Design Wars 5 :: the final reveal ::

Woohoo...the final reveal of all of the designs created by the Design Wars 5 challengers has been posted!

 

 You can see all the wonderful creations and vote for your favourites over on the Design Wars blog, of course if you fancy voting for my design I won't dissuade  you from doing so ;) So here is my final design ::

 

 I'll post more about the slippers themselves tomorrow, but if you can't wait that long, the pattern is up for sale over on my ravelry page now. x

Stranded Knits by Ann Kingstone ::

I've been a big fan of Ann Kingstone's work for a while now, especially her stranded knitwear (wetwang being a particular favourite that I really really will knit for myself one day) if you haven't come across her designs before I strongly recommend you go investigate.

So I was thrilled to get my hands on a copy of her new book, 'Stranded Knits'.  It's such a beautifully put together book.  If you've never tried your hand at stranded knits before, but have a basic understanding of knitting this book would be a fantastic step into the wonderful world of colourwork.  If you have tried stranded knitting before, I would still heavily recommend getting hold of a copy, it taught me so much.

 

I love knitting colour work, almost all of my, handful of, knitwear designs have included it, but Ann's book gave me so much useful knowledge.  The first third of the book is devoted to the 'smart skills for colourwork knitting', and boy are they smart and easy to understand.  This is the kind of knitting book you really want to read, not just flick through and admire the pretty patterns. Techniques I learned so far, include spit splicing (I knew about this technique but the book really encouraged me to give it a go and since I did I wonder why I never tried it before!), choosing the right colours for your colourwork (a lesson I read after I knit my first pattern from the book, d'oh!), steeking and whole new-to-me cast on.  I'm sure as I knit more patterns from the book I will learn more and more too.  

 The diagrams are so clear and easy to understand, which helps bring the written instructions to life. I really don't think I have one bad thing to say about this book.  I would lovingly knit more than half of the patterns featured (if only I could find a couple of extra days in the week!).  I especially love how there are both quick patterns to get you started and full colourwork sweaters to get your teeth into once you get going. I gifted myself the yarn and the time to knit the Enid Headband, over my birthday weekend back in August.  The pattern was easy to follow and a joy to knit.  I love the finished product and am eagerly awaiting the cooler days so I can put it to good use.

 

This was the pattern which I knit without testing the suitability of the colours unfortunately and in an ideal world I would probably have swapped them about a bit as the colourwork isn't quite as prominent as I would like.  But obviously if I'd spent the time reading the book properly before rushing in to knit this wouldn't have happened!

All the samples in the book are worked in Rowan yarns and I used the recommended felted tweed for my headband.  The only issue I really had was with the yarn, as I knit on double pointed needles, I found when pulling the last stitch of each needle tight, the yarn would quite often break, but once I established this problem I managed to find a good middle ground of yarn pulling, which avoided the snapping.

Next up on my list are the Pleiades mitts and hat, possibly as christmas gifts then next year the gorgeous William for myself, I'd love to have a go at Hedgerow but fear it's something I would start and never finish. Stranded Knits is available for purchase as a, real life hold in your hands, book from Baa Ram Ewe here.

Robot Hoodie ::

I managed to persuade Milo to do a little bit of modelling for me at the weekend and Sunday was the perfect day for it too, just the right weather for him to be parading around in the Robot Hoodie I originally designed for Inside Crochet.

 

 You may have noticed that I do love a bit of colourwork...especially on the yoke.  I would say the majority of my designs probably have a colourwork yoke like this.  I especially like to do this with crochet because it's not a technique you often see in crochet, but I think it can work almost a well as those a beautiful knitted fair isle designs.

 

 The principle is very similar to that of knitting, unlike with tapestry crochet I keep the unworked colour loose at the back of the work, creating a stranded interior and just like knitting if it's a big gap for the yarn to strand across I catch it in behind another stitch midway across (hmmm I'm thinking this could become a blog post all of it's own...).

 

 This hoodie was very much a collaboration between me and Milo, before I'd even had the sweater commissioned he was clutching hold of my original swatch, a string of robots, throughout the day...so in love with the robots he was! It was he who suggested it have a hood and he who choose the little toggle buttons. So unsurprisingly he loves it and I was so relieved to see it still fits him, for now at least.


 The pattern is available in sizes age 2-3(4-5, 6-7, 8-9, 10-11)yrs, the sample uses Paton's Diploma Gold DK, but any double knit weight wool yarn would work in it's place. I really love this hoodie and I get so much pleasure from seeing Milo eagerly wear something I've created for him.

 

You can purchase the pattern in the usual places (ravelry, etsy, craftsy).

