There was "Timing"...now "Time"....

and questions like, "Where does it go?" It's the end of the month already and what have I accomplished? It doesn't feel like much. I did take a whirlwind week and drove from Tennessee to northern New York. I should say I 'rode', but I got some quality knitting time in. I started FiberTrend's S-2003 The Sheep Shawl



using Web's wool/cashmere blend in a finger weight. I always say I don't like lace and doing an overall lace pattern repeatedly IS pretty boring. Mixing up the patterns and doing one chart after another is pretty exciting like working fair isle in Meg Swansen's Dubbelmossa and I LOVE fair isle. I'm already down to the sheep so let's hope the border doesn't finish me off.



A quick hour where I grew up was enough to visit the lake and pick up some cheese. Ahh, the power of cheese. After seeing Lake Ontario again and remembering how great it was growing up there, I know why my daughter loves Maine so much. It was still two weeks too early for any foliage, but just in time for the salmon fishing!

Timing

I've been re-writing an old pattern up for one of my lists. It's a felted bag. I usually just wing it when I'm tweaking or creating something new. One just needs to remember to write everything down...even the tiny minutia. So I'm done and need a button. Not just any button. This thing has to "pop"! Startle the senses. One of a kind. So the hunt begins through my vast stash of buttons. Buttons can make or break a project. What you have created may be wonderful but if you put on a blah button, what's the point?

My search ended in Knoxville at Loopville. Jinka, the owner, has always been very helpful whenever I've gone there. I've picked up many great buttons there but really didn't think I would find what I needed. It would have to be larger than most buttons, you see. I thought I would end up dragging out the polymer clay and improvising. In one of the four baskets of buttons I looked through, out popped this!


This button is over 2" square and glittery and one of a kind. I must write and find out the creator's name and give her the proper credit she deserves. It certainly made the bag as you can see here. It's hard to tell but the colours match exactly! Once again there is peace in my home.


Update: I just discovered the button artisan....Gail Hughes and you can see a sampling of more of her buttons here.

Gifts In General

It's always difficult to decide what to get as a gift for someone especially when you do not know who will be receiving it. So I give what I would like to receive. Fortunately, this gift was well received because the recipient is as anal as am I, and I mean this in a most loving way!




I needle punched "Grandmother's Garden" by Stone & Thread (Warning: blatant plug.) purchased at Crossstitch-ville and finished the edges as I would a hooked rug...by whip stitching around the edge. I then glued it to the cover of a 6" x 6" photo album using a water based glue. If the album wears out, it can be detached and glued to whatever or framed.

So it's a photo album. What's so anal about that? Inside I placed "Knitting Project" pages where you can enter all the pertinent information. On the opposite side is room for a picture of the finished project. Most people can just remember what they knit. Well, when you get to be my age, you know that just isn't true anymore. I hadn't even hit 40 when I moved and started unpacking items that covered a ten year span in which I was positive I hadn't knit a thing. This is also when my journaling started. Just be glad I am only going to post on new items I'm working and not the past twenty years worth.

Rug Hooking!

What can I say about rug hooking? This is my latest passion and I can't get enough. Years ago I bought a kit with a two minute instruction on how to hook at a festival. This is NOT the way to start. I gave the kit away in disgust. I now know it wasn't me. It was the kit, hook, and instruction. The kit had size 3 cut, a hook that I found hard to use, and two minutes is not enough time for anyone to properly learn.

I later found a DVD on Nantucket Rug Hooking by Judy Taylor. Since I was a knitter and spinner and a stash to rival some yarn shops, this was a match made in heaven. The chair pad at the top is my very first venture into rug hooking. I simply threw a piece of burlap in the chair and drew the outline of the seat. Then I drew the picture. It's good to know the picture you draw isn't necessarily the picture you end up with. Otherwise, I would have ended up with two headed sheep and a house in the middle of the bay.

Since then I have watched Gene Shepherd's tutorial on beginning rug hooking...bought "Woolly Sheep", a #6 cut kit from Joan Moshimer when I was up in Maine last summer (I added an extra cloud)...




and Red Saltbox Americana, a #8 cut kit from Sharon Perry off Ebay this summer. Don't look for a bush in her kit. I added it. I can not leave anything alone!



Life is good and I'm hooked!

The Acorn Bag

This is my Acorn Bag. The bag itself is not my pattern. It's the Fulled Lopi Tote from Hello Yarn. I LOVE this bag pattern. When everyone was making the Buttonhole Bag, this is the bag I was making. The bottom is perfect, in my opinion. I knit the bag, added an acorn knitted from Nicki Epstein's "Knitted Embellishments" and needle felted the leaf from wool roving I hand dyed. Yes, I can do it all when the lights go out.

The trick of needle felting is perspective. I didn't like my leaf when I was done so it started prying it off from the outside edges. That little bit of lifting gave it the 3D look I wanted to achieve. I grew rather fond of this bag but we were having a spinning demonstration at a local event and I put it up for sale. Of course, it sold. Perhaps, now is the time to make another.

Got 100 gms?

This is a super simple project for that extra ball of yarn we end up with after knitting a sweater. Remember, the yardage is more important than the grams/ounces. Think of this hat as a blank canvas with which to create a stunning/outrageous/gorgeous chapeau. The hat at the top is modified with a simple felted I-cord band. I think the addition of the right feather would be nice...while the hat at the bottom became a pumpkin head. The leaf is from Nickie Epstein's Knitted Embellishments. A hat like this screams, "needle felt on me!" I'll save this idea for the next post. :-)

WoolTales Felted Hat

US 10 - 16" circular needle and/or double points
230 yards of feltable worsted weight wool or mohair

With a SINGLE strand of yarn, CO 100 sts -
Join and knit 65 rows.

