From Dishcloth to Duster

I have some wonderfully soft cotton yarn from Hobby Lobby (I Love this Cotton).  It is just too nice for a dishcloth but a facecloth would be perfect.  Searching high and low through Ravelry and the cotton yarn sites for patterns just didn't turn up what I had in mind and the ridged dishcloth pattern I had made a few years ago, was just not to be found either in my files or on the internet.  So with a few frogged starts, a simple knit two rows, purl two rows ridge with a 3 stitch border became a facecloth with a delightful texture.  

With a good stash of firmer Peaches and Creme cotton on cones and an older simple Swifter sitting idle, in need of recyclable duster covers, I set out to use the same ridged pattern for my mop.  I cast on 70 stitches with a gauge of 4 stitches per inch and knit until there was enough to extend the width of the foam head.  Centering the mop head on the knit band, I folded over each end and stitched them to the bound edges to form pockets to fit the head snugly.  The duster head goes on great now but I am concerned it will shrink when laundered.  The next duster cover will be from the stash of acrylic yarn I didn't give away on FreeCycle before I moved.

Acrylic: To Block or Not To Block?

With DH gone for a week to do some mountain climbing, I settled in to to do some serious knitting.  With 3 days of concentrated effort, a Babies and Bears Sweater is off the needles, blocked, and ready for me to make a trip to the fabric store to find the perfect buttons.

Plymouth Encore yarn doesn't seem to be readily available in my shopping district so I had settled for Lion Brand Vanna's Choice, an acrylic/rayon blend.  With no previous experience with this yarn, I was pleasantly surprised.  The sheen is lovely and the hand delightful.  

With a few modifications to the pattern, the sweater will look great for winter with a cute hat.  The original pattern results in a shorter sweater with a hood but opting to join the two halves of the sweater before adding the front panels (substituted garter stitching in place of the Gansey pattern for both fronts and the back), I was able to lengthen the sweater buy 7 rows and continue the mitered corners.  I also chose to create a stockinette button placket that curled in spite of the garter stitches along the edge and I replaced the hood with a collar so baby can wear a wardrobe of cute knit hats.  ;)

With an obstinate curl along both button plackets, I had a dilemma, try blocking the acrylic yarn or let the buttons hold the placket in place.  Acrylic yarn can be killed by too much heat, but after consulting with the experts on the Yahoo knitlist and some Googling, I was sure I could cure the curl.

Uncontrolled, the lower placket rolled all the way over on itself.

My Rowenta hand steamer is still lost in the maze of moving boxes and it has had an obnoxious drip since it was new and gifted to me.  I decided not to hunt for it.  The Sunbeam steam iron was a better drip-free choice.

Filling the iron with water and setting it for the maximum burst of steam, I practiced on the gauge swatch, hovering the iron above about an inch.  First error was to steam from the right side but a test wash and toss in the dryer showed promise.  The swatch retained its now flattened edges.

Encouraged by the permanent results, I placed the sweater on my pressing surface, wrong side up and proceeded to cover the areas that I did not want hit by steam with cotton hand towels.

Working carefully, I successfully flattened just the button plackets and a small area in the back that was riding up slightly.

Don't worry, both fronts are exactly the same size.

Now, with the success of blocking acrylic yarn, I will be more willing to use it for future projects.  The only thing I won't do again is use that collar!  I followed the instructions for the shaped collar in the Baby Surprise Jacket pamphlet.  I like the idea of creating fullness for a roll line but the points are just not appropriate for a baby sweater.  They look more like a shirt collar or worse. 

Re-engineering the Mason Dixon Hand Towel

It has been my intent to make a Mason Dixon Hand Towel to give with some dishcloths, but the button on the tab bothered me.  It isn't in the center.  The designers use an even number of stitches to create the mitered towel and the tab.  An odd number of stitches would allow for a larger buttonhole to be centered easily.  Also, they start at the bottom up and work to the tab.  

If I can get away with starting with fewer stitches to cast on and count, I will.  So, last Friday, while dear grandson took some longer than normal naps, I set out to re-engineer the hand towel.  The tab is 9 stitches with a 3 stitch, one row buttonhole and then from there, I more or less just looked at the picture and went with appearances rather than attempt to use the instructions to count backwards to make the same number of increases to mimic their towel from the top down.  I used 12 rows of stockinette with 3 ridges of garter stitch in between.  It was an easy project, off my needles by Saturday afternoon.  Now to find the perfect button, maybe a daisy, ladybug, or frog. 

How Did That Happen?

This started out as a project to use up wool scraps but suddenly I was spending just over $18 dollars at Craft Warehouse for more wool yarn to coordinate with just the blue and variegated Kool-Aid dyed scraps for a yarn basket or bag that could sit in my living room without clashing with the decor.  Now I have more leftovers to use up. 

This project was a learning experience.  I have wanted to try felting/fulling a knit project and knitting basket/bag seemed perfect.  My past projects were either unintentional or a sample flat knit that has now qualified for potholders.  After searching Ravelry for felted bowls and baskets, I settled on A Petite Felted Bag by Ann Lim.  Wanting a bigger version, I began with the 4 stitches/8 sections on the bottom but increased until I had a round base of 128 stitches and then worked upwards as instructed.  

