The second of a number of new patterns is up on Ravelry!
Spotted Toadstool Beret. Cute, huh? Are you getting an idea of what the whole collection is about? This three-page pattern includes photos and written instructions for the spot stranded pattern and slip-stitch "gills." It's for baby (14.5" circumference), child (16" circumference), and large child/teen/small adult (18" circumference).
I had a dickens of a time getting the decreases for the beret shape to line up with the number needed for the repeat of the spot pattern. I think I've got it all right now, but if anyone feels like test knitting it in the smallest and/or largest size for me, I'd be happy to send you a free pattern (for the beret as well as the hedgehog mittens, or any other Looking Glass Knits for-sale pattern)! Just email me (my address is listed in the sidebar) and I'll send you the pdf's.
UPDATE: thanks to everyone who volunteered to test knit for me. Your help is much appreciated!
Ravelry download:

Thursday, March 15, 2012
Another new pattern: Spotted Toadstool Beret!
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Labels: baby clothes, beret, children's clothes, hat, original designs, stranded
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
New Pattern: Poky Hedgehog Mittens!
I have a few patterns I'm going to be posting in the next few weeks; this is the first. They're all part of a new collection I've been working on. (While managing to keep up with schoolwork too, more or less!)
Aren't they cute? These little hedgehog mittens are knit with DK yarn at a gauge of 6 stitches and 8 rows/inch. I used Madelinetosh Tosh DK in "French Grey" and "Twig" to make them.
The pattern is $2.99 and available for download from Ravelry. It is four pages long and includes pictures and detailed instructions both for the mittens and for some of the less beginner-ish techniques involved (and I mean REALLY less beginner-ish; the only skills used besides knit and purl and knitting in the round with dpn's are m1 increases, ssk, k2tog, and picking up stitches).
Poky Hedgehog Mittens
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Labels: baby clothes, mittens, original designs
Monday, December 27, 2010
Happy Holidays!
Hi everyone! How about a late-for-Christmas present?
I cobbled together this cowl as a present for my mom and to use up some really nice fingering cashmere I had from School Products. It's kind of a combination of the shape/button of Knitty Gritty Thoughts' Spiral Cowl (a pattern you know I love) with the stitch pattern in Leila Raabe's Shaelyn, another beautiful pattern I'm dying to try. I have to admit I didn't buy the Shaelyn pattern -- just eyeballed it and assumed that the wavy stripes were done in "Crest of the Wave," an old Shetland lace pattern.
I see that School Products no longer has the yarn I used, but this would be a good project for one skein of Jade Sapphire 2-ply.
The pattern is for a woman's cowl -- if you want to make one for a child, it could easily be done by taking out one or two pattern repeats (the pattern repeat is 12 stitches) and knitting only three stripes of the lace pattern. Or if you want your cowl to be bigger, cast on an extra 12 stitches and work five stripes of the lace pattern.
Update 1/14: Thanks to Marina Carelli, who has translated the pattern into Italian. You can download the pdf (in both languages) here.
Update 1/14: Thanks to Lilian Sant'Anna, who translated the pattern into Portuguese.
Obrigado a Lilian Sant’Anna, que traduziu o padrão de Natal Cowl em Português.
Christmas Cowl
Size: 21 inches circumference, 9 inches tall
Gauge: 7 stitches and 9 rows = 1 inch
Yarn: 200-300 yards fingering weight yarn in something light and luxurious, like cashmere.
Needles: 16-inch circular needle, size 3 or whatever size will give you gauge
Notions: one stitch marker, tapestry needle, one coordinating button
Glossary
K: knit
P: purl
K2tog: knit two stitches together
Ssk: slip-slip-knit: slip the next two stitches one by one as if to knit. Return both stitches to left needle, then knit them together through the back loop
YO: yarn over
Instructions
Cast on 144 stitches and join to work in the round, being careful not to twist. Place a stitch marker at the beginning of the round (where you just joined yarn).
