KRL at The Hambledon

 

Our last KRL event at Cornershop

Just to let you know that The Knitting Reference Library will be at The Hambledon in Winchester on Friday 6 and Saturday 7 November. I will be there on Friday so do come along and say hello!

We will have books, patterns and the Knitting Collections Guide. There will also be spare needles and yarn if you would like to learn to knit. The Hambledon is going to display a selection of our vintage knitting patterns in the window and showcase knitwear plus any related books.

There will be space to sit down and knit as well, so bring yours along. Hope to see you there.

Passion or Obsession?

The Last Knit: When knitting becomes an obsession.

Directed by Laura Neuvonen, from Finland. 2005.

Can you go a day without knitting?

Chilli Pepper Drying Tutorial

This year I planted chilli peppers and ended up with lots more than I am able to use. I’ve given away some and made others into chilli jam, but am still left with a trayful. I decided that drying them would be the best thing to do, so I can use them throughout the winter.

There are a few methods that you can use to dry the peppers including sun-drying or slow-baking them in the oven. Since this is the rainy British autumn and a shared oven, I decided to go the traditional route and dry them by stringing them up to dry. Here’s how I did it:

You will need: chillis, some large plastic buttons, some strong thread or fishing line, a large needle.

Step One: Secure a button to be the stopper at the bottom of the string of chillis, as below.

Step Two: String up the chillis by threading straight through the middle of each and pushing to the bottom of the string, against the button.

Step Three: When you’ve strung up all of your chillis, or when the line seems heavy, hang it up in a dry, well ventilated area to dry.

Mine are going into a draughty garden shed tomorrow. They should take about a month or so to dry out completely.

I’m sure you don’t need me to remind you that chillis can burn – do wear gloves if you are at all sensitive to them and be sure to wash your hands after touching them.

Brooches and brain work

Blimey, lots has been happening this week. Much of it brainstorming, drawing, researching and article writing. Oh, and quite a bit of plodding along with powerpoint, making slides for a talk that I’m giving next week about my master’s dissertation.  But there was some knitting too…

Brooches for Making Merry

I’ve been on a real push lately getting more brooches ready for the Making Merry exhibition in Winchester next month. I sewed all of these together this afternoon whilst watching the marvellous Brief Encounter and drinking many cups of tea.

I was lucky enough to get a review too! My scroll brooches were featured on the Found on Folksy blog this week as part of their Neu Vintage feature. Exciting times!

I’ve been on a real creative kick and much of the research that I mentioned has been in trying to decide what socks would encapsulate the essence of literary characters so I can make more Mrs Miniver socks about their relationships: Holmes and Watson, Crowley and Arizaphale and Jeeves and Wooster are on my list currently, amongst others.

A friend at work lent me The Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes so that is proving a great inspiration, not to mention a gripping read. I still can’t quite work out what Holmes socks would be though. He was such a master of disguise. How to get that over in the pattern, material and construction method? (I think Argyle pattern for Watson, by the way: possibly quite loud).

As for Jeeves and Wooster, I found a great 1930s sock pattern in my Nan’s knitting and sewing book, with a false seam up the back of the leg. I will be using that one for Jeeves. His half of the sock will be black, of course. I’m rather tempted to make Bertie Wooster one of those ‘jolly purple socks’ which Jeeves was so disdainful of in The Inimitable Jeeves. Perhaps in silk. After all it was Bertie’s former valet’s theft of some silk socks which caused Jeeves to come into the employment of  Wooster in the first place.

Knit a Poppy Campaign 2009

As you might know, I’m editorial assistant at knitonthenet.com.

We have just announced the 2009 Knit a Poppy campaign in support of The Poppy Appeal.

The background to this appeal is that the Royal British Legion provides financial, social and emotional support to millions who have served and are currently serving in the Armed Forces, and their dependants. Currently, nearly 10.5 million people are eligible for their support and they receive thousands of calls for help every year. The British Legion’s annual Poppy Appeal is one of the ways in which they raise money for their work.

Poppy Brooch designed by Just call me Ruby ©knitonthenet

Please visit knitonthenet to download our elegant poppy brooch pattern (designed by Just call me Ruby) by making a donation of £2.00 to The Poppy Appeal.

We shall be keeping you updated of the Knit a Poppy Campaign via theknitonthenet blog and website, Ravelry forum and Facebook page. We would love to see photographs of your finished brooches and also hear how much money you have raised.

Please email me the details at ingrid(at)knitonthenet(dot)com.

Making it up as you go along…

Sometimes a whole lot of similar ideas come out at once, independently of one another.