I hit the panic button when I realized that the rather wimpy Cascade 220 worsted weight yarn was too fine to felt into a sturdy basket with only a single strand as instructed by the pattern.  A Google search turned up another bag with a round base and buttonhole handles.  Figuring if I ended at the top with the brick red yarn that had a heftier hand for worsted yarn, I might have a bag that would be sturdy enough for a knitting project.  I used the new pattern as inspiration only as I was working from the base up.

Figuring that I needed enough height to prevent the base from pulling up, I continued knitting until the my bag was 15 inches tall.

I chose not to use much of the off-white Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool because I was unsure how well it would felt/full.  The variegated yarn in the base is the same but dyed with Kool-Aid.  I was pleased to find that it is very densely felted and with only one cycle in my top-loader.

The felting/fulling process began with soaking the bag in a pan of warm water with 2 cups of white vinegar to soften the yarn.  After 40 minutes in the vinegar bath, I dumped the bag in a bed pillow cover with a zipper (past felting experience in only a mesh bag resulted in much wool lint clogging our 60 year old pipes requiring a visit from a plumber) and put it in my top loading washer with a heavy navy towel.  On the lowest water level with very hot water, the contents of that load went through a very turbulent agitation for 9 minutes, followed by a cold rinse.  

The results was very satisfactory.  The bag is now 10 inches high and 32 inches in circumference and stuffed  with a round bowl in the base and nearly all the plastic shopping bags I could find in the house.  Drying may take awhile, though.  Our pleasant sunshine is now drippy rain.  I may have to set up a fan to speed up the process.

If you would like more details on how to make the bag, download the pattern/instructions:  Round Bottom Buttonhole Handles Bag

While I am posting on my project, I am going to use some space to comment on the terms felting and fulling.  If one wants to be terribly accurate and base their word usage on the ancient process of thickening woolen fabrics after weaving, fulling is the correct term.  Felting actually is the matting together of non-woven fibers.  Unfortunately, word usage changes the meaning of words and now, knitters commonly refer to felting knits to make them denser and sturdier.  One would have a hard time finding a current book on the process using "fulling" in the title.  Felting communicates as few understand fulling and its history in the textile industry. 

June 21, 2013 Update:  Recently, the bag was soaked in Shaklee's Basic H and hot water for a half an hour and then agitated again.  The bag is now smaller and is stiff enough to stand on its own.  Petite but the bag is now a perfect small project bag at about 7 inches tall and 6.5 inches across the base.  The pattern recipe has not been updated with new pictures.

With a recent gift of off-white wool yarn lurking in my stash, dying and felting another bag are tempting me.  A perfect project for lazy summer days!  

Veggie Bag Dispenser

For two days we had Re-Bath of Oregon tearing apart our bathroom and putting it back together.  While they worked, I knitted.  The results was a Veggie Bag Dispenser inspired by the pattern for a doggie poo-bag dispenser first published in Bark magazine and now posted at Facebook.

I used inexpensive Red Heart acrylic yarn in worsted weight with size 9 circular needles, cast on the 48 stitches and allowed 2 inches for the roll top before the eyelets, then knit even for about 16 inches, decreased to 24 stitches, and ended with 2k, 2p ribbing for an inch. I twisted yarn for a tie that is also the hanging loop. The colors are perfect for my kitchen; matching my curtain topper and the potholders Debra Burgess made me in the Treadle On Potholder Exchange for Machines of Color.

The veggie bags will have an attractive hiding place while they wait to be used for dirty diapers.  I intend to make another for plastic grocery sacks but increase one stitch in the 2nd round after the eyelets, centering the increase between them. The dispensing hole will remain the same at 24 stitches and 2 by 2 ribbing.

The yarn was extremely coarse feeling with little resilience.  It almost seemed like it was over heated in the processing of the fiber. I have never had Red Heart acrylic yarn with such a poor hand but it won't stop me from using more for utility type projects.

EQ7 and Indy's Quilt

Exported Image from EQ7

Some of you know I plan my quilts with EQ7.  So, you must be wondering what I saw when I decided to go with the layout for Indy's quilt.  The colors were similar but not the exact fabrics I had selected.  It was not apparent that the orange was so intense and that the yellow would wash out.  Maybe it was noticeable when I stacked them for a preview to determine the order to use in EQ, but seeing it on the screen was what sold the plan.  Next time, I will try to use closer colors in EQ and consider my preview stack to be my most important factor for fabric selections.  Traditionally, the Rail Fence quilt works best with darkest or most intense color fading to the lightest.  The two block version I made for my mom is an example of the dark to light arrangement.

A Quilt for Indy

Some things just aren't perfect in life and this is one of them.  If I could remake this quilt top, I would start with the fabrics.  The yellow needs to be brighter and the orange overpowers the red.  It is just too much!  Next, I cut all the strips in the blocks on the lengthwise grain.  I know, you real quilters say that is best, but only one, the turtle/snail theme fabric needed to be on the lengthwise grain.  The rest didn't matter and they would have had the give to help me match the rows at the block joins much better if I had cut them on the crosswise grain.  Using a Shape Cut to cut the strips didn't help either.  The slits wobble, producing slight irregularities in the width of the strips.  I will only use that tool for cutting strips for placemats, not for quilt blocks where they have to match precisely.  But with all its imperfections, it is a quilt that my new grandson can drag around until it is thread bare and gramma will make a new one.  ;)