Work two garter ridges: Knit one round, purl one round, repeat these two rounds once.
Work one repeat of Crest of the Wave pattern:
Round 1: Knit
Round 2: Purl
Round 3: *k2tog twice, (YO, k1) x 3, YO, ssk twice, k1, repeat from * to end of round
Round 4: Knit
Round 5: Repeat round 3
Round 6: Knit
Round 7: Repeat round 3
Round 8: Knit
Round 9: Repeat round 3
Round 10: Knit
Round 11: Knit
Round 12: Purl
Work 12 rounds stockinette (knit all rounds).
Work another repeat of Crest of the Wave pattern.
Continue alternating 12-round stripes of stockinette and stripes of Crest of the Wave pattern until there are four stripes of Crest of the Wave. Then work two more garter ridges (knit one round, purl one round, repeat these two rows once). Bind off loosely (I used Jeny's Surprisingly Stretchy Bindoff).
Weave in ends and block very well -- I recommend wet blocking. You can stretch your cowl slightly in blocking it to open up the lace pattern and to make sure your fabric has some drape. You will find that the lace pattern is more "wavy" on the bottom than the top -- feel free to try to pin it in such a way that you make both the top and bottom as wavy as possible. I did this, and it sort of worked.
To finish your cowl, pick up three stitches at the top edge and knit a length of i-cord about 1.5 inches long. Make this length of 1-cord into a buttonhole loop by tacking down end of i-cord next to where you picked up the stitches and weaving in the end. Try on your cowl with the buttonhole loop at the top and fold over the loop to overlap cowl at the neck as tight as you would like it to be. Mark the place where the buttonhole falls when you do this, then sew your button at this place.
Your cowl is done! You can wear it loose and unbuttoned (like my lovely Mom is wearing it in the picture), or you can tighten it around your neck with the button to keep out the wind.
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9:18 AM
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Labels: cowl, lace, original designs, spiral cowl
Friday, September 10, 2010
Fall FO's!
My glorious, super-bright picnic blanket is done!
It's about 5' x 7', uses lots and lots of scraps, and is pleasingly puckered just like a well-loved heirloom. It has snaps to roll it up for toting to picnic locations and rock pockets to weight it down:
I've already used it once and am mightily pleased with myself. And what's this little lump sitting atop my picnic blanket?
Ah, yes, knitting. I've missed you, old friend.
Oh, and in other news, here's a lovely photo of the recipient of the "Sock Yarn Stranded" prototype, looking all cute and cuddly in her sweater:
I see lots of pills on those elbows. Hope that's from hard use!
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Labels: baby clothes, original designs, quilt, sewing, sock yarn stranded, yoke
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Sweetness
Finishing the Orals and the school year has made me want to do nothing but fall back on sheer relaxing pleasure knitting, which for me, unsurprisingly, is making top-down baby sweaters. I bought this yarn back in April to help sweeten a sort of miserable birthday spent alone and under the crushing stress of last-minute studying, and it actually did help.
The yarn is Sweet Georgia Tough Love Sock in "Cedar" with Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in "Andersonville" as a contrast. They looked great together in the skein because there was a little touch of the cedar color in the Lorna's Laces. I bought them intending to make the mosaic-yoke "Cardigan B" from my "Steps to Stranded" patterns, but when I came to knitting the mosaic part, that stripe of cedar color turned out to muddy the crispness of the pattern, and my pretty squares looked more like smudges. So I improvised something that would work with this yarn.
Instead of six rows of mosaic pattern in alternating sequence, I worked four rows of garter stitch in the Lorna's Laces separated by two rows of stockinette in the Sweet Georgia. The beginning of each garter stitch section is where I worked my yoke increases.
I think it looks very nice, and it's a sweet little variation on the pattern. So if you're looking for a variation on the "Steps to Stranded" pattern, I'd recommend it, especially with yarns that are just a little too close in color to make the most of a stranded or mosaic pattern.
