Category: craft

Down to the wire

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The amazing thing about this post is that I wrote it on the train on my way to work. Not because it is amazing that the technology exists to allow me to blog from the train (which is also amazing) but because it means that I wasn’t frantically knitting my shawl, which is what I’ve spent every other train journey recently doing. For various reason, I had even less time to knit the shawl than I expected to have and it was beginning to look like it might not get finished.

Actually, since the pattern was due first, I had to finish writing that without having finished knitting the shawl so the shawl is artfully draped in the pattern photographs to try to disguise the fact that half of its border is missing! The pattern was finished and submitted on Tuesday (also on the train to work) and from then till I handed the sample in yesterday just about every waking minute that I wasn’t been at work was spent knitting.

In the end, the timetable for finishing it went something like this:

Wednesday

18:10 – catch train home from work, knit whole way home

19:00 – arrive home from work, start knitting again

20:00 – stop knitting long enough to eat pizza which had just been delivered

21:00 – contemplate possibility that it’s actually impossible to finish knitting shawl tonight, keep knitting anyway

22:00 – decide that it is possible but that it’s going to be midnight before it’s done

23:00 – Steven goes to bed

00:15 – knit last stitch of edging, decide to leave grafting of edging till morning

01:00 – go to bed having pinned shawl out to block

Various times during the night – wake up from a nightmare that I accidentally brought the shawl to bed and it’s started unravelling, double-check to make sure that shawl isn’t actually in bed unravelling

Thursday

06:30 – curse the person who invented alarm clocks

06:50 – get up, make coffee, get dressed and ready for work

07:10 – force Steven to admire shawl before letting him leave for work

07:25 – realise shawl is still damp, get hair-dryer and dry shawl

07:45 – graft ends of edging and weave in remaining ends

07:55 – take some very quick, very blurry pictures of shawl which will almost certainly turn out to be completely useless for anything

08:03 – realise that I should have left for work 3 minutes ago, put shawl in bag and run for train

8:16 – actually catch train

12:00 – pop out of office during lunch to travel across city to deliver shawl

13:00 – shawl delivered, normal service resumes

Now that the dust has settled and I’ve had a good night’s sleep, I am looking forward to the shawl’s unveiling at this weekend’s Glasgow School of Yarn where it is my entry in their design competition.  I can’t make it along during the day today but I will be there tonight for the party to celebrate The Yarn Cake‘s second birthday and the results of the competition.

And on the way home on the train I’ll be frantically knitting the gauge swatch that is my pre-class homework for the hat design workshop that I’m attending at the Glasgow School of Yarn tomorrow!

I mis-counted.

Susan1 Comment

It is not 152,000 stitches … it is more like 164,000.

Shawl - in progress

I’m working on a new circular shawl design and forgot to count the stitches in the border (mostly because I haven’t decided what they’re going to be yet).

According to my revised calculations, the bit shown in the picture is just over 2% of the total shawl. It would have been nearer 4% but I had to rip out quite a bit last night due to a silly charting error and ignoring the little voice in my head telling me that the lace didn’t look right.

Did I mention that I’m working to a deadline and that I’m moving house between now and when this is due? You’ll have to excuse me, I need to go knit the other 98% of my shawl.

Playing tourist, part II (with knitting and sewing content)

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We’ve been doing sort of the reverse of our Cutty Sark tourism this weekend. We’ve been up in Scotland, exploring the area that we are moving to. We are going to be living near Stirling, which is a beautiful, old Scottish city that mostly looks like the picture below:

Stirling

I spotted both a yarn shop and a fabric shop in Stirling but they were closed when we were there on Sunday so I didn’t get to look around. However, I did find a whole selection of cheap knitting and sewing books in one of the discount bookshops in the city centre. I managed to restrain myself and only bought two.

First was Fitted Knits by Stephanie Japel. I bought this mainly for inspiration and the section with hints and tips on customising patterns since few of the patterns would actually suit me, particularly in the heavier yarns that most of the patterns call for. It’s a beautiful book though and easily worth the £3.99 that I paid just for the photography!

