New Pattern: Flapjack Mitts

I have been AWOL for far too long - pressures of work and publication deadlines. Also I've not had much to share as I've mostly been knitting magazine samples. I do intend to do some yarn reviews over the next few weeks as I've had the chance to knit with lots of different yarns - almost all wools or wool blends though.

One of the publications that I've been working on with the lovely folks at Knit Now magazine is a pattern supporting Roald Dahl's Marvellous Children Charity. Knit Now are co-ordinating Marvellous Mittens which will is a collection of patterns for mittens, gloves, arm warmers etc which will be released over the forthcoming months. I am lucky enough to be the designer of the first release:

The Flapjack Mitts are simple and quick with a cabled pattern that splits to form the thumb. They are knit with 1 skein of Colinette Cadenza (shade shown: Cumin) but other standard wool yarns at approximately 130yds/50g would also work. My original prototype was in Rowan Silky Tweed which is a very light aran (really a dk) and gave a more rustic look.

You can download the pattern via Ravelry here and there is a link on the pattern page to a JustGiving site for honesty box donations to the Roald Dahl Marvellous Children Charity. You can also go straight to the JustGiving page by clicking here.

These gorgeous photos were taken on a beautiful late Autumn day using one of our last dahlias as a prop. I can only take credit for the hands - the photos are the work of my very talented husband.

The importance of swatches

Guilty confession time...I know I should swatch every time I knit something but I tend to have even tension and usually hit the gauge without needing to change up or down so when I'm knitting from a pattern I tend to wing it. I will swatch if it has a weird gauge for the type of yarn, or it's in an unusual stitch pattern but even then only if it's for something that needs to fit. I don't think I've ever swatched for a shawl pattern even though I know there are lots of reasons why it's useful to spend that time swatching and blocking. Here are some of the reasons:

1. It lets you know if the stitch pattern will make you lose the will to live (with frustration or boredom)
2. It lets you know if your tension is wonky or if you need to make adjustments to the pattern or pick a different size to meet your gauge
3. It can be an outward sign of inward stress that you've been ignoring
4. It's an opportunity to practice the stitch pattern/s, see how they flow together, and find out if they block differently
5. It lets you know if your yarn will work with the pattern which is particularly helpful when you're substituting yarns which I normally am

All that being said I still rarely swatch. The only time I remember swatching was as a relatively new knitter making a cardigan in Jaeger Roma. I swatched, came out bang on gauge, and then I picked up the wrong needle and before you know it I had a gauge square with perfect tension and a cardigan that was a size too small (also I learnt my lesson about knitting in pieces and not being able to try as you go). That cardigan has looked at me reproachfully for the last couple of years until I sent it to a new life with a smaller knitter in Sweden.

Even when I started designing I would do all the maths, sketches, pattern write-up and then knit the whole piece with much frogging, note making, and re-knitting. This state of affairs continued until the last few weeks when trying to put together multiple pattern submissions meant there was simply not enough time in the day to knit the whole piece and I rediscovered the joy of the swatch. As you can see I now have a small and growing collection:

The yarns here are (clockwise from top left) Wollmeise 100% Superwash, some generic 4ply wool of unknown provenance, I think DB Rialto 4ply striped with Noro Kureyon Sock, Rowan Creative Focus Worsted, RYC Cashsoft Aran and on the top Yarn Yarn Crannog

This little heap tells me a few things:

1. I don't have an extensive palette of colours
2. I need to find something to do with the swatches
3. I seem to be on a texture binge at the moment
4. I really don't like knitting with alpaca

Closer examination of two of the swatches reveals more about my 4th point. 

I had in my head a very clear idea of a design - shape, pattern, what to wear it with (even the shoes) and colour. For some reason, even though alpaca makes me sneeze and sheds so much that my knitting chair looks like it's been attacked by a moulting Fraggle, I thought and alpaca blend would be perfect. I'm not sure what I was think but it definitely had something to do with the alpaca sales pitch of warm, light and soft yarn. So I hunted on the great plains of the internet for an alpaca blend in the perfect colour and found the yarn on the right which is Rowan Creative Focus Worsted in New Fern. Now it turns out that I have knit with this yarn before under a previous name (Nashua Creative Focus) but I didn't realise it at the time. So I knit a swatch full of lovely cables and moss stitch and it didn't look too bad...and then I blocked it and like my hair on a humid day it fluffed up and obscured the pattern. It is soft and light and looks like a bowling green with a moss problem but it's not going to work for this pattern. Back to the hunt which took me all the way to a part ball of RYC Cashsoft Aran - smooth, plied, bouncy, round, soft and full of woolly goodness and look at the difference in the pattern definition - perfect! The colour is all wrong for my mental image but since I also don't own the right shoes I can come to terms with that. 

