Category Archives: knitting

The tale of two wraps and a cowl

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A second Spindrift wrap is off the needles, blocked and on its way to a new home.I just used pins for this one as I didn’t have my blocking wires at the time and I was in a hurry to get this blocked.

Lacy type knitting evidently isn’t my forte but I’m going to keep trying.  A double yarn over here or a missed stitch?  I don’t know but it won’t unravel so I’m calling it good.

Besides who will notice it when worn?

I did reblock the first Spindrift that had several challenges and it looks so much better.  I used the new blocking wires for this and was really impressed with how easy it was to shape the wrap.

I picked up the dropped stitch and used a crochet hook to “knit” it down to the eyelet and tacked it down.

I probably should have just tacked the stitch where it was dropped as the result of trying to take it to the edge or in this case a change in pattern caused a line of tight stitches.

But blocking helped relax those to some extent.  My cast-on needs some practice, too.

Lesson learned.  I hope I can remember it again!

This cowl is for my grandson, brother of the twins.  I can’t send them something and ignore him!

The pattern is the Neon Jungle Cowl but I made some modifications that can be found on my Ravelry page here.  I liked the thermal-type texture of the Broken Rib Stitch and it looks good on both the right side and wrong side.

The color is a multi-hunter green but looks more bluish here.

It should keep him warm.

 

 

 

I bought some

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Blocking wires that is.

The packet is quite small but then these are the flexible wires that don’t use up a lot of space when not in use.

This is the mixed set that includes 3 – 70-inch wires, 4 – 35-inch wires and 30 T-pins.

I’ve already blocked another neck wrap with them and they are a delight to use.

These were ordered from Miss Babs.  As a welcoming gift, she included three stitch markers…

…and a cute ten-yard twist of this gorgeous yarn.

One day I’ll even buy some of her hand-dyed yarns.  They are all so beautiful!

Smalltown, USA

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I live in Smalltown USA.

That fact really hit home the other day while I was mailing something at the post office.

The postal worker and another customer were admiring my Don’t Tread on Me purse that I made last year.

Customer:  That is a really cool purse.

Postal worker:  Yeah.  I really like it.

Me:  Thanks.  I made it.

C&Pw:  Really?  How did you do it?

Me: I knit it really big then I tossed it into the washing machine with hot water and it shrunk to this size.

Customer:  Did you mean to do that?

Me:  Yes, so that it would be a smaller size.

Customer:  Was it hard?

Me:  Not really.  The wool was a bit scratchy and that made it tough on my hands but it wasn’t that hard to knit.

Customer:  Oh, you could sell those.  I bet someone would buy it for $50.

Me:  Well, I have $70 in yarn and $5 in the hardware so if I were to sell it, I’d charge $500.  It was a lot of work and it’s lined, too.

Postal worker:  If you decided to sell them, then she (customer) and I would quit our jobs and come and work for you!

Me:  Or I could sell the pattern for $30 and wouldn’t have to do all that work.

Smalltown, USA

Blocking wires

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I’ve got another Spindrift Shawl completed.  Well, except for the blocking.

Why so knit another one so soon?  Well, I wasn’t all that pleased with the colors of first one.  One of the visiting twin granddaughters loves the rainbows and unicorns so I offered it to her at Thanksgiving.  Well, I can’t give one twin something without giving the other one so I had knit another Spindrift Shawl for her.  Only we’re calling them neck wraps instead of shawls.  Nine-year-olds don’t wear shawls.

I blocked the other Spindrift with pins.  Fun? Not.

I don’t have blocking wires to help with that process but understand how useful they are.  Blocking wires are thin wires threaded through an edge stitch and making it easier to keep the edges straight during blocking, and allowing for fewer pins to shape the item.  Here is an excellent article explaining how and why this is done.

I have another shawl in my queue that I’ll talk about another time.  I’m not sure if I’ll knit any others later but I decided that want a set of flexible wires as they would be easier to store.  And blocking wires can be used on other knitted items, too.

So, when you block your knitted or crocheted items do you use pins, straight blocking wires or flexible wires?