theraineysisters knitting and so much more

This addendum to my previous post was longer than the post, so I decided to start a new post!!  Phyddy asked, “What is invisible stranding?”

Invisible Stranding is the term I coined to describe a technique for carrying stranded floats across any number of stitches without catching them.  It is a machine knitting technique that has been adapted to hand knitting.  I wrote up a pattern, called It’s Not About the Hat, to share this technique with others.  The pattern includes a series of videos that demonstrate all the steps, and the tricks I have learned along the way.  Invisible stranding is perfect for projects with long floats.  Here are some examples:

Mother Goose Hat

Rose and Lily

And the reason I dove into invisible stranding with both feet: Dale of Norway 10903.  There were places in the chart where you had to carry a dark color across 30+ sts of cream!

This technique is a game changer and removes any obstacles to stranded knitting.  It opens up all sorts of possibilities!!

Kim and I are ALWAYS standing at the entrance of the Creative Activities Building right at 9am for the opening of the doors.  Not this year.  It reminded me of the many times in recent years I have missed hubby finishing at the Birkie. 🙁  The bus gods were not with us.  We got there shortly after the place opened, though we did take the time to scarf down a corn dog for breakfast! 😉

The first thing you see when you walk in is a big boat.  It was one of the entries and did quite well!

The only thing was that it blocked the entrance to the building and created a bit of a bottleneck.

The hunt was on to find our entries.  This was a strange year for me as far as knitting is concerned.  My  Dale of Norway was such a time eater I didn’t get as many things done this year.  Loyal readers of the blog will recognize most of my entries.

I was very pleased this year.  Roosevelt, Window to my Soul, Vogue Hat #5, and Dale of Norway won first place ribbons.  My Elephant Hat and Scatness took second.  The winners in those categories were amazing.  The sweepstakes went to a circular lace shawl.

Kim’s entries were displayed very well and showcased her flawless knitting (elephant hat and submarine sweater).

The winner of this year’s Penelope Knitters Award for best gloves went to a fellow Camper – Lucy Norman.  We saw the gloves at Camp and knew she would get this award.  Just stunning!!  Congratulations!!

So, a fun day!  The weather was picture perfect and we left exhausted.  I will probably go again next week with hubby!

PS – We tried the Macaroni and Cheese Cupcake at LuLu’s and definitely recommend it!!  🙂

When Carter and Herbert discovered the entrance to King Tut’s Tomb in the Valley of the Kings (1922), they knew they had unearthed something important that had to be shared with the world.  They didn’t build or invent the tomb, only uncovered it for the rest of the world to appreciate.

That’s how I felt when I discovered a new knitting technique that I call Invisible Stranding…only on a smaller scale.  Okay, a much smaller scale.  Okay, the analogy is overwrought and ridiculous.  BUT, I felt really excited about it and wanted to share it with the world.  Okay, the knitting world.

Invisible Stranding allows you to carry yarn across any number of stitches without catching the floats.  Catching floats creates a visible pucker in your knitting and often allows the other color to show through.  Invisible Stranding eliminates these problems and leaves the knitting smooth.

I was particularly interested in this method because of the Dale of Norway sweater I have been working on for the past few years 🙁 .  The carries on some rounds were greater than 30 sts and that was a problem.  Everything I tried looked awful.  But then I used this technique and it worked perfectly.  No dimples, no puckers, no color showing through.

In order to share my discovery, I needed a vehicle, so I decided to design a hat pattern.  Hats are small projects.  🙂  I used worsted weight yarn.  🙂  And only two colors.  🙂  My goal was to focus on the technique, not get side tracked with other design elements.  Plus, Malabrigo Merino Worsted feels like cashmere.  🙂

The result is my It’s Not About the Hat Pattern which is available on Ravelry.

It’s Not About the Hat

The pattern comes in 5 sizes, and both standard and slouchy fit.  I charted the color motif and also wrote it out line by line.  There are YouTube video tutorials for all aspects of the technique.

So this is what I have been working on the last few weeks!  It feels good to get it off my plate and out into the world!  🙂

Response to question from PurrlGurrl: PurrlGurrl asked if a newbie to fair isle/stranded knitting could attempt this project.  I agree with what Sally said about it being for people who are already familiar with stranded knitting.  No attempt is made to walk the knitter through stranded knitting.  It is only meant to introduce people to an advanced, additional  approach to the knitter’s toolbox.

BUT, that said, there is nothing stopping someone from trying it!!  There are multiple youtube videos that demonstrate the entire process start to finish!

