are hanging in my dining room.

There now I have added some rosemaling to this blog, so the title makes more sense now. :-)

When the sweater reaches a point that is interesting again I'll add new pictures of it. for now I am plugging along on it.

I redid the sleeve hem

2007-08-10T09:25:00.000-05:00

Above you see the bottom of the first sleeve after I ripped out the border part and reknit it from the brown rows down. This is the first time I've ever ripped out and reknit in the opposite direction. If you look closely you can see the difference, but you do have to look closely.

Here are the two sleeves finished. You can compare this photo to the one below to see that now they are much closer to the same size--still not identical, but close enough for me.

I'm working on the body now. I've completed about 1 1/2 pattern repeats or 5? inches.

2007-08-01T09:57:00.001-05:00

I have finished both sleeves, though I am still going to redo the hem of the first, so I guess I haven't actually finished both. Here is my start on the body. It seems to be the right size. After the first one was way too small, I was worried that this one was coming out too big. The only thing I changed was to go to a larger needle, ( 3 mm instead of 2.5) but I am also knitting looser. I got the correct gauge on the sleeve and did lots of calculations to determine how many stitches I needed for the body to come out right, so it should be right. Getting the gauge right and the size right is the hardest part of knitting.

The second sleeve, cont'd

2007-07-23T08:14:00.001-05:00

It's boring, working on the second sleeve, but at least they will both be done when I finish the body. That will be nice. The second one is coming along better than the first. The gauge is more even, though it is looser. In the picture you can see that the bottom part of the first one is smaller. I wish that one was larger and the second one was smaller, but the second one will be okay, since this is sort of a jacket-like sweater. I used a larger needle and added one pattern repeat to get it larger, but my knitting was looser besides that and so the second one turned out a whole lot bigger than the first. I hope when I redo the first one at the bottom, it looks okay. I wish after all the practice I've had with faire-isle type knitting, that my stitches were more consistent. I keep trying and hoping it will improve.

Still plugging away: the flat stage

2007-07-20T18:02:00.000-05:00

I'm working on the second sleeve. It is coming along better than the first, I think. It doesn't seem worth posting a picture of, but maybe when it's a bit longer.

I have a couple other things I need to do: Make window treatments for our study, that we have just redecorated, do some work in my garden etc.

And for fun I'm reading a memoir by Claude Michelet called "Une fois Sept". He was the youngest of 7 children. It is a lot of fun. He writes with a lot of humor and he had an active imagination as a child.

I visited a local art museum today and we went to the opera last night and saw "the Barber of Seville".

That's it for today.

Rest day: sleeve complete

2007-07-16T09:13:00.000-05:00

Here is the finished sleeve. I have to redo the color border, so it's not really finished, but I reached the top and bound it off. I'm not entirely happy with it. I wish I could get my two-color knitting more even, but at least none of the stiches have completely disappeared, so it's not as bad as some of my earlier efforts. It's acceptable.

Do we have to take a day of rest now? I do have two other projects that need just a bit of finishing to be done. Maybe I should work on those today and start the next sleeve tomorrow.

Progressing on the sleeve:

2007-07-14T07:26:00.000-05:00

I thought I'd show you how I keep track of where I am in the pattern. I scanned the pattern into my computer. (If you don't have a scanner make several copies.) This pattern has a repeat of 26 rows and 26 stitches. I don't think I'll ever be able to keep it in my head, so I will have to use these diagrams for most of the sweater.

The arrow printed on the pattern indicates the stitch that should be at the center of the sleeve (midt pa ermet) I started with 73 stitches, so the 37th stich was the mid-point. I counted backwards to find where I should start the pattern. I also needed to increase one stitch each end of the row every 4 rows. So I next drew a solid line on the pattern at the starting point which jogs out one stitch every 4 rows. This helps me keep track of the increases as well and I don't need a pesky stitch counter, which kept getting in the way. I highlight the row I'm doing next, knit that and highlight the next row. I'm alternating my highlight colors, but that doesn't really serve any special purpose. When I put the work down I highlight the next row and indicate with an arrow that that is where I should start next. Each time I complete a pattern I throw that one away after transfering the starting line to a new page. This is the third page I've done now. So I have almost completed 3 complete pattern repeats.

Stage 4: Sleeve hem

2007-07-12T07:53:00.001-05:00

So I started on a sleeve, which is what I should have done in the first place. It is always easier to rip out a sleeve and start over, than to do that with the body. I will have to start the body over, but if I have enough yarn, I won't have to rip the first one out. Not sure if it can be used, but not having to rip it out and untangle the yarn and rewind the balls will be a good thing.

I completed one repeat of the pattern on the sleeve. It is a 26-row repeat and 26 stitches also.The hem is still tighter than it should be, but I think I can live with it. I may start the second one with more stiches and if it comes out better and the difference bugs me I can undo the bottom of this one and reknit it in the other directon. I have never done this, but I have seen it done and I know people who can help me do this.

In the interest of being brutally honest, here is the other side of the sleeve showing the increases. It's not great, but it's not horrible. The pattern called for using fewer stiches in the border than in the pattern, but my knitting with 3 and 4 strands pulls up so much that I should have just started with the larger number. I didn't realize it was pulling up so much. Actually the first one I did was looser, but looked horrible. Oh well, this is what I can do now. I'll keep practicing and hope to get better.