Fitted knits

I’m hoping to get more use out of the second book which was Sew U Home Stretch by Wendy Mullin. I’ve heard really good things about the Sew U books and I’ve been wanting to have a go at sewing knit fabrics for a while since I’d love to be able to sew my t-shirts and tops for work. The patterns included with the book don’t go big enough for my bust size but there is plenty of discussion about how to apply the principles in the book to ordinary commercial patterns. There is even a section on making your own patterns from existing items that you love.

IMAG0047.jpg

If we weren’t moving I would love to have taken the class on sewing knits that The Make Lounge are introducing but the first class isn’t until October so I’ll just have to make do with the book and the internet for now. I’ll let you know how it goes!

The finishing touches – sewing edition

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I was taking some photos of our flat in its “finished” state the other day and realised that I hadn’t blogged about some of the things that I’ve sewn for it.

First up: roman blinds for Steven’s study. My thought process went something like this: custom blinds are quite expensive; blinds are just rectangles, really; I know other people who’ve sewn their own blinds (my mother-in-law who has at least 3 decades, if not 4, more sewing experience than I do); my big sewing handbook has step-by-step instructions; how hard can it be?

Roman blinds

Roman blinds

The answer: reasonably hard but, in the end, actually achievable.

Study

They’re not perfect but I’m pretty damn proud of these.

I went through a similar thought process when I saw some table runners on a display in IKEA. For once, this project turned out to actually be easier than expected since they were selling the fabric with the side edges pre-hemmed so all I had to do was cut it to an appropriate length and hem the ends.

Dining table set

Deciding to then use the same fabric to make matching seat cushion covers was a bit more complicated. The chairs had come without cushions and really aren’t that comfortable without them. It’s surprisingly difficult to find plain square chair pads without ties and the ones with ties just aren’t shaped to fit on chairs with solid backs. We did manage to find some (IKEA again) that had velcro straps that we cut off but they were bright blue so really needed to be covered.

Dining chair cushion cover

I didn’t have a pattern or instructions to follow for these so just sort of made it up as I went along. I cut the hemmed edging off the fabric and cut  squares for the top and bottom of the covers from the geometric pattern centre strips. By undoing the hemmed edging and ironing it flat, I got a nice wide strip that I used for the band around the cushion. I then assembled these as very narrow box cushion covers with an overlapping envelope type opening on one of the narrow sides. Since these sit against the backs of the chairs, it doesn’t matter that they’re a little flappy and don’t stay perfectly shut.

Again, the result isn’t perfect but they do look good along with the matching runners and, hey, at least they’re not blue!

Playing tourist (with bonus knitting content)

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My sister and her boyfriend came to visit last weekend since they had tickets for the event that shall not be named and we took the opportunity to play tourist with a visit to Greenwich Market and the newly refurbished Cutty Sark.

Cutty Sark

The restoration of the ship has been going on pretty much since we moved to Blackheath and only finished in April of this year so it was great to actually go and have a look around before we move away.

Cutty Sark

The ship is beautiful and there is a wealth of information and interactive exhibits on its history. It’s well worth a visit if you’re at all interested in sailing ships.

Imagine my surprise however when I opened a drawer in one of the exhibits to discover this:

Cutty Sark

Apparently, although she is famous for being a tea clipper, one of other cargoes that Cutty Sark carried was merino wool from Australia.

Cutty Sark

I didn’t spot any yarn for sale in the gift shop though!

Finishing touches

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Lots of finishing touches being put on things around here at the moment. My Real Ale Socks pattern got finished and published.

The other sock pattern I’ve been working on is also nearly finished and should be being sent to be edited in the next couple of days. Here’s a little peek at the sample before it was blocked:

Sneak Peek

 

Also, after nearly 4½ years, we’re finally putting the finishing touches on this flat and, more importantly, after nearly 7 years, we’re putting the final touches on our time in London; come September, we’ll be back in Scotland. This makes me very happy and a bit sad at the same time and also somewhat terrified since there’s lots to do before we can move!