Week 133 : NY Cape in progress

I am almost finished a Tessuti NY cape. I used their wool knit "double tweeded check" which has worked really well. I had to be very careful of the fabric, it had a tendency to stretch more than a woven.

The wool binding I bought for the edging, in the end, wasn't used. It was the wrong shade of grey and especially when seen with the internal finishing on the hood.

The interior seams were bound with a simple fine cotton/poly bias binding instead (its unlined) and it was such a good effect and colour that I simple continued that for the front.

It has a hood and you can see the binding on the edges of the seams. Its a lovely finish.

I still need to buy buttons (a few on the front and one each to separate the 'sleeve' from the body. I think I'm going to go with a black. I can't find my leftover fabric otherwise I'd consider a self covered button.

Week 132 : Pink hat

Hat number two is finished. Exactly the same as last week's green hat but knitted at a slightly looser gauge with a 9mm needle so its a little bigger.

The yarn is Madelinetosh ASAP in the colour Posy.

Other than this hat, I have knitted on the brown gradient Plucky Bello sweater. I am half way through the second sleeve. I hope to be up to knitting the yoke this coming weekend.

Week 131 : Hats

I was given a lovely Spud & Chloe yarn kit to make a hat. The pattern is Slope
Hat by Susan B Anderson. The green colour is called Hedge.

It was such a fast knit on 8mm needles. I knit this first version in two evenings (and that only because I ripped out a couple of versions before I settled on a gauge I was happy with.)

I made some very minor modifications. I knit to a tighter gauge so I had a little more yarn leftover than many other Ravelry versions..

Secondly I substituted a few purl stitches up at the transition of the cable into the main knit panels. The pattern has the purl stitches either side of the cable finishing earlier

I like the increased definition of the cable panel.

This is my nine year old daughter modelling it. She has a preference for a more girly colour plus a matching scarf so I realised straight away I had to buy more yarn.

So Madelinetosh ASAP in three colours arrived.

Sun Rose and Black Walnut

and Posy, which I cast on.

I have plans for more hats too. I think every child I know should have a hat this Christmas for the following Australian winter and so there is still more ASAP yarn in the post. More photos to come as they get knitted up.

The Plucky gradient sweater is com in along slowly. I have finished the first sleeve and working on the second. Once I've joined up for the yoke knitting with the lightest 'oatmeal' colour, I'm going to incorporate a colour contrast in. Probably the yoke from Nieman but I haven't ruled out a shorter Stasis motif. Maybe just the cuff depth.

I am doing a few rows here and there on my yellow cardigan too. Once I've cast off the body fabric I can start a button band and go shopping for buttons.

Week 130 : The absent week

Last week had no crafting, and very little activity at all as I was terribly sick with a cold.

I have a few things to show, which I hope to upload when I'm back online after the weekend.

Week 129 : Gradient

I made good progress on the Gradient collection of Plucky Bello yarn from last week. I am still knitting upwards through the body but on the third skein. Almost at the underarm and one more colour (Oatmeal) after this.

I am planning a simple colour motif around the yoke when I get to that point. perhaps Neiman using the darkest skein over the lightest.

The colour change is as follows
Starting a 9cm band of colour "a",
-    then introducing colour b as; a, a, b, a, a, b,
-    then alternate rounds; a, b, a, b, a, b, a, b, a, b, a, b,
-    then back to the 2rounds/one round proportion but with the new colour dominant; a, b, b, a, b, a, and on to "b" solid colour knitting for 8cm until the next transition sequence.

That was the only knitting I did over the past week.
I did cut out the New York Cape pattern from Tessuti  using this black and white plaid wool. The grey wool fold over binding is also from Tessuti.

I was inspired by the strength of the plaid fabric in this Celine coat. (Except why is the bottom edge left raw on this runway image? The other photographs I've pinned show it with a continuing binding. Perhaps they ran out of time?)
Anyway, depending on how I feel about the fit and handle of this NY cape/jacket I might make an additional one in a bold plaid with contrasting binding.

