A-line frock

Just completed this one and I'm mighty proud. I drafted the pattern myself from scratch. This is my third in the 'flora and fauna' fashion series! The placket for buttons (at the back of the dress) is much more cleaner than in my previous endeavours. I was also better this time with the piping at the neck. The V at the yoke was a bit tricky but it turned out not bad for a first attempt.

The Gurus speaketh: 'every mistake is a design opportunity'. So it was when an erroneous fabric cut gave me the idea of a box pleat of flowers peeping from among the fishies.

Pattern-making with fabrics share the very same fundamentals as that with knitting but fabric is much more unforgiving with mistakes. That's coz there is no intrinsic stretch in the material! But look at it this way: the learning is that much faster with fabric!! :)

Flora and Fauna

One digs flowers and the other, fish. I'm talking of my darling nieces ofcourse. In the pictures are a couple of wearables I cut and stitched for them recently. I used printed flannel to keep them snug.

Traditional (Exc)Uses for Knitting - Winter Wear!!

These are my experiments with knitting a cap and a pair of gloves. For the cap, I followed a pattern for the J-crew at www.knittinghelp.com.

The gloves are a most clever I-cord design illustrated in NonaKnits' blog:
http://nonaknits.typepad.com/nonaknits/serial_patterns/index.html

These were my first pair ever and my confidence grew in strides as I proceeded to completion; thanks to the elegant design and simple instructions.

Socked by the Dark Age of ignorance

On the precious subjects of swatch and gauge, here's a reminder why they're so critical: a most disproportionate one of a pair of socks (see picture). Too large in diameter and too short from heel to toe. All because, I in my beginner's blind enthusiasm, set out to conquer the world (of socks) and ignored taking my arsenal with me. That arsenal incidentally is the gauge. This sock (pun intended) - fortunately or unfortunately - taught me more than I had intended for it to!! :)

Size it up by simply gauging!

I have only recently discovered the utility of a swatch. The most common use of it is to identify needle size for any particular project but the real genius of the swatch is in re-sizing fitted garments.

Most patterns come in line-by-line instructions and in case of sweaters, a very simple outline of the pattern drawing is available. Mapping the smaller geometric units that add up to make the complete pattern comes handy in more ways than one. It not only makes for better understanding of the instructions - often making them almost intuitive - but also illustrates the underlying architecture.

Now that we've broken up the pattern into smaller units, and have the requisite swatch gauge information, we have full control on modifying the pattern. Why stop there? Change needle sizes, change yarn materials. The result is a fully customized pattern derived from a generic one. What a thrill!! :)

I knitted the sailboat (shown in picture) following free pattern instructions from www.knittinghelp.com. The only purpose it served was to quell my doubts on how even my tension was. I'd picked up needles and yarn after more than a decade and did not want to dive into projects unless the tension was even. I was quite pleased to see that the sailboat did infact look like one!! It spoke to me: " Sail on..!"

Jewel Profusion

This teeny tank in jewel tones is the quickest to knit! Here's the ingenious pattern: http://www.zibibboisgood.com/patterns/patt_10minutetank.pdf

I had made one for my 4.5 yr old niece by following exact instructions from the pattern. One tank-top later, I got wiser. In place of a double-needle BO seam, I used kitchener grafting to seam the edges - gives a clean invisible seam. Also, for this second one (the one in the picture here), I reduced the size to fit my 1.5 yr old pretty little niece.

I didn't want to change the gauge by using smaller sized needles. Although it is a perfectly respectable practice - if at all this method is used - I prefer knitting less and enjoy getting my fingers dirty with the nuts and bolts of garment architecture. So I did some basic re-engineering to arrive at the new numbers.

I followed the original pattern to derive a pattern diagram, divided it into blocks and converted stitches/rows numbers to cms going by the gauge in the pattern. I then diminished the size of each block in the schematic to suit my baby-niece's measurements. Finally, I arrived at the new numbers by converting the length/breadth/hypotenuse etc of each geometric block by using the gauge I derived from my swatch. The end result is just perfect!

Thank you Nee for the wooden buttons idea. Found just the right ones at the yarn expo.

A trot to a yarn expo and $200 later..

.. what would one expect but cart-loads of material! You name it, I got it. Yarn (but ofcourse), books (1000 sweaters by Griffiths and The Advanced Knitting Architect), and a mag subscription (Interweave Knits). Oh, I forgot to mention another set of DPNs.

The picture on the left has my green yarn looking yellow thanks to the flash. So that's why another one without flash - just so the hue is captured.

I mostly stayed away from funky equipment (no budget) but I was quite taken in by the knitting-pattern software. There was one for motifs, another for sweaters, a third for socks and so forth. Not compatible with Unix/Linux sadly. For motifs I plan on using Gimp but that's some way off.

Itching to swatch all the yarns. Got a few patterns in mind too! 

Fear Factor

A vile looking spider, this! :) I'm arachnophobic - you can imagine how easy it would've been joining the head to the body and attaching the legs. Yikes! Don't even ask!! :)

And it isn't even Halloween. What was I thinking!!!

Tutorials and Tools

Thanks to my beginner's enthusiasm, I had purchased a couple of books - 'Chick Knits' by Julia Cooper and 'Knitting School - a complete course. Very quickly I discovered Amy Finlay's instructional videos on www.knittinghelp.com. Since then, the books have been pretty much untouched! Goes without saying that all videos are great - but I especially dug the ones on 'tips and tricks' and 'fixing mistakes'.

Two words on Chick Knits - most unchallenging. Perhaps it's a good starter for someone who wants to overcome the fears of knitting and wants to begin with really - and I mean really - simple patterns.

Besides the books, I'd purchased a beginner's kit containing an instructional leaflet, 2 pairs of straight needles and useful notions like stitch markers, gauge ruler, stitch holders, cable stitch holder and a row counter. Apart from the row counter, I'm very fond of the everything else that came in the set! During this shopping binge, I picked up a crochet hook, the use for which I realised later when I found my stitches slipping off double-pointed needles and unravelling - thank God for impulse buys. :)

And how can I not mention my precious boye needlemaster set of needles and paraphernelia?!! I just love the set. Love it love it love it!!

Cables

This cable headband was my latest venture and has proved useful as an accessory. That's a bonus coz my intention was just to knit something quick to get a hang of cables. I'm mostly good with it now, except, it gets a little tricky holding the left-needle stitches from slipping while I'm knitting off the cable needle!

Introduction

This is my space to wax eloquent about my projects. Let me leave it at that coz, like the it of the ebay ad, many MANY different activities translate into 'projects' depending on some yet-undiscovered forces of nature!!! And some of them - surprise surprise - actually materialise into products/skills!!

For a few weeks now, I have been knitting. It was more than 12 years ago that I had knitted some and then stopped. I was surprised by the ease with which I could pick up from where I had left off so many years ago. Gratification of this nature is wicked!

So the intention is to post my WIPs and completed projects, some exciting discoveries and maybe an opinion or two too. On for some fun!!