And the lesson of the day is...know your yarns and pick the right yarn for the right job, and don't forget to swatch and check. I'm not sure what the Creative Focus is right for but there must be something...any suggestions?

Flapjack knitting

I posted a while back about mojo knitting - the sort of thing you do when you've lost your spark and need to regain it. This was another such project I recently completed.

These simple cabled fingerless gloves are made from less than 50g of Rowan Silky Tweed (colourway Flamenco). I don't always enjoy knitting with tweedy yarns as they can be a little rough until they're blocked but this was fine to work with.

I'm about to put the pattern out for testing so this should be released fairly soon. I can knit an entire glove in one RWC test match (England vs Scotland last Saturday for Glove 2) so it's a quick knit and might be good for Christmas gifts

Third shawl and first sister

My eldest sister turned 50 this year - and you'd never know it so I hope the youth genes run in the family - and so I started her entry in my sisterly shawls series. Except it's not a shawl. It could be a shawl, and when I write it up it will have a shawl option but at the moment it's a very long (82" x 8") shaped scarf. My other sisters named it so it's definitely a family affair.

Presenting Rosehip:

Knit in Posh Arabella (Cashmere/Merino) in Souffle, Rosehip has subtle cables and simple undulating lace resulting in a restrained piece of elegance. Perfect (I hope) for my classy eldest sister!

So, a very belated Happy Birthday to her (just over a month late) and this is going in the post.

FO Friday - Mojo knitting

I finished the hat without needing to buy more yarn!

Here it is blocking over the lid of a cake tin. I had about 7 yards left of the yarn which is lots really...

And this is the detail of the centre which has more accurate colours:

Simple cabled hat (improv.pattern)
Colinette Art (0.6 of a skein) in Ischia (I think)
3.25mm and 4mm needles

I don't think it's worth writing up but I might change my mind. Some things I improvise are just 'mojo' knits - I'm in a slump and need to get my knitting mojo back with something simple but lovely.

WIP: New design

This is a new design for a wrap and is likely to become pattern support for Dodoknitz!! who provided the yarn. I've not given it a final name as yet.

This is knit in Dodo Sock which has excellent yardage and lovely stitch definition. This particular colourway is a new one I think, designed for this pattern and will hopefully be available as a kit in the future

In other news I have been baking! Himself volunteers at a local primary school as a governor and their brand new PTA ran their first ever summer fair at the weekend. This being England it rained but that didn't seem to dampen any spirits. This was my contribution to the cake stall:

35 iced fairy cakes, a chocolate/vanilla marble cake, an iced lemon loaf cake and at the back a tray of butterscotch flapjacks (I recently discovered butterscotch chips at the supermarket).

Baking for school fairs is something I remember my mum doing when I was little and she ran the parish and school cake stalls. For her it was a more military operation involving bakers delivery pallettes and several trips in an estate car so this was very lightweight.

As Himself wasn't allowed to keep any of the cakes above he's very much hoping that he won the 'guess the weight of the fruit cake' competition so keep your fingers crossed.

Through the woods again

I started knitting a Through the Woods hood for my smallest niece but due to underestimating the size of a toddler's head I have had to reknit it completely with my yarn held double and have now run out of yarn. Still here it is in progress:

It still need a deep ribbed border at the front and the bottom and some button band. I added the bobble as I suspect she's a bobble type of person. This is quite a quick knit - I managed this much in about 4 hours of committed knitting and it's Wendy Mode DK held double for a chunky weight (and yes I know I could have just bought Wendy Mode Chunky but I was subbing for what I thought was a toddler size, turns out toddlers have quite large heads especially when they are covered with curls)

I do have some Wendy Mode Chunky in Imperial Purple to make the same hood for smallest niece's mother, possibly without the bobble though

In other news, today is my birthday which is so far full of crafty things (new button box with starter buttons, Mobair yarn, quilting book...). Happy me day!