I’ve been thinking for a while about crowdsourcing tweets to make a knitting pattern. I’d flip a coin to tell me to knit or purl but receive the rest of the instructions from my twitter followers. It’s something which I’ve sort of done before, with the aid of a few friends, but not on such a scale.

This is Mmm – Entrails, or The Red Un-Round. The result of pub-instruction knitting, it was originally cast on as a mobius wrap. It didn’t end up that way.

Mmm - Entrails (or The Red Un-Round)

From my Ravelry notes:

I liked the first version of The Round so much I decided to cast on another.

But… what happens in this one is going to be dictated by other people’s suggestions at the pub quiz.  I’ll cast on the amount of stitches they suggest, knit the amount of rows that they want and make it to their specifications rather than mine. I will change colours when they say and make the buttonholes to their request (size and placement).

Given that I usually knit this at the pub, random suggestions are making it all the more entertaining!

So, they asked me to stop knitting. I did.
Then they said: Cut it in half. Er… okay.

I think its quite good actually!

I’m planning to make a pair of wrist-warmers this time with the crowdsourced instructions which will come out with all kinds of weird patterns on them: I hope! There’s still a bit more planning to do, but I’ll be setting that up and executing it within the next couple of weeks.

It seems that quite a few other people have had similar kinds of ideas for knitting just recently: playing with making patterns or being influenced by social media.

How about knitted tweets? Knitters in the north of England, organised by the glittyknittykitty blog came together at the Shipley Art Gallery for an evening event which included freeform knitting something in 140 stitches or under. You can see one of Brendadada’s knitted tweets here.

Then, last week I found knitting dice, which are available from Knitivity. Basically, you throw a set of five dice to determine where your pattern goes. I’d love to have a go with some of these!

Lastly though is Lee Meredith’s new e-book Game Knitting.

Orange Game-Knitted Hat by Lee Meredith. Used under Creative Commons licence.

Its concept is ace. In her own words:

The easiest way I’ve found to describe how game knitting works is this:
You make a list of reoccurring things that happen in a TV show, as if you are going to play a drinking game to the show (drink each time something on the list happens), and you want it to be a crazy night!  Which means, if you really were to turn your list into a drinking game, you’d either want to take very small sips of light beer, or you’d be too drunk to play after a couple of episodes.  So, once you have this game list, you design a knitting pattern around doing/changing something in your work every time something on the list happens.  This may be as simple as switching from knit to purl stitches, or making an eyelet hole, or something a bit more complex, like cabling or turning your work for a short row.  Just don’t try actually playing a drinking game as you game knit!

So, I tried this out while I was watching Strictly Come Dancing with my family at the weekend. Casting on for a sideways hat, I knitted an eyelet every time one of the following happened:

• Len Goodman said ’seven.’
• Someone went wrong during the dance performance.
• Bruce Forsythe made a dire joke.
• One of the professional dancers got feisty with the judges.
• One of the dancers came on in something akin to a tablecloth.
• Craig Revel-Horwood said something bitchy about the performance.
• There was actual paso music for the paso doble.
• Tess said that the judges’ scores were in.

Strictly Come Knitting Hat

I was knitting in a mid-grey, and you can’t really see very clearly the patterning of the eyelets whilst it is being knit. I think it will come out more when it is blocked. In the meantime, above is a glaring photo in front of the window so you get the general idea. I’m going to continue with it next week, but with shows of two and a half hours each week right up until Christmas I think I’m going to end up with a whole lot of Strictly Come Knitted items!

But should I make an earwig too?

I’ve been getting some great inspiration for spinning from my parents’ garden this summer. Working with my hand carders, the latest roving I have produced came from these two plants. The first is lantana. It’s kind of like a candytuft, but on fire. The second is my old favourite, the dahlia. My Isle of Wight grandad, Georgie used to grow them for shows and was forever moaning that the earwigs were getting in them. My Mum grows them today as a reminder of him.

I’m going to spin up some yarn in this colourway and depending on how much I get out of it, will make either wristwarmers or a hat for my Mum.

Something in me says I should make an earwig motif to go on them. I think she might appreciate that.

‘H’ is for the knitted poem

Knitted H square for the Poetry Society

I knit like my fingers were on fire this Sunday to make a last-minute ‘H’ for the Poetry Society’s Knitted Poem which is a project to celebrate their centenary. They were missing both Rs and Hs and put out a call last week for speedy knitters to make some before the sewing-up deadline on 26th September. The Poetry Society had a stand which I saw at I Knit, showing some of the finished letters. I had thought that the deadline had passed, so I was really pleased to get a chance to take part.

