Like the Magic Loop Starting Position in the post below, this tool is a little helper in communicating with my students. This time, it’s the Kitchener Stitch!
This one is more of a simple chart than a list, so feel free to download and use this printable resource: KitchenerStitch
Filed under Classes, Techniques
I’ve been teaching my knitting students how to use the magic loop method for knitting in the round. I don’t mind double points, and I learned how to use two circulars, but magic loop is my favorite, especially for new in-the-round knitters. It’s safest to transport (I shudder to think how many loops I’ve lost off of dpns), has the fewest possible transitions from one needle to the other, and it’s the most economical (only one circular needle length needed for anything from 3X sweaters to the last 2 stitches on the top of a hat).
I’ve developed a help I call Starting Position and have started handing it out in my classes. It does a good job of preventing the most common issues new learners seem to have until they become comfortable with the technique. Whenever a student is ready to switch working from one needle to the other, I tell them to make sure they’re in Starting Position. In case you or someone you know could use the help, here it is!
Starting Position for Magic Loop
1. All loops (or as many as can fit) should be on the wood or metal parts of the needles. These will have been roughly split in half before beginning, with one half(ish) on each needle.
2. Needles should be held with points to the right, with one needle in front of the other.
3. Fabric (or cast on ridge) should be moved so it is hanging down with no twists.
4. The working yarn should be attached to the back needle. (If not, rotate front needle to be in the back and check #3 again)
THEN, holding the loops with your left hand (hold front and back together), pull the back needle out to the right, in the direction it is pointing.
Here it is in pdf, for a printable resource:
Filed under Classes, Techniques
It may not look like much at the moment, but this is one of the projects I’m most excited about this year. It’s plain old garter stitch, nothin’ fancy. The cool part is that I’m going to knit two rows (one garter ridge) each day (God willing), and I’m going to use a yarn that matches the Kansas skies.
I struggled a bit about how to keep things accurate and properly represented. Should I knit at the same time each day? Is that even possible with my schedule? How do I show a the amount of clouds on a cloudy day without using every shade between white and gray and blue known to man? Do I want this to be wearable? How do I deal with the fact that Kansas weather seems to change every 5 minutes?
In the end I just decided to toss perfect accuracy out the window. I decided I did want to wear the thing after all, so I chose 5 colors that look well together. Darker blue for clear skies, lighter blue for partially cloudy, light gray for cloudy/light rain, dark gray for stormy, white for snow or frost. I’ll just look out my window when I’m ready to knit and choose the color based on what I see. I’m really excited to see how this turns out!
Other knitting today:
Progress on my first venture into the land of fingerless mitts with partial fingers.
And a few rows’ more on Craic. The cables on this are awesome, but I’m a tad concerned about how snug it may turn out to be. It will certainly get a vigorous blocking.
Tonight I’m going to work on a shop/class model sock. The yarn is eye-searing green. My mom would love it!
Filed under 12 in 2012, 2012 list, On the Needles
Resolutions abound in this corner of the knitting world. I’m in great company, as I’m seeing lists upon lists on the internet.
Here are some of my fibery goals for the year 2012:
Spin at least 4 rovings from my stash into yarn.
One pair of socks for each person in my household.
Design and publish at least 2 of the patterns rattling around in my head.
Start and maintain a “gifts” tub including several baby gifts.
Finish chosen potential Fair socks by August 1. (No more panicky knitting sprints!)
Complete at least 8 items on my Ravelry 12 in 2012 list.
Create one needlepoint project from start to finish (newish area in the shop–I need to be less ignorant).
Create one weaving project (fix the ignorance, again).
I think this is within reach if I stay focused. I know I’ll be distracted here and there, but I like how these goals shaped up.
Yesterday I got started on one of my 12 in 2012 projects, Craic:
It’s got 3 distinct cable motifs going on, and I absolutely love it. The yarn is Bugga!, a Christmas gift from a friend.
Onward and upward!
Filed under 12 in 2012, 2012 list, On the Must-Do List, On the Needles
I don’t know about your home, but in my home, we have all kinds of “if you give a mouse a cookie” stories. One of our all-time best (or worst) ones of these was when I decided to make bacon for breakfast and Sean and his Dad ended up replacing a living room window. Classic.
Today’s wasn’t quite as dramatic, but it still has some serious weird.
If you decide to clean your desk, you might discover that only one of a set of earrings is on the desk where it was expected to be.
If only one of a set of earrings is on your desk, you might have to look under and around the desk.
If you decide to look around your desk, you might decide that you might as well clean out under there.
If you decide to clean under there, you may realize it’s been a while since you sorted through a particular UFO tub.
If you decide to sort through a UFO tub, you may discover a project or two that you can’t remember ever being in love with.
If you find an unloved project, you may discover that that object could be bound off right now and it would make a fine toy/fluffy/friend blanket.
