Gauntlets

Posted on December 12, 2015 by Elka Bolhafner

Elegant Gauntlets in progress

Very excited to have my knitting bug again! Even tho I no longer knit hours and hours a day I am still managing to get things done. YaY me and my sense of accomplishment.

Last weekend we went to our state Capital with the girl scout troop via train which was exciting. The train ride was conducive to knitting, of course, but the traipsing up and down hills from one site to the other was most decidedly not helping me reach the end of my project.

Just off the needles are the Elegant Gauntlets from Sally Melville’s The Knitting Experience Book Two: The Purl Stitch Becoming Intuitive. The book was put out by the XRX folks and the pattern is riddled with mistakes. The pattern’s sizing depends on gauge and the smaller size has a recommended gauge of 6 stitches per inch but the larger size has a recommended gauge of 7 stitches per inch. Math tells us that this is incorrect. The more stitches per inch the smaller the diameter. And for recommended needle sizes they suggest a larger needle for the larger size but one goes down in needle to get more stitches per inch. Finally somewhere along the hand they have you working on 3 needles but state knit on needles 1, 2 and 3 then x stitches of 4th needle. I personally was offended by the errors and slightly horrified since this series was billed as beginner books. Mind you the patterns are very elegant and so much nicer than the plain unshaped items one often found in beginner books.

Case in point my lovely new gauntlets awaiting some weaving in of ends and a dunk in the sink. The yarn is a lovely handpainted merino from Prism in shades of purple and brown and an inky almost black blue. Unfortunately it appears as if I downsized my cord to camera and am going to have to continue working with my iPhone for a while longer. A small issue to be sure.

Next up is Strokkur by Ysolda. I ordered the Lett-Lopi a couple of weeks ago and it arrived on Thursday. I am not sure what color I will end up using for my contrast. I picked some shades to hopefully match a skirt I own and am waiting for a clear day to compare the 3 potentials to the stripes on said skirt.

Well yarny days and knitterly evenings

elka

Love Bites

Posted on October 28, 2015 by Elka Bolhafner

Winter Hats & swap

I couldn’t help noticing that my gift for my Love Bites Swap partner would perfectly compliment my tam collection. I have them set out in a pile waiting a wash and block before winter sets in and would put my knitting down on them before turning down the lights at night. Okay the Neep Heid is still awaiting ends weaving but it is in the winter hat pile nonetheless. Thinking about all those ends has me wondering if I cut my yarn at end of every change when knitting the Midnight Sun Tam designed by Sandy Blue. Midnight Sun Tam remains one of my favorite finished objects ever. Ahem. I digress.

So Hunter Hammersen blogs over at Violently Domestic and I first noticed her work when she was offering free sock patterns on Ravelry. Slant I believe was the first that I noticed. One of her recent projects consists of 3 books inspired by Curiosity Cabinets and the drawings of various plants and animals one would find in illustrated books of such things. I was drawn to the pattern for fingerless mitts called Serpula Contortuplicata. Wow does auto correct throw a fit over that one! It is very organic with the cables going first this way then that. I also liked the open spaces created by the cable crosses–I find it rather gothic somehow.

Things I learned knitting this:

I like having pdfs of my knitting patterns! I believe this is the first time I ever knit something without having a hard copy of the pattern {unless I was designing myself of course}

Knitting laceweight mohair with stainless steel double points is a recipe for stitches slithering off the ends.

I should trust my judgement.

Assuming somebody might read this and be unawares I spent a good part of 10 yrs as a sample garment knitter for yarn companies. It kept me occupied and gave me some extra spending money when the kids were babies. Part of sample garment knitting is, in my opinion, proofing the instructions.

Hunter’s chart for the hand portion begins with a slipped stitch and I decided to follow it despite my feelings that she intended us to slip the first stitch of each row instead of each repeat. I contacted Hunter after I finished my project and mentioned the chart vs row question and she is updating the pattern. BTW I don’t know if it is just because knitters are such a great group but Hunter is another person I have corresponded with a few times in the past and she is always a delight.