A note on the yarn: in my previous post I had expressed some doubt about the Sweet Georgia yarn, but I rescind that comment: after wet-blocking this yarn is heavenly -- soft and sort of silky feeling with no scratchiness, and it seems to have lost the fuzziness that was making me worry about how well it will hold up. I think if I were knitting socks with it I would still knit them at a pretty tight gauge just to be sure -- and this yarn is a relatively fat sockweight, so knitting on one's normal sock needles would already be knitting it pretty tightly. But at the looser gauge of this baby garment, it drapes beautifully.
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Labels: baby clothes, original designs, steps to stranded, top-down, yarn reviews, yoke
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Phew!
I passed my Orals, and I am celebrating by knitting another yoked baby sweater. I feel no shame about knitting a baby sweater with no intended recipient -- and I'm not alone; Grumperina just spoke on the subject herself.
This is made with some splurge yarn -- Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in "Andersonville" and Sweet Georgia Tough Love Sock in "Cedar." Both are just gorgeous, sophisticated colors, and they work really well together. I have some questions about how well the Sweet Georgia will hold up as it seems a little fuzzy from the get-go, but I don't care. Who could resist that glorious, complex shade of blue-green?
As summer approaches I am lining up some more knitting projects and taking a vow that I will actually finish at least two sweaters I've been sitting on. And of course, I've also got to start writing the dissertation!!
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Labels: baby clothes, original designs, top-down, yarn reviews, yoke
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Bellyphant!
Sorry about the gap in posting there, gentle readers! I have been studying for the Orals like a madwoman. I hope I can make up for my e-silence by offering at long last the pattern for my baby sweater with elephants on the belly -- or as I've dubbed it, the Bellyphant Cardigan!
Click here to download the 9-page pattern pdf for $4.99 (Ravelry dowload):
This one is a first for me, because it's a bottom-up raglan instead of a top-down. The difference was necessitated by the design's having the elephants at the bottom of the sweater -- unless you want to do some math, it's much easier to start with the stranded portion and then knit in stripes until it's the right length, rather than starting at the top with the stripes and then beginning the stranded portion at the appropriate number of inches from the bottom of the sweater.
The details:
Size 3-6 (6-9, 12-18) months
Finished Measurements 21” (22”, 25”) chest, 10.5” (11”, 12.5”) long
Gauge 6 stitches and 8 rows = 1 inch
Requirements
Size US 3 (3.25 mm) straight or circular needles. I would recommend a long circular needle
Size 3 (3.25 mm) double-pointed needles or long circular needle for magic loop
300-400 yards sport weight yarn in main color (MC) (I used Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino in brown #11); about 200-300 yards sport weight yarn in contrast color (CC) (I used Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino in pink #15 or teal #203)
8 stitch markers
2 Stitch holders or scrap yarn
Tapestry needle
7-10 Coordinating buttons
Skills required: knitting flat and in the round, stranded knitting done flat, 2x2 ribbing, paired decreases, three-needle bindoff, picking up stitches
The pattern includes a glossary of all abbreviations as well as illustrated instructions for ssk (slip-slip-knit decreases), picking up stitches, and working three-needle bindoff.
This pattern does require flat colorwork (not knit in the round), and there are some pretty large stretches of one color only in some rows. If you’d like, you may prefer to knit it in intarsia rather than stranded knitting. The colorwork section is only 11 rows, though, so I think it's reasonable.
Click here to download the 9-page pattern pdf for $4.99 (Ravelry dowload):
The original recipient of this sweater adores it, and I've worked up two more of them to sell for my choir's silent auction. So the pattern has been test-knit by me in two different sizes and knit a total of 3 times over the last 6 months or so.
That's it, my friends! As soon as I'm done with the Orals I promise I will post again. I'm so looking forward to knitting again, and indeed to doing anything with my spare time other than read about medieval lay devotion!