It was the first time that I’ve done intarsia and found that it wasn’t all that bad after all! Sometimes I just need a prod in the right direction to try something new. Using small amounts of yarn on cards helped a lot to eliminate tangling.

Intarsia anti-tangling mechanism

We were asked to mark the back with our favourite poem, but to be honest I couldn’t choose. I put two titles onto my label. Two which create somewhat of a paradox when read together: one which I occassionally address but have yet to resolve in myself.

I chose  The Tyger by William Blake with its religious imagery and the sceptical Storm which is a beat poem by Tim Minchin.

You can see how everyone else is doing in the Ravelry Knit a Poem group. There are some lovely, inventively knitted letters there. Also stay tuned to find out what the final poem will be (it’s a secret until the sewing up is finished).

I Knit Weekender

It has taken me ages to get the photos off my camera, but finally here is my trip to the I Knit Weekender last Saturday. Such fun!

Knitting Reference Library stand. Don't they look efficient!

I travelled up on the Saturday and worked on the Knitting Reference Library stand with Linda, Kate and Carolyn from Uni of Southampton Library (and from my knitting group). It was a whole lot of fun and I met loads of great people, old friends and new (including an American sock monkey on a swap!)

Sock Monkey! Note her pink John Deere tractors fabric dress.

As I was on a stand, I didn’t have time to go and do any workshops or attend talks, but lots of people came to talk to us. I met Alice Starmore, Woolly Wormhead, the Knitting Noras (and Ashley!), Ysolda Teague, Joyce Meader, Jennie Atkinson, Neta Bruce and many more lovely people, including Betsan from Stitchlinks, and Susan and Gavin from KnitontheNet who I will be working with soon. Some people I knew online such as Curlyminx from twitter, others I see all the time at my knitting group. Of course not forgetting Gerard from IKnit too!

I even managed to get some (rather extensive) shopping in too:

Yarn Haul

I hadn’t bought any new yarn really since Unravel back in February, so I went all out and got some Malabrigo Lace, Zauberball sock yarn, Colinette Jitterbug, Fyberspates sock yarn in Cherry Tree and some Irish Linen yarn to try. I reckon that’ll keep me going for a while!

Sneak Preview of Xmas Knitting

I also bought some lovely pink vintage metal needles and some Cascade 220 which is being knitted up as a Christmas present. It was a long, long day which started with my friend Katie giving me a lift to the end of the Picadilly Line at Heathrow and ended with an epic train journey of three and a half hours back due to delays. It was such fun though. Can’t wait til next time.

probably the easiest wrist-warmers in the world

 

Here’s a really easy pattern for wrist warmers that is great for showing off your handspun yarn. I started off knitting a much more complicated open twisted rib stitch pattern, but soon realised something. It was almost impossible to see the pattern because the yarn I was using was the star of the show. I might as well have been knitting garter stitch. I started again with a simple two  by two rib, which gives the stretch that the wrist-warmers need, and shows off the yarn to its best. This is a great first pattern for knitting in the round, and has a just a couple of easy features to knit. The thumb is simply a large buttonhole, and the only other detail in the pattern is the fluted cast-off edge, which is made by increases.

You will need:

Approximately 100 metres/ 110 yards of aran (worsted) weight yarn.

4.5mm dpns or circular needle.

Stitch marker.

Tip: Divide the yarn into two balls before you start as it is hard to estimate where to stop once you’re knitting. I find that using scales to get it right helps.

Gauge: 5 stitches  and 7 rows per inch in rib pattern.

I wrote this pattern to fit my medium sized hands, but the pattern has lots of stretch, so gauge is not vital. Use larger or smaller needles if you need.

Abbreviations:

K: knit

P: purl

Kfb: Knit in the front and back of the same stitch (to increase)

Pattern:

Cast on 40 stitches using the longtail cast on method (for stretch).

Join without twisting and mark the start of the round with a stitch marker.

Work in pattern *K2, P2* until the work measures 3cm.

Next round: K2, P1, cast off 5 stitches, continue in pattern to end of round.

Next round: K2, cast on 5 stitches using the backward loop cast on method, continue in pattern to end of round.

Continue to work in pattern  until they measure approximately 19cm (just under 7 inches) from the cast on edge.

Next round: *Kfb, Kfb, P2* to end of round.

Next 2 rounds: *K4, P2* to end of round.

Cast off in pattern and weave in ends.

Then knit the other one (unless you’ve been magic looping them of course!)

Thanks to Lily for modelling in the photos!

Please feel free to knit up the wrist warmers to keep or as gifts/charity fundraising, but please do not knit up for commercial purposes or reproduce the pattern without first seeking permission.

Copyright © Ingrid Murnane 2009. All rights reserved.