I am in the knitting doldrums and patiently ::yeah, sure:: waiting for some yarn deliveries (“Um, John, you may notice a few packages arriving in the next few days…” 🙂 ).  So, when I am impatiently waiting for the next project, I usually drag out some musty old thing that I stopped working on because it was boring or problematic.

Or two musty old things.  One is my Window to My Soul (I admit that I do not understand the name of this one).   It is cute and should be fun to wear next spring and summer, but I am at the point where I am knitting acres of stockinette and getting nowhere.  Plus, there are the sleeves to do as well.

Sally finished hers and it turned out so great, that I am inspired to keep going.  It is mindless, so I drag it around with me.

The other musty, old thing is really old.   A really old thing.  I first mentioned this in September 2009.  It is Dale of Norway 10903.  I have started this multiple times for multiple reasons, but I must really want the darned thing because I keep coming back and giving it another go.  Maybe this is the year to be done with it!!  Yay!!

The problem with working on these two projects is that when my new yarn arrives, I will want to drop them like hot potatoes.  But I kind of hate doing that, especially when 10903 has been waiting for 6 years.

So maybe my new yarn purchases will have to sit in wait until they become old and musty to get any attention! 😉

I am waiting for the mail. I am waiting for yarn. I am waiting for yarn for my Dale of Norway 10903. I am feeling really stupid right about now.

Back Story
I suffer from Dye Lot Anxiety. It harkens back to my earliest knitting experiences. My first sweater is a tale of dye lot woe.

In the old days, before great yarn stores and gorgeous patterns (Rowan, Bliss, Starmore), and Ravelry, Twist Collective, etc. there were only two ways to buy patterns (there were probably knitting magazines out there, but I was not aware of them). You went to the yarn store (which carried about three kinds of yarn) and looked through their sad, meager pattern collection OR you saw the design of your dreams in a women’s magazine, like Redbook or Good Housekeeping. If it was the latter, you sent in $3 and a SASE and placed your order. 4-8 weeks later, your pattern would arrive. No color photos (maybe one or two B&W’s), no diagrams, no charts. Lots and lots of tiny little writing. That is how I purchased the pattern for my first sweater. Then off I went to buy the yarn.

I wanted something practical, so I bought white acrylic. I know. However, I did not buy enough white acrylic. I had no idea about dye lots and most cheap acrylic yarns now don’t even HAVE dye lots! So back I went to buy more yarn. The new white was more like gray and very noticeably different. So, I decided to add some red to give my new sweater style and pizzaz. There were lines of garter ridges that did not go all the way across the front until they reached the bustline, so I actually figured out intarsia so I could create a notched area (it is in the gray-white yarn):

I keep this sweater as an example of what NOT to do on so many levels — it is full of oddities. And a bad dye lot.

A few years later I was again inspired and ready for a cabled Aran-inspired classic. Again, off I went to buy yarn (wool this time!!)…carefully checking the dye lot numbers. You can’t fool me twice!!

This sweater was a huge challenge for me. I did not know how to cable without a cable needle and there was cabling on every row. It was a slow go. I had used my first skein of yarn and had maybe 8-9 inches of the back done. I started my second skein and it was a completely different shade!! Very noticeable! But how could that be when I was so careful?

I had matched the color numbers, not the dye lots! The first skein I used was the ONLY skein that was different!! Aaaarrrggghhh!!!

Those two experiences have made me obsessed with dye lots AND with buying enough yarn. Add my tight knitting gauge and the fact that I am the size of Big Foot, and I need to buy a lot of yarn! There are times when I need 30-50% more yarn than called for in the pattern. This is a source of ongoing ‘tension’ with Sally and me since she is the size of a teacup.

The Present
When I bought the yarn for my Dale of Norway, I planned on making the size medium (as I said back then, their sizes are crazy big). BUT, I bought more yarn than called for for the largest size. The largest size said you needed 8 skeins (400 gms) of the off white. I bought 9. Hey, no problem!!

Except that I was looking at the chart for the Child Sizes! The adult large takes 600 gms (12 skeins). Yep. Way short. I contacted Kidsknits (Mary Ann Stephens — super nice and great to work with) and she of course did not have any left of a two-year old dye lot. The irony is that she had plenty of the yarn when I bought it two years ago.

Most stranded pieces are not problems for differing dye lots, but on this sweater, the white areas are so large and unbroken that a different dye lot could be very noticeable. I will just have to wait and see how far off the new dye lot is and if the knitting I have done so far can be salvaged. Starting this a third time is not an appealing option for me. 🙁

So, I wait for the mail. Tick. Tock.