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Labels: baby clothes, bellyphant, cardigan, original designs, raglan, stranded
Friday, February 26, 2010
Snow day update
The snow is falling into the trees outside my window; school is canceled; I'm sitting here in my nightgown and grandfather's old sweater knitting a sock heel and reading Judith Butler for orals. It's just a lovely day.
A few quick updates:
1. Thanks so much for buying my patterns this past month! I was able to donate $125 to the American Red Cross for Haiti relief because of pattern sales during my pledge period.
2. The giant doily blanket is coming along well. I don't know how to crochet so I am finishing the edges with an easy knitted-on lace; picture above. It's an eight-row repeat that goes on sideways and eats up 1 doily stitch every other row (so four rows total each pattern repeat). It's slow going, but I like the way it looks. I've done about 1/4 of the blanket edge so far.
3. The elephant sweater is all finished and awaiting buttons. It's heart-squeezingly cute. Still working on the pattern. The elephants are an 18-stitch repeat, so it's kind of hard to figure out whether it's even possible to write it for different sizes than the one I made it in.
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12:53 PM
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Labels: blanket, haiti, lace, original designs
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Wins of the Week
I am pleased to report of a number of wins, both epic and not. It has been a big week for:
1) Haiti Relief. Thanks to readers like you, I have been able to donate more than $100 to the American Red Cross, and I am only halfway through my pledge period.2) Elephants. The new baby sweater is almost finished, and it is pretty freakin' cute. Question, though: I've been holding off on the button band because I am wondering if the body of this looks too long. Thoughts, gentle readers?
3) Snow. There was a minor snowstorm last week and apparently a biggie in the making. Which also makes this a good week for...
4) Delivery. I have just discovered the joys of Fresh Direct and PJ Wines deliveries. It's surprisingly exciting to get a pile of boxes from Fresh Direct delivered up to one's door -- kind of like getting a present, even though you know what is in it!5) Cleaning tips from Ravelry: I pulled my beautiful cashmere spiral mitts out of my bag on Thursday and discovered that a red liquid ink pen had exploded all over the cuff of one of them. It looked like a bloodbath! But Ravelry forum posts came to the rescue: turns out hair spray and rubbing alcohol remove ink (in fact, I bet the hair spray works because it contains alcohol). So after some liberal hair-spraying and rubbing with alcohol prep pads (all I had in the medicine cabinet) and a good wash with shampoo and conditioner, this is what remains of the ink. The two little spots you see were quarter-sized deep red blotches. Pretty sweet! Plus, the mitts are now softer and fluffier than ever!
6) Fingerless mitts: the possibility of my spiral mitts' being destroyed led me to reconsider the fondness I have developed for them. They are surprisingly useful both indoors and out -- especially indoors, as my living room is quite cold and having just that little bit of cashmere around my wrists is surprisingly helpful in keeping my warm. So I cast on for a pair of October Leaves fingerless mitts with some Dream in Color Smooshy in "Gothic Rose" that's been languishing in my sock yarn drawer for more than a year. What a lovely pattern, and what a beautiful yarn! And fingerless mitts take up a surprisingly small amount of yarn. Which led to this being a good week for...
7) Cable earwarmers. This is a Bamboozled in the same yarn, held doubled this time. This is also a great pattern, and the only mod I made was to add a cable repeat (my row gauge was off from the pattern's) and to switch out the ties for buttonhole tabs.
Also wins, but not documentable in photo form:
8) Belated resolutions. I've been on a weight loss kick and have lost between 3 and 5 pounds, depending, oddly, on where I place the scale in my apartment. Magnetic anomalies? Ah, that reminds me...
9) Lost. It's back on, and it seems great so far. Much better than last season.
10) Emma. The Masterpiece Theater series has been adorable! Which leads to...
11) Cable TV. I finally caved and got cable for my apartment. I realize that both ABC and PBS are not cable channels, but my old antenna only picked up 2 channels.
