Needles & hooks

A Real Post.

This one includes pictures.

First, last I posted, I mentioned I was doing Weavette squares for this year’s ornament. And so I did. Here it is on the tree.

What I did was make two squares, one including beading, and then crochet them together with some stuffing. The beading was the trickiest part. I made a blank white square first and then I used markers to note which top strings I wanted to put beads on. Then I made sort of a pattern on paper per vertical string:
- String 1: (down) 2 green 2 red
- String 3: (up) 4 green 2 red
- String 5: (down) 1 color 4 green

And so on. The things you have to note are that there are two sets of vertical strings, even numbers and odd numbers, so I had two sets of lists. Further, you’re winding up and down, so that’s why I listed which direction the strings were going. Finally, I strung all the beads onto my yarn before I started winding the weavette. Making sure to swap which order I loaded the beads depending on whether the string was up or down. Then, with my loaded yarn, I wound the Weavette. When I placed a vertical that had beading, I slid those beads down. When I did the final weaving, I’d move the beads into place before running the needle. Took a bit of fussing, but comes out neat.

Here’s a close-up:

And here’s the back (my initials and year in backstitch):

On Jan 2, I came back out to L.A. for more work. I’m away from home until Mid-February working on a project out here. The days are long and tedious. I’m on site by 8:30am and I usually don’t get back to my hotel until about 7pm every night. I’ve done a little knitting, but not nearly what I’d hoped.

But there is a break in site. Tomorrow I leave for a cruise! So I’m in the middle of putting everything on hold while I’m gone. I’m sorting things for “leave behind” and “take on cruise”, I’m doing a ring check of my section of the knitting blog ring, I’m doing a gauge swatch for a project I want to do on the cruise, I’m listening to vintage Madonna, and I’m playing the very addictive FizzBall. Somehow I’m not good at focusing on any one of these activities, so I click on a blog, knit a row while I wait for slow hotel downloads, then play a round of Fizz.

And I have to give up my laptop in an hour so that I can stash some stuff at a friend’s house while I’m gone. See you all later!

Comments: 4 — Posted under: Knitting, Almost Random, Weavette

My oldest UFO

Tonight I received the new issue of Cast On in the mail. And reading the article about the new instructions for the Master Knitter’s program, I remember that I started that once and never sent it off. In fact, I did everything but write the report, even though I knew exactly what I wanted it to say. I think it’s been about 2 years, so there’s no way I could take it up again without redoing all the swatches. Anyway, I guess I should ask for a new set of directions and see if I want to take it up again.

However, I am making progress with some of my other UFOs.

I picked up Mermaid again. I think my gauge might be a little too loose now, but I think it will look okay in the end. I’m almost to the last page of my spreadsheet and I laid it out last night and I think it’s gonna measure up okay. Hopefully I’ll finish the body for real soon.

And over the weekend, I had some knitting time while waiting for and during a pedicure, so I made some progress on the third installment of Rockin’ Socks.

Here’s 2 repeats of the pattern:

It’s lacey and open, but really looks like ribbed entrelac:

As for the 2nd installment, they still need buttons. I thought I had the buttons, but I realized that I only have 3 buttons, not 4. So I need to go shopping, and I need some quality time with box of neglected knitting.

In the meantime, here’s what I did with some of the leftovers of Fairgrounds:

I’ve been thinking about using leftover sock yarn to make a blanket of Weavette squares. I think it might be too thin with just one strand woven. But perhaps too thick to deal with doubled. So I’ll have to think some more.

Comments: 3 — Posted under: Knitting, Weavette, Rockin' Socks

Weaving Along

I played around with my Weavette a little more. I’m to the point where I’m able to weave the basic square without looking at the instructions. And I’ve taken it a couple steps beyond.

At first I made a handful of squares in some acrylic sport weight pastel yarn I had left over from long ago:

After making several, I thought about a way I might join them while making a new one. So I used some white yarn for contrast to see what I was doing, and joined two pastel squares on sides:

Unfortunately, as a joining technique, it was painfully slow and not all that elegant-looking. The way the Weavette works is that you simply wrap yarn around the pegs in 3 directions (vertically, horizontally, vertically) and then you weave in the last direction (horizontally), locking all the yarn in place before popping it off the loom. By joining the other squares, I had to make a stitch each time I wrapped around pegs, which slowed me down a lot.

I had also heard that if you use variegated yarn, that you end up with plaid. I decided that the sport weight stuff I’d used might have too long a color run, so I tried with a small remnant of Koigu KPPPM I had left over from Charlotte’s Web. The pink and purples stood out clearly, but I think the 2-inch square is a little too small to really see anything.

However, given the thin weight of the Koigu, I decided to try doubling it. But I’d already done the first weave, so I simply rewove again in all directions. It was a little tedious, but it looks really neat. I used up this ball of Koigu, so I’ll need to dig out another to try it the easier way of holding two at the same time.

Next I tried it with some worsted weight yarn to see how that worked and whether I could get a tighter weave with only one strand. This worsted was on the lighter side, so it’s still somewhat looser than I expected. However, it (and the double-strand Koigu) showed me the challenge of weaving without splitting strands. On a larger loom, you can offset warp threads from each other to run a shuttle through without difficulty. And switch the offset to return. With this loom, you have to use the needle/shuttle to wind over and under threads. And they naturally want to not go where you want them to. I think having a slight bend in the tip (like a Chibi needle) would help the weaving process be more accurate. I sent Buxton Brook an e-mail suggesting it.

Finally, I got thinking about how I might incorporate beads. I realized I had to add them to the yarn before I started winding. I couldn’t add them after I was weaving. So I did a little counting and a little math and I strung up a bunch of beads on some sport weight. It was definitely fussy, but had a neat result:

However, I strung one too many in one direction, so it doesn’t line up nicely at one end (the top). It’s hard to see in this photo because my camera refused to focus on the shine:

So, Julie asked me if it was fun and if she should get one. Clearly, I’m having a good time experimenting with it. I’m not sure what I’d actually do with the squares yet. I don’t think the 2-inch ones are all that useful, so I ordered a 6-inch loom today (from Spinning Wheel Yarn Shop — free shipping!). I’m sure you’ll see more photos of weaving projects here in the future.

MAILBAG
Jocelyn suggested using a toilet paper tube to wind the microfiber ribbon yarn. I’ll have to save one and try that. I was just using my handy Wool Winder and that wasn’t very happy.

Comments: 3 — Posted under: Weavette