Two posts about two different indie knit folks who are very nice to deal with ^5 to knitters.

But Look:

Serpula Contortuplicata

Look Again:

Organic

So seriously pretty. Luckily I have a second hank of the yarn and will reknit this for me. It definitely belongs in my wardrobe since it goes so well with all my hats. I look forward to making myself a pair.

Belongs in my closet

And of course I hope my swap partner loves them. How could she not? Soft, silky, organic with spooky holes for Halloween fun.

yarny days and knitterly evenings

Royal

Posted on August 23, 2011 by Elka Bolhafner

Brandywine is done~ such a lovely and fun pattern. I used a yarn from stash purchased on Ebay oh my goodness at least 5 years ago. Mainly because I haven’t Ebayed yarn since the ex and I split up. No particulars on weight or yardage but I had a disappointingly large amount of yarn leftover. Disappointing because I am a large woman and like big shawls but followed the instructions to a T and now suspect I could have done more repeats. Anyway it is what I like to call purple. A marled yarn, 100% geelong marketed as fingering weight, composed of one strand of navy and one strand of purple. Aubergine of the blue black variety~~ YAY. More lovely shots:

Rosemary Hill is so very very clever. BTW this style of working the edging on with body ~ starting with a few stitches and working up towards a triangle~ was first seen, by me, in a Spin Off article written by Robert Powell. The issue is from the Winter of 1996 so probably impossible to get however if you can do library loan the pages are 30-37 inclusive for a tutorial and sample shawl. If you have any interest in shawl design there are a couple of pages covering motif placement within the body of shawl. I have been interested in the concept since I first read the article but never quite got around to applying it since the proliferation of lovely shawl designs can be a bit overwhelming. It is really nice to see it in use. FWIW Powell’s designs are not widely available. I believe he had a few in A Gathering of Lace but otherwise, with the exception of this article, I believe they are only available via Catherine Knits in kit form. Although…. I think his earliest kits are now available as patterns also from Catherine Knits. I have purchased kits, which I usually avoid like the plague, from Catherine and been very pleased with the service from her shop.

More pictures~ one of the point and another of the frame:

Earlier I said what I like to call purple and that is for a reason. A lot of times when people say purple I see red violet. Or just plain blue red which I consider red. Or lavender. Being a lover of the cooler end of the spectrum and all a lot of blue in a red is not purple but the shade of red I would wear. If that makes any sense. Now other people hear purple and think a totally different color. For example my middle daughter is quite fond of purple and I recently knit a lacy baktus for her. Mainly because she was trying to swap mine! I had taken her down to The Loopy Ewe one day while she was off of school and she picked out some Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere in Pixie Pour for herself. Okay in reality it was for me although I sincerely doubt I would have picked that shade for myself. Despite her claiming it was purple. Either way I was in the mood to shop and she *does* knit. Kinda.

And another daughter requested that I knit some Toast so that she can give them to one of her oldest friends on the Sweet 16 soiree coming up this Friday. Favorite color of BFF since Kindergarden? Purple of course. Thankfully Toast doesn’t take long to make since I only have a few days left:

As soon as I finish this purple pair of Toasts I need to knit another in some Dreams in Color Starry so that another daughter may gift them out. We are all fully outfitted in our Toasts and apparently they are still a big hit with the youngsters since my daughters’ friends make sure I hear how lucky my kids are to have me knit them. Hurray for knitting!

yarny days and knitterly evenings

Stitches Report~ Picture heavy

Posted on August 23, 2005 by Elka Bolhafner

OK I went to the hardware store to pick up some blocking materials and they didn’t have what I was looking for. I need to go to the big boys [Home Depot etc] instead of my helpful Ace dudes. Therefore no AFTER pix yet.

I am in a bit of a knitting slump and had planned on putting the Stitches report and some FO’s spread out over the next week or so but my good friend, Miss Toni, sent me an email insisting I spill already…..