Design Wars :: Yarn ::

 You may remember me talking about being accepted to compete in Design Wars 5 a couple of weeks ago.

 

 Well...on Friday my yarn delivery arrived!

 

 I'm so excited, the yarn is beautiful and the colours are wonderful.  I cannot wait to get stuck in.

 

Little Sheep Tags :: a tutorial ::

I'm afraid to admit I have already been thinking about Christmas knitting, really in terms of knitting time it isn't very far away at all. As a side thought of this (or maybe in a little attempt at procrastination) I got thinking about accompanying gift tags for all these handknits. As a result these little sheepy tags were born.

 

 Last year I made little cardboard tags with yarn information, washing instructions and a little spare yarn wound around (the same yarn as used in the piece) incase of any mishaps.  Recently I've been playing with shrink plastic and so the idea for these little sheep was born.

If you would like to make your own I have sheep template here, you are welcome to print out and trace.  With the shrink plastic I used the resulting tags measure 4.5cm (1.75") across and 2.5cm (1") tall. Here's what you'll need ::

• Shrink Plastic (I used Wizard Shrinkles in white which I got from HobbyCraft)
• Permanent Markers
• Hole Punch
• Small Sharp Scissors
• Picture to trace
• Masking Tape

Cut a piece of shrink plastic to a size just a tad larger than the picture you are going to trace.

   

 Carefully tape your plastic over the picture (this is optional really, it helps to keep the plastic in place making the tracing easier, but you could just hold it in place with your hand if you thought that would work for you).

 

Using a black permanent marker trace your picture onto the plastic.

   

 Remove your plastic from the drawing underneath and carefully cut around it, using your small sharp scissors, leaving a couple of millimetres between your drawing and the edge. This is the tricky part!

   

 Using the hole punch, punch a hole in his tail, this is so you can thread a piece of string/yarn through it so that you can attach it later.  You might want to practice the positioning of your hole on a piece of paper first, so you can work out how far in you need to go, I won't lie, I messed this up on my first attempt!

   

 If you like you can do a little colouring at this stage or if you like a classic look leave him plain.  I coloured in the faces, legs and ears of mine.

   

 And now you're ready for the fun part, baking!  Follow the instructions on your shrink plastic and watch your little sheep curl up, shrink and flatten down again. I had a couple of pieces of parchment paper and a heavy book ready, then as soon as I took them out the oven I popped them between the 2 sheets and put the book on top to help flatten them further.

   

 You can then varnish them if you would like them to have a glossier finish. And there you have it, little sheep gift tags, perfect little bobbins to accompany your beautifully crafted hand knit and crochet pieces.

 

Design Wars ::

Design Wars #5 was announced this week and I'm thrilled to say I am going to be taking part. If you haven't heard about Design Wars before, it's basically a challenge wherein 10 designers battle it out to come up with the best crochet design which is voted for over 5 categories. The only theme is that all the designers must use the same yarn, which is provided by Red Heart. I use Red Heart a lot for my Crochet Today designs, so I'm fairly familiar with them and really pleased with the choice of yarn we're going to be using.

 

There are some really great designers taking part in the round and I cannot wait to see what everyone comes up with. If you fancy checking out the other designers you can find their facebook pages listed below :: Jenny Allbritain :: Susan Carlson :: Sarah Lora :: Sascha Blase-van Wagtendonk :: Crystal Bucholz :: Lisa van Klaveren :: Alessandra Hayden :: Tara Murray :: Katie Hanken To keep up to date with all the Design Wars going ons you can sign up to their mailing list here. Stay tuned here for more details as I can reveal them!

Inside Crochet 45 ::

Issue 45 of Inside Crochet came out last week and as usual it's full to the brim of gorgeous patterns and wonderful photography (courtesy of Britt Spring).

An ode to the granny square, Joanne Scrace's gorgeous cover scarf is such a beautiful modern twist on the classic (I know Joanne generally isn't a big fan of!), making it classy and sophisticated and taking it a world away from it's usual image.

Simone Francis's dressing gown is unlike anything I've seen before, so delicate and glamourous.

I also have a pattern in this months pages, my Leonie Cardigan.  I'm particualry fond of this design, it's made in Rowan Pure Wool 4ply and it so light and soft to wear.  Crocheted as a bit rectangle, the front can be left to hang open, or fastened with a shawl pin in a number or ways.  The stitch pattern I used is the classic Catherine Wheel Stitch.

As the lovely Claire, is so swift at returning samples I already have it back in my possession and I know it's going to be the perfect accompaniment to autumn.

Issue 45 is on sale in most newsagents now, or available online here.