purple and blue vest
December 31, 2011
Another vest for my dad. Modeled off of a navy blue zip up vest that he wears all the time. This one is made with three different yarns. A super bulky malabrigo in purples and blues, a worsted weight malabrigo in bright blue, and a lace weight madeline tosh in navy blue. All hand dyed yarns. I just love this particular combination. Both the texture and color combine and contribute to the beauty of the finished material. And knit on size 15 needles, the material knits up quickly, and has a particular firmness that is quite lovely.
The border has a few rows of garter stitch, and then the rest of the vest is stockinette stitch. To edge the front and armholes I picked up stitches (3 out of ever 4) knit a row, and then cast off. Quick, tidy and simple.
My dad chose the purple zipper, and I attempted to sew it into the knitted material. My current method for sewing in zippers is to: 1. pin the zipped up zipper into the sweater/vest. 2. unzip and hand baste the zipper on both sides. 3. machine sew the zipper from the right side of the material, taking care to back-stitch at the beginning and end of the line.
I know that there are different sewing machine feet for sewing in zippers, but I haven’t been able to figure them out yet, so I wrestle through with the normal foot…hoping that I don’t break anything.
orange (red, yellow, pink) sweater
September 22, 2011
This is another orange sweater. One strand of thick yarn, and one strand of thin yarn held together throughout. The thin strand kept changing, from yellow, to pink, to red, and back and forth between. The thick strand stayed orange.
The sweater was knit top down, on size 10 needles. I wanted to use Malabrigo worsted weight yarn for the base, and added a strand of lace weight so that I could use the size 10 needles for the gauge required.
I had been looking at the four colors of yarn in the store for a while, thinking of what to make. I was considering a lace project, and when I realized that I could put the two weights of yarn together it was a perfect plan.
The sweater is knit in reverse stockinette, with garter stitch borders. I liked the effect of the constant change of threads and the more bumpy texture of reverse stockinette. I changed the lace weight yarn every row, or every other row, at random.
The inside of the sweater shows the striping differently, and I managed to tie away all the color changing ends. (Except for in the sleeves, where all the little lace weight ends are flailing around…)
The side “seams” were created by a row of stockinette, and add a nice little touch.
All together a very simple sweater, and worked up quickly, with the big needles.
living in the woods and making stuff 