Posted on 01/21/2008 by Andrea
| Comments (2)
Filed under :
Knitting, Tips
People say it's a good thing to make mistakes. Making mistakes allows us to learn, builds character, yadda yadda.
Those people are crazy.
I was too demoralized to mention it at the time, but when I was trying to finish Brad's St. Mawes sweater just before Christmas, I ran into a monumental knitting disaster.
This may be difficult to see, but it's a hole in the sweater. You see, I realized after I sewed the front and back together, knitted on the collar, and sewed on one of the sleeves, that I had knitted the sleeves FOUR INCHES too long. In the process of trying to remove the seamed sleeve, I accidentally CUT a stitch in the front of the sweater.
Let me pause here while we all finish gasping in horror.
Okay, I'm recovered now.
Like I said, I was too demoralized to face this. I put the sweater away for a month and finally got up the nerve to bring it back out and figure out what to do about this problem. The answer was simpler than I had even hoped. There's a very clearly photographed example in Knitty of how to fix this type of problem: Knitty: Repairs 101. You basically undo the knitting horizontally until you have weave-in-able ends and use a new piece of yarn to graft the stitches together, much like a kitchener stitch.
See? All better:
The only real problem I ran into was that this hole occurred in the second-to-the-edge stitch, so I didn't have a long end on that side to weave in. Here was my solution:
I tied a new piece of yarn to the short end using as tight of a square knot as I could manage. I plan on weaving the knotted end into the sleeve seam.
All's well that ends well. Now I just have to take care of that small problem of the extra eight inches of sleeve.
Posted on 01/16/2008 by Barb
| Comments (6)
Filed under :
Finished Objects, Knitting, Spinning, Tips
I recently added a zipper to a sweater and people asked how I got it in straight, without having it look all "ruffly."
It's pretty simple. In addition to a sewing machine, your garment and the zipper, you'll need a sheet or two of white tissue paper.
This technique works for all sorts of finicky fabrics ...
Here I'm putting an open-end zipper in the front of a sweater. First, carefully block the sweater, making sure both edges for the zipper are the same length, that they're straight and any stripes or patterns line up left to right.
I generally leave the zipper zipped when I do all this, but if it's easier for you to take the two halves apart, that works, too.
Position the first side of your zipper along the edge of the sweater as shown, and pin it in place. Then lay a sheet of thin tissue paper over it. The tissue paper permits the sewing machine foot to glide over the knitting without pulling at or catching on the yarn. With the tissue side up, carefully stitch through tissue, sweater and zipper, making your row of stitches far enough back from the teeth so the zipper pull will be able to move freely along teeth without any yarn catching in it. It's pretty easy to see what you're doing right through the tissue paper.
Then carefully tear the perforated tissue paper away and remove the pins. Repeat for the second side of the zipper.
Photo by Andrea
That's all there is to it. When you're finished, you'll want to give it a good blocking, of course.
I just grabbed a bit of scrap yarn and tied it to the zipper pull on this sweater, but it's fun to find an interesting bead or bauble to dress it up. I'm keeping my eyes open for just the right thing!
Posted on 01/15/2008 by Andrea
| Comments (4)
Filed under :
Knitting, Tips
In the last episode of Cast On, Brenda mentioned that she loves the Fiber Trends felted clogs, but she hates knitting them because it's so easy to get lost in the pattern.
I kind of feel the same way, but I love them enough that I know I'll be making lots of them in my time. They'll make great gifts. In the process of knitting these, I've come up with a triumvirate of tools for not losing my place in this rather convoluted (but completely genius) pattern. In case they're helpful for anyone else, I thought I'd share them here. Basically, it involves documenting in the pattern and in your knitting where you are at any given time. Doing it this way, I was able to knit the soles of these clogs without ever having to rip back ONE stitch.
1. A Post-It Note.
The Post-It Note marks the section you're currently knitting. I line it up so that the left-hand side of the paper aligns with the first stitch in the section I'm working and the sticky side is just above the line I'm looking at.
Once you're finished working a small section (e.g., a bunch of M1s or a section of knitting before a wrap-and-turn), move the Post-It note so the left-hand side of it now aligns with the next unworked stitch you'll be working. ALSO, before beginning to knit that next section, you'll now need your cable needle:
2. A Cable Needle.
Once you move the Post-It to its new location, you want to mark in your knitting the last stitch you just worked. I stick a cable needle through the stitch I just finished working and also through the knitting below (just to keep it secure). This is your lifeline. You know that all the knitting up until this cable needle followed the pattern and you don't have to worry about it anymore. If your next task is to knit 24 stitches, for example, it'll be really easy to make sure you've actually knitted 24 because the cable needle should be back at the 25th stitch. It'll also be hard to forget where you are in the printed pattern because that Post-It note is sitting there telling you what do to next.
Here's a close-up of what I'm talking about:
(You could also use any movable stitch marker or safety pin. I used safety pins at first, but I found the cable needle was the fastest and easiest, because you can slip it in and out easily without having to open it.)
3. Some Hershey Kisses.
Hershey Kisses, safety pins, bottles of beer. Anything that you have several of and doesn't move of its own volition (I was going to say cats, but that wouldn't work). I used Hershey Kisses because they were the only thing I had seven of that were easily within arms reach. Plus then you can have a built-in reward when you're done knitting.
The Hershey Kisses are for those times in the pattern where it'll say something like (M1, K2) seven times. You don't really need the Hershey Kisses, but if you really want to be foolproof about knitting this pattern, it's just easiest to have seven items handy and move them one pile to the next as you finish each (M1, K2).
And that's it!
If you do these three things together, you'll actually be able to knit Felted Clogs even if you're not in a soundproof room, even if you're absorbed in watching that episode of Buffy, the Vampire Slayer where the girl's mom who really wanted to relive her cheerleading glory days switched bodies with her daughter and then started sabotaging the other cheerleaders using voodoo. This complicated pattern will actually start to resemble relaxing and relatively mindless knitting. I swear.
And for anyone else who's knitted these, let me know if you have any other tricks for getting through this pattern! I plan to knit lots more of these in the future.
