Just-in-time Travel Knitting

~ Kristin Tolle ~ Leave a comment

Antarctica, the only continent I’d never set foot on, always felt out of reach. But after three years of planning and saving, last month I went. And when a knitter travels, they must have a project along!

My first plan was to take a pair of socks I was making, but I finished them the day before I left. These I took to wear.

Then I decided to knit a Whale Watch Hat designed by PDXKnitterati. This I finished on the flight down.

Thankfully, I brought a third project, another pair of socks, which tided me over. These are still a WIP.

Our days were busy and there was hardly time to knit. But, the expedition team, many of whom knit, would hold two-hour “Knit and Natters” on ‘at sea’ days. I attended half and lots of attendees were crew. That’s right. Just like in the days of old, seamen knit!

The trip was amazing, and I enjoyed it so much, I signed up for a trip to Machu Pichu, the Galapagos, and the headwaters of the Amazon with the same company. I leave in early May.

Why so soon? Seeing my dad nearly die last summer while I was caring for him made me realize it’s time to stop just existing and start living life.

And knitting? That’s coming along for the ride.

If you are wondering which project I landed on from the “Fresh Scent of Vintage Wool” post; I started the blanket, realized there wasn’t enough, and switched to the sweater. Fingers crossed I’ll have enough, since there are only 70 yards on each of the 23 skeins.

The Fresh Scent of Old Wool

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 8 Comments

The smell of sheep is heady as I slide the yarn out of its sleeve. I’m reluctant as I put the first of 23 skeins on the swift for winding. It’s old yarn. Probably spun before I was born; back when Bear Brand Yarns, USA was still a going concern.

The labels are in good nick, which gives me another pang of guilt. It says, “Permanently Mothproofed” and “Knits in a Jiffy on Big Needles”. It calls the yarn Four Seasons and that it’s a “washable” color. Though the care instructions tell a different story. This yarn will likely felt if not washed carefully by hand.

Bear Brand Four Seasons vintage yarn in a rich teal

The color is surprising—a lovely teal that you don’t often see in vintage yarns. Looking closely, it’s a consistent, solid color, mildly heathered only because it is 100% pure fleece wool. There’s none of the color variation you get with newer yarns or unrelenting fixed color of acrylic. It’s a color I gravitate to when purchasing new yarn and yet I’ve kept it “as is” for more than 25 years, since my grandmother stopped knitting like a treasured antique.

It is that—a treasure. But to leave it unused doesn’t feel right. And in this new year, I want to change that.

As I turn the winder, the smell of sheep brings back memories. I hear my grandmother telling me to be careful putting the hanks on back-to-back chairs for winding. She owned a winder, but not a swift, but she’s most often wind balls by hand because it was “too much trouble to get that contraption” out.

As the 23 small cakes build up (only 71 yards each) these skeins are in the phase of becoming. And that by caking them, they are that much closer to being something warm and loved, instead of languishing in a box, waiting to be used.

Now to choose a project. A blanket or a sweater? It’s a tough choice. Thoughts?

Updating the Queue for an Inspired 2024

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 5 Comments

In 2022, I took a year off from my “Buy No New Yarn” fast. The result was that I knit twice as many projects than I had in any previous year. Let’s face it. Touching feeling and smelling fresh fiber is part of the inspiration that drives us as fiber artists.

In 2023, I went back on my “yarn buying fast”. Did this impact my creativity? Possibly, but it was only one of many reasons.

Seed Stitch Bathmat
Shadow Study Throw
Tenderfoot Bathmat
Home Knits of 2023

It’s been a tough year. Some of the highlights were catching Covid (twice, once severely), being my parent’s 24/7 carer for 5 weeks, a water heater failure, black mold, rats and repair/remodeling fails.

With my knitting time curtailed, I only completed 9 projects (shown here)—mainly simple and small scrappy items. The upside: everything started was finished. The downside: at one point there was nothing on my needles for weeks. It felt odd and a bit scary to be “stuck” for inspiration.

Whale Tail Hat
Fool Hat for Dad
Pastiche Hat
Hats Knitted in 2023

I’m bursting with enthusiasm for 2024.

Will I keep the yarn fast going? Maybe, but it won’t be a rule. So far, I’m focused on “shopping” through the amazing yarns in my stash. These have been paired with beautiful patterns already in my library—ones I’ve wanted to make for years.

Deep-V-Hoodie: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/13-deep-v-hoodie
Vogue Knitting – Deep V Coverup
No Pattern – Fitted Turtleneck
Sleeveless Shell in Broken Rib
Sweaters Knitted in 2023

What’s helped is that my stash and library are (now) within arm’s reach. My library is in a bookshelf next to my bed. My stash in my closet. To get up and get dressed is to be surrounded by inspiration.  