12) Productivity. Shockingly, considering that the previous three entries on this list were television-related, I have been able to get a lot done in the last week and am now sitting smugly at the cafe blogging with hardly anything hanging over my head for the upcoming week. Indeed, the two pieces of reading I have stacked in front of me at the moment are not even things I have been assigned to read! (They are, however, medieval).
That's it! Anyone want another earwarmer picture?
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2:43 PM
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Labels: baby clothes, cable, gloves, medieval, original designs, spiral mitts
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Thanks!
A big thank you to everyone who's bought my patterns since I pledged to donate to Haiti relief -- already I've been able to donate more than I otherwise would have, thanks to you, and I will continue to do so until 2/14. If you're still looking to help, please do check out the "Help for Haiti" pattern sales on Ravelry. Knitters have been making a big difference: Yarn Harlot reports that her readers have donated an astounding amount so far!
Meanwhile, some knitting pictures.
The Stor Lysedug is making good progress, but unfortunately it's impossible to photograph in any way that doesn't look like a giant gray blob.
Having never knit a giant doily with aran-weight yarn, I have found this quite a pleasing project so far. It's a pretty quick knit, despite the fact that as I near the end the rounds are taking longer and longer to finish. I'm not sure how big this will be by the time I finish. I was hoping for something like 6' in diameter, but I think it will more likely be 5' -- still big enough for a lap blanket, but just barely.
I am usually a fan of knitting from charts, but that's kind of impossible to do with a circular pattern like this, and there's something cool about the element of surprise in reading written-out directions. This pattern uses all k2tog's and directional double decreases; I've been knitting it as written, but I'd like to try it again with ssk's for symmetry and symmetrical double decreases.
Meanwhile, I'm working on a new pattern, for a friend's baby boy to be born soon. There was a request for elephants:
Posted by
Jen
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10:50 AM
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Labels: baby clothes, blanket, fair isle, haiti, original designs
Sunday, January 17, 2010
A little help
On Ravelry, lots of pattern designers have pledged to donate a percentage of their pattern sales to Haitian relief efforts of their choice. I'm joining the effort: I'll donate 50% of proceeds from my pattern sales from now until 2/14 to the American Red Cross for their Haitian relief efforts.
My patterns for sale, just to recap, are Radcliffe Cardigan, Steps to Stranded (sweaters A, B, C, and the set), and Sock Yarn Stranded.
Ravelry now includes a "Help for Haiti" tag search that lets you see all the designers who are donating to Haiti relief -- there are tons of great patterns on there, and some designers report being able to donate pretty large amounts of money after just a day of listing their Help for Haiti patterns. So if you were thinking of buying a pattern but were waiting, or felt like it was too decadent to buy a pattern, now you can buy all the stuff you've been waiting around on, while feeling good about helping out in the process!
Posted by
Jen
at
9:25 AM
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Labels: haiti, original designs, ravelry
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Nothing New November
I'm in the process of moving apartments, and when I started to pack the knitting area I was appalled at the size of my stash, and at the pile of unfinished pieces in my work basket. Whence my new motto: Nothing New in November! No new yarn, no starting new projects!
Here are just a few of the pieces yet to be finished:
Selbu Modern. I have some doubts about this: it's looking very small, and I know that I can stretch it to block, but perhaps not as much as I originally thought. I have to say that I am a fan of colorwork but this has not been super fun to knit, so the thought of ripping it out and adding a pattern repeat to make it the right size is not particularly appealing. So this might be a back-burner project.
Ripping and re-knitting the sleeves of my Shalom cardigan. These just never fit right, and I had been thinking that the whole cardigan was too big to wear when in fact I think it was just the sleeves that were too big. This should be about a two-night project in front of TV, I think; I've already pretty much finished one of the sleeves. I'm also going to thread some elastic into the collar to make it stay tight -- Karabella Aurora 8 is a stretchy, heavy yarn, and the neckline gets pulled way big by the end of a day of wearing it. Re-knitting with it reminds me of what a nice yarn it is, though -- super soft, super bouncy, and not particularly pilly, yet.