If you think about finishing a UFO as a friend blanket, you may have a crisis of conscience about breaking your promise to yourself never to knit for stuffed animals.
If you have a crisis of conscience, you may go digging in your purse for inexplicable reasons.
If you dig around in your purse during your conscience crisis, you might find a missing earring.
And then there’s this:
4th and long on this morning (although the clean desk and surroundings is nice). PUNT!
Filed under Finished Objects!, Wool Gathering
My countdown was interrupted by a router that decided it had had enough of us and went to a better place. It’s amazing how I take all these electron-shuffling gizmos for granted.
At any rate, I’m now plugged into the cable that is supposed to be plugged into the main computer through which we watch every sport known to man. (Home run derby was fun to see last night!) In between the last post and this one I had the carpal tunnel surgery, and everything went well. The stitches came out a few days ago, and I was eager to get back to the knitting. I finished these:
Another Baby Surprise Jacket (this might be #6)…
and the commissioned piece I was chugging along on before the surgery.
It’s a interesting design. I like the traveling cables and the shaping is lovely. I think my OCD tendencies were having issues with the differences in the three different sizes and types of cables. Also, there was enough applied i-cord to choke a yak.
It has a little bit of drying left to do, and then it can zip to its new home.
Katie fell in love with Rebecca Danger’s Knitted Monster Book and decided she needed a monster. She needed one badly enough that she is actually willing to knit it herself rather than pull out the Bambi eyes and beg me to knit it for her.
She was reading through the directions and she paused for a moment, looking perplexed. This conversation followed. Truly.
Me: What’s the matter, Kate?
Katie: Well, I’m not sure I understand all the directions. I don’t know how to magic loop.
Me: Well, I am a knitting teacher, you know.
Katie: Hmmm…okay (sounding unconvinced).
Me: You know, I just finished a class in which the students learned how to magic loop.
Katie: Hmmmm. Okay.
Apparently I can impress some of the people some of the time with my knitting/teaching skills, but Katie is not one of those people. She is, however, one of the people I can teach to do magic loop, as her purple monster behind will attest. I’m counting it as a win for me.
Filed under Finished Objects!, Wool Gathering
I’m tempted to call it a wash.
On the one hand, I made some progress on this:
On the other hand, I had to rip out the pink and yellow sock. I have no idea how it could have taken me so long to notice, but rather than the nice 12-stitch spacing there should have been between the twists, I had 2 13-stitch spacings and one 10-stitch spacing. I knit for about 4 inches like that before noticing something was wrong. Impressive, no?
So now it looks like this:
It’s been thrown back in the knitting bag after receiving a good talking-to, which is so not fair, considering who the dunderhead was in this scenario, but I am way too annoyed with it to worry about fairness. We’ll kiss and make up soon, but I’ll be knitting something else today.
Filed under On the Needles
This is it.
In spite of really spending quite a bit of time knitting yesterday, and all of it on one garment, it doesn’t look very impressive. Here’s the side by side:
I suppose I shouldn’t expect much drama from something with such small gauge.
Filed under On the Needles
Yesterday was a finishing day. Babies have been arriving, and of course they need woolie happies, right?
Yes, it really is that eye-searingly pink.
Different pink, but still pink. Very, very pink.
These sweaters got “finished” (seams, ends, blocking) yesterday and will hopefully be going to their new homes in the next few days. I worked a bit on a second sock, too:
Wouldn’t you know it: pink.
I think I need to work on another color today!
P.S. I was really unhappy with how WordPress was shrinking my photos and making them look blurry. You can click on any of them if you’d like to see them in a bigger size. I decided to go for clarity over weird shrinky blurriness in a larger photo.
Filed under Finished Objects!, On the Needles
I cannot believe how quickly last weekend flew by! One minute I’m heading out the door to teach a class, and the next minute Rory McIlroy is hoisting the U. S. Open trophy and I’m crying with pride for him like I’m his mum or something.
So, this weekend:
I made some progress on this commissioned piece. I like how it’s coming together, but I’m not in love with the pattern. It’s a bit of a puzzle to sort out, but we’ll get there eventually. I stopped on this when it was clear I’d need to be looking at three pages at once and probably need a slide rule to decipher. Seemed a bit tricksy for knitting while watching an exciting tournament.
I cast on and knit maybe 7 rows on what might be Fair socks. I think I’ve done about 352 cables so far. Just an estimate. I picked this up again Sunday for the last round of the tournament, but I was so nervous for Rory that I quit after about 10 stitches and 45 cables. About.
I ended up knitting on my hot mess, which is getting messier by the millimeter. I’m going to either love this or hate this when it’s done, but I can’t tell yet.
This morning while the olders are at Junior Golf, I cleaned up some yarn/pattern/fiber mess that was threatening to take over the living room, and I’m ready to go back at it.
Filed under On the Needles, Wool Gathering