I also decided to stop saving scraps of yarn (less than 100 yards) and removed a lot scrappy projects from my queue. Too often they felt like things I “should” knit as opposed to making things I want to knit.

Alongside new projects, I queued ones I’ve made and loved. If you loved a project, why not make it again in a different color or yarn weight? Just swatch until you get the right gauge/color scheme.  

I’m also adopting the mindset that more isn’t better. Better is better. And what’s better than doing the projects that inspire you?

Joyful Patterns – AKA Downsizing Your Library

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 5 Comments

When my husband and I moved last summer to a place half the size of our previous home, we had a rule, no boxes move unopened. We both had boxes in the garage (mine) and in a storage unit (his), that had not been opened in two or more moves, most from before we moved in together.  

To decide what to keep and what to save, we had to see it all. What followed was a tiring three-month process of narrowing down everything we owned to the things we felt we needed—with a few exceptions. For me the exception was knitting books and supplies.

As I’ve been working on my latest sweater, I’ve been power watching Marie Kondo’s show on Netflix, Tidying Up. In her show, she helps organize everything: clothes, dishes, office supplies, crafts, etc. Regardless of the item, you must touch it and ask, “Does this bring me joy?”

I walked over to my overburdened bookshelves and felt a sense of sadness. Several of my books had never been opened. Most had never been used.

When I looked through them I realized that there was a lot of duplication and some ego involved. Letting them go was a relief. And there was another burst of joy when I removed them from my Ravelry library. I felt like a weight had been lifted!

Marie suggests you thank the items before discarding them and I am truly thankful for the inspiration these books provided–including the knowledge of what books not to buy! I’m also happy to have a foot of space to place pending projects—where the pattern, yarn and needles are ready to go. No more digging them out of storage!

My plan is to take my extra books to my local library or yarn shop. Since Salish Sea Yarn Co opened on the island, there are loads of new knitters on island. So, having some sharable resources can only make that easier for them to pick up their new craft.

Am I brave enough to tackle my stash next? Maybe.

Charity Knitting With the Capitol Hill Knitters of Doom

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 2 Comments

I meant to talk about it last month, but since a friend of mine already blogged about it, I think I felt a bit like it didn’t matter. We ended up getting a lot of local news coverage (CBS, Seattle Spectator, Capitol Hill Seattle Blog, etc.). It was heartwarming (and body warming) fun!  

In retrospect, I think there are thoughts I can share. For example, beyond charity, reasons why you may wish to consider it.

Fellowship: I loved participating with others in my group. We are not a guild, just a bunch of gals that meet up at a brewery. A common cause to be a force for good made us even more cohesive.

Stashbusting: As I’ve said elsewhere in this blog, I have so. much. yarn. Why not use it for a good cause?

Swatching: You have to be careful here since a hat in the round may not match a flat swatch (the curse of purling). But if you are planning an in-the-round project, as I was, it’s a great test. Or knit a scarf in the new pattern/technique you are trying to perfect.

Joy: It made me happy to think someone in need would be wearing items I made. I love the notion that I may have made a difference. It’s true that woolen socks, hats and scarves only addresses a tiny piece of the challenges facing the unhoused. But there is joy in making whatever contribution you can to those in need.

Sea Glass Hat Knitted as a Swatch for a T-Shirt

Important things to consider:

If you do do this, it is important that the items be good quality. Before this opportunity came up, I’d been stockpiling hats to sell at my LYS. And eventually, I’ll do that. The upshot is they were “sellable” quality items. This means that donating them, alongside the men and women in my knitting group, is a meaningful gesture.

It’s also important that the items be washable. For this reason, I used superwash wool or acrylic for all of the donated items.

How to get started:

Our donation was organized by a member in order to keep it local, but I’ve also found great joy in knitting and mailing off red premie hats. And after we got coverage, other groups reached out to us to make suggestions and recommendations. Good acts beget more good acts—a virtuous circle.

Ravelry also has several charity knitting groups. Unfortunately, many of these have gone a bit fallow. So, start a new one and let me know, so I can join!

My knitting group (Yes, we really are called Capitol Hill Knitters of Doom) is always looking for more ideas, so if you have any, please share them in the responses and I’ll pass them along.

Longing for Something Simple

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 7 Comments

I’ve been on a brioche kick. Thanks to PDXknitterati, I have mastered much of the new nomenclature of brioche, I’ve been on a kick to do a lot of it to cement it into my brain. Keep in mind, I’ve been knitting brioche since I discovered the “Built for Comfort Hoodie” it in Vogue Knitting’s Winter ‘98/‘99 issue (Vol. 16, No. 3).