Then after that I made a start on the wool felt sofa throw using the Mary Flanagan felt squares I bought from Purl Soho.

I bought eight bundles in all (as per the Purl Bee project suggestion and this resulted in two of each of four bundles.

I had to cut each accurately to square and according to the smallest dimension.

It was hard seeing the waste pile. But I am thinking about crafty ideas for how I can use them.

I made a sample seam on a few edges. Its a double stitch line and I have 100% cotton. So my next challenge is to set them out. The question is randomly, or in bands with the colour shifting?

Then I blocked Stasis. The gauge remained more or less the same at 20st / 30r per 10cm. the wool has bloomed out a little and the colourwork yoke is sitting a little more comfortably in the adjacent grey fabric. I think its going to be a challenge to get this yoke to sit perfectly, it is such a deep band with no decreases, then a dramatic reduction. Its hard to absorb that sudden loss of width without puckering.

Photograph: Before

Photograph: After

Week 128 : Blazing Desert Star

I have made some progress on the silk cashmere cardigan in the bright yellow Sundara Sport Silky Cashmere. I am about half way down the body.

I made time for a thorough sort of my craft room and dug out all the knitting wip. Frog or Finish! Some projects were unravelled and all 'keep' projects marked out of hibernation on ravelry.

Even though there were some long-forgotten projects which are deserving of attention, I cast on two new sweaters.

The first one is a sweater from the new Wendy Bernard book. Its a stitch dictionary and also a collection of patterns. This lace front sweater is called Checkerboard Mesh Pullover, although the pattern notes that many other charted (and written) lace panels in the book could be substituted. For my first version I'm following the pattern as written but I plan to be a bit more adventurous next time around.

The yarn is A Verb for Keeping Warm 'Metamorphosis' in the colour French Monks' Finest.


I cast on a second sweater too. This is a simple bottom up raglan. I hope it will be a basic straightforward knit. I haven't used this yarn before, its Plucky Bello in four taupe & brown colours.
They were bought as a gradient set and I will knit them progressively starting with the darkest.

I'm doing a simple 2x2 rib to the edges.

No sewing this week since my craft room was turned upside down. But I am still mucking around with jars and school fete ideas.

Week 127 : Fundraising Idea - Gift Jars

Each year my kids school has a big fete for fundraising. I've been involved in a stall selling gift baskets and even though its still several months off, I've started collecting some handcrafted items suitable for the stall.

I'm making more of the pincushion jar sewing kits I first started making in week 110.

Last school holidays I made over a hundred jar lids as a specific school fundraiser. Those were in the school uniform fabric and included sewing items appropriate for repairing a uniform, the current plan is to make a selection of non-school themed kids.

Of the two jars above, the blue one is committed to a gift for a friend but the black and white one will be filled for sale.

The black and white fabric is from a short length of Auntie Cookie fabric called Letterhead and the blue is a Liberty Tana Lawn bought a one time ago from Tessuti.


My next fundraising project is to sell play dough at the fete.

I saw some ideas on Pinterest for using jars and was inspired to raid my daughters long-forgotten box of plastic animals. The jars will contain the brightly coloured dough, (made with flour, water, salt, vegetable oil and cream of tartar. Plus food colouring.). For today and to show other volunteers what we're planning to make, I just scrunched up a square of felt inside the jar.

The animals are superglued to the lid and then oversprayed with gloss enamel.

I used the same lid and plastic figure technique to make a 'manicure' kit from a jar.

Then since I had superglue enthusiasm, I experimented with buttons on a jar lid. Not sure what this will contain. Maybe hair accessories.

… and tried my hand at fabric covering with this silk and braid version.

On my knitting,. I finished Stasis. Its bigger than I was expecting but otherwise a perfect casual throw-on sweater for cold weekends out of the city.

I'm not keen on the yoke decreases. The dramatic stitch reductions are a bit more obvious in this yarn than I would have liked.