No question this is a mountain challenge for me. I'm glad I joined this tour de france kal, because it has given me the incentive I need to keep at this project and not get discouraged.

As for doing French while I do this, I listened to a Frech CD while I was knitting and also finished reading a mystery in French last night, after I quit knitting for the day. I read "Maigret et le Phantome" by Simenon. Is anyone familiar with his series of police novels?

The lower border - continued

2007-07-10T09:23:00.000-05:00

The Border:

Here is the border pattern, completed. I pinned it to the carpet, because it rolls up otherwise. I also folded the ribbed facing under it. This is how the hem should look, but without the pins.

I really hope I don't have to rip this out.

Stage 3: Border

2007-07-10T09:06:00.001-05:00

Stage 3:

This is the gauge swatch that I made before I started. I did one repeat on #3 needles and a second one on 3.5mm. I decided the second one is closer to the gauge, so that's what I plan to use.

I did the border pattern again, after ripping it out once. It turned out much better the second time. In fact I am happy with how it looks. I have a picture, but it's still in the camera. Now I am afraid to measure it, because I think it is too small, which means I'll have to rip it out and do it again. Aaargh! For some reason this pattern calls for doing the border on 2.5 needles with 265 stitches and then increasing to 273 stitches and 3 or 3.5 needles for the body, which is the all-over design in the gauge swatch here. I can't figure out why they wanted me to do the border on smaller needles. The number of stitches I understand. That is because the repeat is different and that is to make it come out symmetrical at the center front. But it doesn't seem like the bottom hem should be smaller than the rest of the jacket. They do call it a jacket (jakke).

So I'm going to go up to my yarn store to see friends who knit there on Tuesdays and ask their opinion.

Stages 1 and 2: casting on and ripping

2007-07-09T08:37:00.000-05:00

Stages 1 and 2:

I did get started on my sweater on the 7th. I was flying home from a family reunion over the holiday weekend. the reunion was held in Alabama and we flew home from Atlanta. I cast on the 269 stitches, joined them (being careful not to twist) and started knitting the ribbing. After 3 rows I checked for the 3rd or 4th time to be sure it wasn't twisted. It was!!! I tried and tried to get it to come out right, but no, I had twisted it. So I started over. There is no way to fix that other than to start over. I was using a needle that was too short, but it was the one I had. It is hard to be sure you haven't twisted the work when it is scrunched up on a shorter needle.

Attempt 2: I did the ribbing (the pattern called for 21 rows.) this will be turned under as a facing and I really wondered why I needed 21 rows, but I kept going. I think I quit at 20 though. Then I started the border pattern. This is when I discovered the border rows require 3 and even 4 colors carried in one row. Not somethng I have experience with. This is truly a challenge for me. I tried carrying two colors in my right hand and 2 in the left and got 6 rows done, but it was unacceptable, so I ripped it out, untangled the 5 colors and started the pattern again this time carying only 1 color in the left hand and all the others in the right, dropping one and picking up the next. I even figured out how to do this without twisting the 3 colors in the right hand, so I learned a new technique. I also found out it didn't work to try to do anything else while I did these rows, so I took my knitting up to the deck to work on it in silence. I have done 4 rows of the pattern and they look okay, I think. I still need to check the size, though. If it's too small that will mean ripping it all out again.

The picture above doesn't show much except the colors. The knitting rolled back, so what you do see is the back side, but I'll make it show better in the next one.

I have to go out today, so will come back to this later.

My Norwegian sweater - tour de France - project

2007-07-03T08:24:00.000-05:00

My mother and I were visitng Norway in May. Our relatives took us on a tour of the area (near Egersund in Rogaland) which included a visit to the Gjestal factory outlet store. My mother picked up some lime-green yarn (10 balls for $10.00-total!) I spent more than that, but this was still a bargain. I also bought a pattern, which is in Norwegian, so I'll have to work on figuring it out. It is a cardingan with an all-over two color pattern using the dark blue and brown yarn. The other three are used in the contrasting border. I hope to get started on the gauge swatch today and be ready to start the sweater on July 7th along with the start of the Tour de France.

I have finally managed to instal my scanner. We got a new computer and it hadn't been reinstalled. So here is the picture from the pattern book of this sweater. (I hope) The photo is not a good one, because it doesn't show the contrasting border very well. Why don't knitting pattern books think about these thing?

Considering starting a blog

2007-07-01T18:08:00.000-05:00

I might change my mind and do this afterall.

I will be living in Paris Sept 2 through Dec. 1, 2007. I am thinking about writing a blog at that time.

I also have decided to do a knit-along project with the Tour de France knitters. I picked up a Norwegian pattern for a cardigan in Norway last month and have hardly even looked at it, but I need to start a new project, so I think this is going to be it. It is a two color all-over pattern. I'll see if I can find a picture of it on-line. My colors are teal and brown, with accent borders in red and gold.

The pattern is in Norwegian, which is not one of the languages I read, but I have translated some of it and I know a knitting friend who knows Norwegian so she can help if I get stuck.

That's it for now.

No blog here

2007-06-19T07:44:00.000-05:00

This is not really a blog. I considered it, but changed my mind. I do have a website.