I’m currently knitting another sweater from the same Vogue Magazine issue: an Adrienne Vittidini Turtleneck Pullover. I’ve knit it once before (my sweater is the example in Ravelry). This time I’m dressing it up a bit with some furry yarn: Bernat Marmot and some vintage Brunswick Germantown Worsted.

Cotton Raglan Mock Turtleneck
Picture from Vogue Knitting Mag
WIP Turtleneck Sweater

What I think I’m trying to do is make my items seem simple to do by repetition. But it’s not working, because right now all I can think about is doing a *really* simple project. Something to cleanse my knitting palette.

Do you ever feel like this? And if so, what do you do to get your maker mojo back?

I-Cord Fix Works for Old Sweaters Too

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 2 Comments

Have you noticed that you’ve stopped wearing an older sweater?

Maybe you feel like you should wear newer ones you’ve knit. Or maybe there’s something, and I know I hate to admit this, that hasn’t held up as well as you’d like.

Many years ago I knit an Einstein Coat. I loved it when I saw it on the pattern designer at a Stitches event and it was very simple to make. The only thing I didn’t like about it was that it was very boxy. So, I made a fitted version. When you alter a sweater pattern, other things can happen. If you are interested, you can read about those foibles in this blog.

Over the years I’ve noticed that more and more, the coat gaps at the button band. Had I knit the sweater as written, this would be less noticeable. But in reviewing others’ results (there’s almost 1500 examples), I’m not alone. A coat knitted with chunky weight yarn is heavy and, as a result, stretches. Over time stretching is more pronounced around the buttons.

I tried just tightening up the buttons, which helped (and I recommend). But it didn’t fix it completely. Others added a button band and/or moved the buttons further in. This can help, but what if you no longer have the same yarn? What if it’s discontinued?

Not wanting to only wear it open, I contemplated frogging it. But then I remembered how much time it took to make it. Hands down, it’s the biggest garment I’ve ever knit. It’s so big, I often I use it for a lap blanket.

I recently fixed shaping issues with a new sweater by using I-cord, so I thought it might be worth trying it on an old one. When I fixed the new sweater I’d also run out of yarn, so I chose a contracting color. Since i-cord is a finished edge, it looks like an intended design feature. You can read more about that in this blog post.

I started with 3 stitches, but that didn’t wrap around the edge well enough for such a thick fabric. I then tried and stuck with 4, but if I were to do it again, I might use 5. The video I used to get started was this one from Purl Avenue. I watched several, but many were for i-cord bind offs or doing it as you go, not adding it to a finished edge.

Not only did it give me another inch between the buttons and of button band, it shored up the edge and held is straight even when fully buttoned. That made the stretch come from the sweater, not the edge. I also chose a less stretchy yarn (bamboo viscose), rather than wool, to make sure that it wouldn’t become lax over time.

I can’t wait to try this on something else!

And speaking of fixing old sweaters, I’m looking for a way to “loosen” a button band that’s too tight. If you have any ideas for that, I’m all ears. I didn’t knit the sweater (it was a gift), so I don’t the yarn and I’m a bit nervous about unpicking someone else’s work.

From Floppy to Fabulous – I-cord Saves the Day

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 3 Comments

I love Hannah Fettig’s designs and I love Madelintosh DK, but sometimes I don’t love them together. The first time I knit, what I like to call the George Hancock (a combination of Georgetown and Hancock patterns in Home and Away) I loved it. But I also knit is from the bottom up, in pieces. What I failed to realize is that the structures came from the seams.

Bottom-up George Hancock
Two books from Quince & Co. Home and Away and Madder 2
Top-down George Hancock

The second time I wanted to try a top-down version, since everyone is always saying how you can get a better fit. To match my figure, I made a medium until the waist and then increased to a size large at the hip. This also made the sweater longer, which I also wanted.  

I hoped the smaller size on top would also help compensate for the heavy garter collar, but it didn’t. The front hung in a deeply handkerchief hem and the back pooched out, making my hips look even bigger—the opposite of what I’d hoped.

To fix it I tried these in order:

  1. Taking off the collar and knitting it with one size smaller needles (2 sizes smaller than the body)
  2. Knitting side i-cord ties at the waist
  3. Adding i-cord to every edge in a “sturdier” but “lighter” wool

The first one helped. The sweater fit a bit better, but it still was saggy in the front and poochy in the back. So, I moved onto #2, attaching two i-cords at the waist to tie it shut. No joy. I tried a leather belt but even that failed to hold up all that garter in a slippery Madelintosh.

The pattern was written for Quince and Co’s Owl, not a heavy merino superwash wool. It only worked in the bottom-up pattern because the seams provided structure.

