Can you spare a square? April brings us to EZ's "mystery" blanket. Contrary to the meaning "mystery" has taken in the fiber arts world, we are not being asked to blindly knit something for which we have incomplete directions and no finished photo. In this case, rather, we are knitting something which should prove "mysterious" to other knitters who examine it. Namely: In which direction was it knitted? (And yes, all knitters who examine this blanket will have to sign an agreement not to dangle any prepositions in front of it!) This is because the squares are knit from the center out, then grafted together. Smaller squares are then knit from the outside in, and borders are picked up and...
Race to the Finish I really thought I was not going to get these done in time. I cast on 27 February, and if it hadn't been a leap year, I would not have finished within the prescribed month. I was using up scraps of my hand-dyed sport weight from the baby sweater and a couple of woven scarves I had made as Christmas gifts. When I ran out of hand-dyed scraps, I decided to use up some 6-ply sock yarn I had languishing in the stash. To be honest, if I were making these for someone in particular I would have used matching yarn or at least attempted to make the stripes look purposeful. As it stood, I was...
In Which I Make a 45" Square Swatch With the doldrums of the double knit blanket behind me, I launched into the square shawl. I think this is really EZ's way of getting you to knit a second blanket without calling it that, because I have a hard time imagining what else a baby would do with a 40"+ square of knitted lace. I heeded our author's suggestion to have a lace pattern picked out so that the ever-increasing square would not get too monotonous - I had had enough monotony for one month, thank you! Enter my all-time favorite, most referred-to, most baffling, stitch dictionary! The Mon Tricot Knitting Dictionary: 900 Stitches and Patterns! I inherited this treasure from my...
Sl1, K1 ad nauseum I'd like to begin by admitting that I probably should not be so hard on this project. If I hadn't already learned this technique, I would have been dazzled and charmed. However, as it happens, I have already used this technique and found it to be largely unnecessary. Double knitting is when you product two "right" sides of knitted fabric at once. The stitches alternate which side they belong to, and working double knit produces a stretchy, cushy, thick piece of fabric. Double knit lends itself particularly well to colorwork, because if you work the two sides of your piece as inverses of each other it virtually eliminates floats. I will admit that while the end...
Thank Goodness for Leap Years! This month was a doozy. So much of a doozy that I did not write update posts (obviously), did not take progress photos (whoops), and (almost) did not finish. (You'll have to forgive my obsession with parentheses; it's one of the few remnants of my time in academia.) So let's start by acknowledging that there will be a couple of belated February follow-up posts with details about projects and photos and all that good stuff, ok? Ok! EZ casually suggests that one might knit some babies' things in February, then proceeds to pithily describe 1) a double knit baby blanket, 2) a square shawl, 3) a baby cardigan, and 4) a pair of baby "longies"...