I took 3 classes and enjoyed all three of them. The first was called Nordic Color taught by Nancy Bush. I have so many plans for using this technique its crazy. Why just before leaving Zoe was complaining about her lack of wintery hats and after consulting with her I was mad as a hornet. She wanted a hat with leaves flitting around into a pile. Not a repeating pattern or a leaves on vine sorta pattern but an intarsia pattern. Ha ha ha. Nancy Bush to the rescue. Look for hattie goodness when I get some stuff off my knitting platter.

The second class was on Russian Grafting and I think its a very interesting technique needing some field testing. As mentioned yesterday I have utilized it on my STTS[actually Shetland Tea Shawl or STS] so will get a better idea of how much I like it once blocked. Plus other occassions to test general lovability. The most intriquing use seems to be in seaming as far as I can see so Must. Knit. Sweater. Pieces. Again knitting plate.

The third class was called ummmm Off the Cuff or something of that nature. I actually was half asleep during this class since I left my sister’s apartment at an ungodly 6am and knit for the 1.5 hrs I had between arrival time and class time. I have taken to knitting when I can’t sleep cause it ummm puts me to sleep shhhhhhhh I didnt’ say that but you know relaxing soothing nerve and worried mind calming meditative bs I actually finished half of my class project since returning home:

Toni actually doesn’t give a rats ass about my classes and just wants to know about the LOOT. Tough she, and you too, have to see my progress in dealing with WIPS first. I noticed that Toni actually blogged about what I did last week:

That pile o’ yarn consists of: Donegal, Rogue, and the BW topdown. I had purchased some BWA for Celtic Dreams and didn’t feel like plodding through 3 sweaters before getting to it. Not that I have CO mind you. I will be stuffing the yarn for those three sweaters on my yarn caddy in case I choose to restart one of them soon. The yarn caddy is the reason for my funk. Upon my return I arranged my purchases and was shocked. I had been shopping daily and stuffing the bags under the car seats between trips. I really did not realize I had picked up so much yarn. To remind myself that I was living in land of plenty I went to the main yarn stash area and picked up similar yarns ex: Douceur et Soie and Kid Seta for Rowan KS Haze or other yarns I had picked up since my daddy got sick 10 months ago. Talk about retail therapy gone haywire. Anyway here is the caddy sans ripped stuff but with extra yarns for ripped stuff ;^>

Unfortunately I can honestly say I have more yarns I purchased in past few months that didn’t make it onto the caddy AND that there are CONES OF YARN hiding behind the laceweight on lower shelf. Not bulky weight cones but cones of ummm Zephyr and Cashmere. No wonder I am broke and being pathetically into retail therapy[not normally just recently] I still have an overwhelming urge to shop on a daily basis. My favorites from Stitches:

Laceweights from Skaska designs also available from Dimity’s Dry Goods The top two are cashmere/silk blends and not the same blend~ one is 50/50 the other 80/20~ which was not my intention the other 3 are my faves esp the loverly taupe yak and silk blend. Another laceweight Alpaca from another vendor proves to be my absolute favorite couldnt’ have walked out of Stitches without:

The seller told me it was Crea[first shearing] Suri Alpace from her own farm. 3000 yards of the most wonderful stuff I have ever seen for real. And I have seen some pretty awe inspiring yarns in the past 30 years. Just saying.

Being the sock knitting addict that I am

Stop Laughing

I picked up some sockyarn that is a nice heather instead of the handpainted the was all over the place:

I am still waiting for some kits purchased from Nancy Bush and have picked up some CP Kid mohair blend[why I had to pull out the similar yarns to stop myself from buying stuff I had tons of already] and beads for River since returning home:

By and by I did finish the first of my socks for yarn purchased mere hours before going to stitches:

Ok thats the highlights of past two weeks shopping and reduction of WIPS spree. Toodles and happy knitting

Elka Knits

because

Category Archives: Hands

Gauntlets

Love Bites

Royal

Stitches Report~ Picture heavy