At Red Alder, one of the designers mentioned that i-cord was the “duct tape” of knitting. So, after the leather belt experiment failed, I took a lighter, yet stickier, wool yarn and knit i-cord around every edge—including the sleeves, which were too short because I ran out of yarn (bonus problem solved).

The i-cord directly onto the garment edges by picking up a stitch for every row. As I was going around the neck, I noticed it wasn’t having the right effect at the fitted waist, so I tore it back and skipped every second stitch 2” above and below my natural waist. This created fitting in the collar to match the body.  

Lastly, I sewed up the bottom and created a top attachment to create a pocket. Because who doesn’t want a full-sized hidden pocket in their sweaters?

A Fitted Knit Jacket With a Pocket

I’ve frogged a lot of sweaters over the years—too many to count—including the sweater from the last blog. Sometimes frogging makes sense, but this time I knew that the pattern/yarn should have worked. I knew it was a structural fail, not a knitting fail. And when structure is what lets you down—i-cord is a potential solution.

So, hats off to i-cord!

Knit on!

To Tear Out or Fix; That Is the Question

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 2 Comments

Are you a ripper or a fixer? I’m a bit of both.

One of the teachers at the Red Alder Fiber 2022 Festival said that i-cord is the duct tape of knitting. And while I’m sure that there are cases where this is true—it doesn’t fix all problems. For example, if you knit the armholes much, much, much too large–i-cord is not a solution.

Sweater patterns do not typically fit me. I have several things against me.

  1. I’m curvy, particularly in the hip area.
  2. I’m broad shouldered (wide across the back) and small breasted.
  3. My rise from my breasts to my shoulder is long.
  4. I’m almost 6 feet tall

The pattern I used is Audrey, by Melissa Leapman—a beautiful, easy-to-read, quick knit. To make it fit me better, I made adjustments to fit my unusual body. The design is for someone less curvy than me—it has no fitting but gave the impression of hourglass figure—no matter what your shape.

To deal with my longer body, I knit a few more “straight” rows at the bottom. To deal with my long measurement from top of the shoulder to nipple, I did this same at the top of the body too. Unfortunately, while this worked well at the bottom, it didn’t at the top. I ended up with a huge armhole–about 4″ to large for my twiggy little arms.

Audrey – body pieces blocked

I really, really should have cut my losses early and tore it out. Instead I blocked the pieces, sewed them together and knit the button band. The latter took two tries to sort out with my adjustments.

After three tries at the sleeves, Bottom up, then top down, followed by a hybrid (armpit short rows), I realized that no amount of fiddling would fix it. But given I tend towards the fixer end of the spectrum, I sallied forth.

And now?

I’m ripping. But that’s okay, I have all kinds of ideas on what do to (and not to do) to make it fix me in the best way possible.

Wish me luck!  

When Knitting Isn’t a Labor of Love

~ Kristin Tolle ~ 4 Comments

I have cast-on-itis. I want so badly to cast on another sweater project, my teeth ache! This is because, at any given time, I like having a “menu” of projects on the needles. This generally consists of:

  • A pair of socks
  • A hat or scarf (or both)
  • A sweater
  • A throw or blanket; and (maybe)
  • Minor household items (rug, dishcloths, etc.)

There was a time when I had one (and only one) project going at a time, with other projects queued behind. The monogamy ended when I started knitting blankets because they are harder to do “in transit”. This led me to realize, I really enjoy having a selection of projects to choose from depending on my mood, where I am, and what I’m doing.

At present, I do not have a sweater, hat, or household item on the needles. And my closet is full of project bags filled with all the necessaries to get started. This is to keep me focused on completing at least one of my two WIP blankets. If I had my way, one of these I’d toss out—yarn and all.

It’s been years since I started the throw, which only gets worked on as a chore. I want to finish it and send it on, but it keeps getting stalled.

How I ended up here was I wanted to prevent my mother buying a pretty throw made of cheap, plastic yarn she saw in an art shop. It was obvious to me it was for looking at, not using. So, I asked her if she planned to use or display it. “Use it, of course!” *sigh*

I regrettedly I told her I’d make her something she could actually use. Unfortunately, mom went out and bought the same velour yarn and picked out a close pattern. And here we are, years later, her without a throw for her couch and me with a project I pick up rarely and reluctantly. Deep in my heart, I’m cetain it will have the same problems as the art shop blanket.

Velour WIP Blanket

Knitting for family and friends should be a labor of love. “Knit to order” is for people that do it for a living. In short, if the urge hits you to stop a person from making a bad knitted item purchasing decision you shouldn’t. Firstly, support to support the fiber artist and secondly for your own sanity.

Has this happened to you? Is so, what was the item and what did you do?