Remember this guy? This sweater has been on my needles for more than two years! It's been languishing almost finished because I now hate wrapping my purls the wrong way, as I was doing when I started this. It seems to take twice as long to knit a row this way! One sleeve is about 3 inches from completion, and the other one is still unworked from the armpit join. This project could take me more than just this month to complete. In trying it on to gauge sleeve length, though, I am reminded of how adorable it will be when I finish it!
One new spiral mitt, waiting for thumb ribbing, and then for its partner to be knit. I tried a different design for these and have decided I like the original spiral mitt much better. This pair might be gifted for Christmas.
Then a couple of cheats:
I cast on a few days ago for a featherweight cardigan. I'm counting this as a "nothing new" sweater, though, because I ordered the yarn (Colourmart cashmere 4-ply) more than a year ago. Knitting my mitts and cowl with the gray cashmere made me absolutely burn to work with more cashmere, so I pulled this out of the stash.
This one is really a cheat: This is the ribbing for the left front of a new cardigan design I started only a few days ago. It doesn't really count as "nothing new," if I were being a stickler, but I've got to have something besides sleeves to knit, don't I?
This is only the tip of the iceberg, peeps. Among the other unfinished items I dug out of the knitting cupboard are not one but two baby sweaters awaiting a second arm, the left front and two inches of the back of my birthday BFL sweater, about half of a chevron scarf to match my chevron beret, another patterned-yoke sweater left off about an inch from the armpit division, an adult surprise jacket for my mom, and a cable sweater I've had on the to-finish list since I first learned how to knit five years ago. Oy!
Will it all be finished in November? Definitely not. But will anything new be cast on between now and December 1? Absolutely not!!
You hear that, Jennifer Little? Absolutely not!!
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Labels: beret, chevron, fair isle, featherweight, finishing, original designs, selbu modern, shalom, spiral cowl, spiral mitts, top-down, yarn reviews, yoke
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Fall freebie: spiral mitts
I was so enamored of Knitty Gritty Thoughts' spiral cowl that I knit myself some matching mitts. I had exactly the same experience with the mitts that I had with the cowl: I thought I'd never wear fingerless gloves, that they would be impractical or not warm enough, and it turns out that I adore them and wear them and the cowl all the time!
I'm passing on the pattern to you. It's super easy and quick to knit. I had been knitting my cowl with two plies of Colourmart 4-ply weight cashmere (so a little lighter than fingering) held together, so I used them singly to knit these mitts. If you want to do something similar, you could use any luxurious fingering weight yarn to make the mitts, then hold it double to make a matching spiral cowl! I imagine that these would be lovely knit out of Malabrigo sock yarn, for example.
Spiral Mitts
Size: Ladies' small/medium ( 7" hand circumference) with 8 stitch/inch gauge; Ladies' large (8" hand circumference) with 7 stitch/inch gauge
Gauge: 8 stitches and 10 rows = 1 inch (small/medium); 7 stitches and 9 rows = 1 inch (large)
Note: these mitts are knit top-down (from the fingers to the cuff). This means that you start by knitting the thumb and hand parts separately. It also means that you can tailor it to the amount of yarn you have by knitting the cuff longer or shorter as needed.
First, make your thumb tube: CO 28 stitches and join to work in round, being careful not to twist. You can place a marker at the beginning of the round if you’d like. Work 4 rounds k1, p1, rib. Work in stockinette (all knit) until piece measures 1". Break yarn, leaving about a 2” tail, and place stitches on a piece of scrap yarn.
CO 56 stitches. Join to work in round, being careful not to twist. Work 5 rounds stockinette (knit). In next round, *k2tog, YO, rep. from * to end of round. Work 5 more rows stockinette. In next row, knit each stitch together with one loop from your cast-on to make a folded picot hem.