Happy New Year, Faithful Readers! As I said to Sally this morning, I overdid it last night. No, not drinking and raucous revelry! I overdid it with my knitting. I am suffering this morning from sore wrists and sore elbows. Just too pathetic for words!

New Year’s Day is a time of reflection. As I look back over this past year, I have made quite a few smaller projects. I think I have suffered of late from “failure to launch” syndrome. It has become mentally difficult for me to tackle the big, complex projects because I know how much time and work is involved…so I haven’t. My New Year’s Resolution is to get up on that diving board and take the big leap!! And lose 30 pounds (but that is my resolution every year!).

What will be that big project? I went down into the dungeon -er- my knitting/sewing room and started searching through bags. I do have several big projects stashed. I came upon ‘Dale of Norway 10903’ as it is affectionately known. Long time readers may recall that I “started” this project quite a while ago (The Long and Winding Road). I do not remember why I started the bottom band and then put it away.

It seemed like a great idea to restart this lovely Norwegian sweater since the boring band was already done. It took a while to regroup and figure out where I was.

A word about Norwegian sweater patterns: they leave a lot of details to the imagination. Like the number of stitches for the shoulders, and any number of other things. Because the sweater has both a pullover and cardigan version, I was able to cobble together the numbers by comparing the two. I reworked my pattern so the armholes will be centered to the latticework pattern.

Off I went with a vengeance. But then reality hit. It looked awfully small. My original blog post specifically mentioned that I had gotten gauge on a US 2, but I chose to use a US 3. I don’t know what went wrong, but I was 7 inches off!! So, after knitting 12 rows on > 300 sts, I had to start over!! This is why people do not make sweaters!! I started over by doing a provisional cast on — I will knit the band after the body. I also changed to a US 4 needle and things seem to be going swimmingly. Whew!

This particular pattern also has a unique aspect to it with the patterning. There are some incredibly long (31 st) “floats” between color changes!! I first fell in love with this sweater when I saw it on WendyKnits Blog in February 2004. Wendy discussed that she did not wrap her floats across the 27-31 st white areas because a- they show through and b- they create puckers. So, I thought if she can do it, I can do it. So I did not “grab” my floats in the dark olive/white section of the leaves that I finished last night:

The back:

Risky, to be sure, but I wanted the white sections to look as good as possible. The red arrow on the top picture shows where I caught the green float. I usually grab floats to align with sts already worked from a previous row, which did not exist to this point. The second choice is to align the floats with a stitch from the NEXT row. Since the next row is covered up, I mark these spots on my chart with a pencil dot so I know where to grab the floats and cause minimal disruption to the fabric.

The next color up is pale green, so I may catch them — shouldn’t show through as much. But later I will have burgundy against the white, so I will again have very long floats.

So, we will see slow progress over the coming months. I would love to go start the pale green rows right now, but I need to ice my elbow. I am a knitting dork.

PS – Twinset Jan mentioned that maybe the long floats will felt to the back of the sweater with washing and wearing. A great thought, but the yarn is Daletta, which is washable! 🙁

Ahhh, fall is in the air and I am loving it!  Well, it is actually really hot today, but still.  The Vikings are playing football and school has started, so that constitutes fall for me.

I am cobbling together the yarn to make Dale of Norway 10903 (catchy name, huh).   I linked to WendyKnits blog because that is where I saw this pattern many years ago.  I have loved it ever since and had it in my “I’ll get to that one someday” queue.  Well, that day has arrived.  The yarn hasn’t!  I am going to make it as a cardigan and have changed the blue to one that is a bit darker.  Now I will wait patiently for my yarn and dabble in other things.  I.  Will.  Wait.  Patiently.

In the meantime I am trying to get my SewJo back (sewing mojo ).  I have an event to attend in 2 weeks.  It is a gala.  Old ladies in prom dresses.  I do not own a prom dress and never did.  I am not the evening gown type.  So what does a dud wear to a gala?  I am going to wear a dressy suit.  I bought some drop dead gorgeous gold/brown/black brocade for the jacket and some silky black for a longish dress to go underneath.

Of course, the beauty cannot be captured — elusive as a butterfly!

I have done the cutting and now must start the sewing.  Woo Hoo!!

PS: in response to Julie — Dale of Norway 10903 does not have an official name.  Wendy (of WendyKnits) named it Frida to give it a name.  But if everyone calls it Frida because Wendy named it, then I guess it has a name!