Next row: *K8, k2tog* repeat around.
Knit 2 rows.

Next row: *K7, k2tog* repeat around.
Knit 2 rows.

Next row: *K6, k2tog* repeat around.
Knit 2 rows.

Continue these three rows (changing to DPs when needed) knitting one less in the decrease row until 30 sts remain. Knit the next two rows.

Last row: K2tog around. Pull thread through remaining sts and finish off.

Felt to desired size.

If this is your first felting attempt, measure you head and add about 1". That is the size you will look for. Trying on a wet hat is not fun. Throw the hat in a zippered pillow case protector or tie it up in an old pillow case and throw in with the regular wash. A 100% mohair hat will felt fast...usually one load. An all wool hat will generally take about three loads...but not all wools felt equally! Check the hat often. Take the hat out and spread flat and measure. This is the outside measurement and will be slightly more than the inside measurement. If I want an inside circumference of 23", I felt until I get a measurement of 12" across the flat hat.

Let’s say you over-felted. Soak in a little hair conditioner and stretch the hat out on pot or bowl with the circumference you want.

After you get the size you want, shape and dry out of the sun, usually 1-2 days.

Have you made a slight mistake in a stitch while knitting? Don't worry, it usually becomes invisible after the felting process. If it doesn't, it can become the starting point for decorating your hat. This shouldn't be stressful. Go with the flow.

Copyright 2003 by Janis Garwood a.k.a. WoolTales. All rights reserved.

Do you have 100?

Yards of wool, yarn, string, that is. Then you can knit these in the smaller size. I wrote this pattern ages ago on the way to visit my daughter in Maine...in December. I was knitting a pair of mittens and realized I couldn't finish the second if I closed up the tip to the first. The fingerless mitten was born. I thought I was SO clever. Then I started seeing them everywhere...especially more recently. The very first pair did not look quite so polished as the final version. The fingerless mittens above were done in 2003 using hand spun Spinderella Thrums. http://www.spinderellas.com/thrums.html

Feel free to tweak and add a stitch pattern or cable. Add a kid mohair to the cuff. There is no right or wrong. I'll post a picture of the first pair when I dig them out in the fall. Live in a colder climate? Wear them over your gloves. Then you can make many coordinating pairs. Enjoy!

WoolTales Fingerless Mittens

Materials: size 5 US double points, 110 yards worsted weight wool

Sizes: Medium - women’s, (Large - men’s)

Abbreviations:
K = knit
P = purl
st = stitch
sts = stitches
Rnd = round
CO = cast on
BO = bind off
inc = increase

Cuff: CO 40 (44) sts. Join work and K2, P2 for 3” (20 rounds)
Knit even for three (3) rounds.

Thumb: Rnd 1: K3, place marker, inc 1 in next st, K1, inc 1 in next st, place marker, K to end (5 sts between markers). These are the thumb sts.

Rnd 2: Knit around.

Rnd 3: K3, inc 1 in st. after the marker, K3, inc 1 in st before marker, K to end. (7 sts between markers)

Rnd 4: Knit around

Continue in this manner until there are 15 (17) sts between markers.
Knit 1 round.

Next row: K3(k1, p1 between markers), knit to end. Repeat this row 2 (3) more times.


Thumb Finish: K3, BO sts between markers while working rib pattern, knit to end.

Hand: Next row: K3, CO 3 sts, knit to end.

Knit 2 (3) rounds even.

Work K2, P2 for 10 rounds.

BO working in rib pattern.

Weave in ends.

The best news of all, the mitten will fit either hand...so make another mitten now.


Copyright 2000 - Janis Garwood, WoolTales

It's all about preparation.

Like this? I am preparing to start my daughter's Dale of Norway "Park City" sweater. I have been swatching and testing yarn. Above is what I made in Hauk and which I think I will end up using.

This is easy to do. Simply find a charted pattern of approximately 25 stitches for each side and work it in the round for however long you need. I think this chart work was 27 rows and then I added the stripes. Work the four decrease until it's the size you want for your top opening and voila! This particular chart came from Vogue's Stitchionary 3.

The Whale

The Whale - A Cautionary Tale

I found this lovely pattern at my local CrossStitch-ville and the frame for only $1 at the local Art & Frame shop. I WAS going to outline the whole thing with the gold punch but got too scissor happy snipping the ends of threads from the back side and accidentally cut my fabric! Argh!!

There was nothing left for me to do. I couldn't continue to punch past the cut material so I had to mount the picture on a piece of wool and surround it with the gold cording. Up close it does not look good. This will NEVER be a gift. My only consolation (other than learning a lesson the hard way) is that it is placed on a wall where one can not get within eight feet of it.

Everyone needs a blog.

This is my first post on my first blog...like I have nothing better to do with my time. Ha!

WoolTales is the name I chose for my business when I was in Virginia ten years ago. I had such grandiose ideas of actually making a living in the fiber world. I suppose some can but they need to be more talented than I AND they need a head for business. I found the pressure of deadlines took the fun and creativity out of it for me.

To add some decent content for the poor soul who stumbles upon this site, I am working the placket bands of a Henley knit in CotLin from Knit Picks. The pattern is Top Down Henley for Women by Knitting Pure and Simple. I don't usually repeat patterns, but I have worked this one four times.

Now to learn to upload pictures.