In next row, make one stitch (or increase by one stitch), then begin spiral eyelet pattern as follows: *k6, k2tog, YO, rep. from * to end of round. You should be able now just to spiral your way around the mitt ad infinitum. Work three full repeats of the spiral pattern (24 rounds), or until work measures 2” from folded-down hem.
In the next round, join your “thumb tube” to the mitts as follows: work 28 stitches in spiral eyelet pattern. Place a marker. Knit across all your live “thumb tube” stitches, working the first few stitches with working yarn and tail end of thumb stitches held together, and place another marker. Work remaining 29 stitches in spiral eyelet pattern.
In the next round, work to first marker in spiral eyelet pattern and slip marker. Slip-slip-knit (ssk) or work your favorite left-leaning decrease, knit to last 2 stitches before marker, k2tog, slip marker, and continue round in spiral eyelet pattern.
In the next round, work to first marker in spiral eyelet pattern, slip marker, knit to second marker, then finish round in spiral eyelet pattern.
Repeat the previous two rounds until there are two stitches between the markers. In the next round, work spiral eyelet pattern until one stitch before the first marker. Drop marker and k3tog, drop second marker and continue in spiral eyelet pattern.
Continue working in spiral eyelet pattern for 4 more full pattern repeats or until work measures 3” from bottom of thumb gore or 7” from folded-down hem. Work 6 rounds stockinette, decreasing by one stitch in the first row of stockinette. In the next round, *k2tog, YO, rep. from * to end of round. Work 5 more rounds stockinette. Break yarn, leaving a long tail. Fold hem and tack down live stitches with a tapestry needle to make picot cuff.
Weave in ends, block as you prefer and repeat with second mitt!
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8:53 AM
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Labels: mittens, original designs, spiral cowl, spiral mitts
Monday, August 31, 2009
At long last... Steps to Stranded!
Special note: from now until 2/14/10, I will donate 50% of the proceeds from all my pattern sales to the American Red Cross for Haiti relief efforts.
Cardigan A ($1.99): buy now
Cardigan B ($2.99): buy now
Cardigan C ($2.99): buy now
Or the packet of all three ($5.99): buy now
I'm pleased finally to present a pattern I'm really excited about: Steps to Stranded Baby Cardigans!
This package of three top-down baby cardigan patterns is intended for all ranges of knitters, from beginners who only know knit and purl to intermediate or advanced knitters who have been wanting to try stranded knitting but are a little afraid to try.
Cardigan A has a circular yoke worked in contrasting self-striping yarn for a big effect with very little effort. Cardigan B uses Barbara Walker's "mosaic knitting" to achieve a two-color yoke while only working with one yarn at a time. And Cardigan C... is the one I'm really stoked about: it uses a modified mosaic technique worked over one row at a time to achieve what looks like fair isle... but without ever having to use more than one yarn at a time, and without steeking!
The 16-page pattern includes detailed, illustrated instructions for every technique included in the pattern except knitting and purling, as well as lots of other photos, hints, and charts to make everything totally clear. It's written for thee sizes, from 3 months to 12 months.

Best of all, these three sweaters use up extra sock yarn and are also the same gauge and measurements as my Sock Yarn Stranded Sweater, so you can graduate from these to that! And in fact, the Sock Yarn Stranded fair isle yoke never has more than 3 stitches at a time of one color, so you could use the same modified mosaic technique from Cardigan C to knit it!There are two ways to buy: you can buy the individual sweater patterns, or you can buy the packet of three patterns at a discount ($1.98 less than buying all three individually).
Cardigan A ($1.99): buy now
Cardigan B ($2.99): buy now
Cardigan C ($2.99): buy now
Or the packet of all three ($5.99): buy now
Posted by
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2:36 PM
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Labels: baby clothes, cardigan, chart, mosaic, original designs, steps to stranded, techniques, top-down, yoke
