A Stretchy Bindoff and Kitchener Stitch

Poppy has been knitting like a fiend, finishing her Icelandic sweater for our upcoming trip. She recently consulted with me about how she should do the collar as she was modifying it from the original pattern. She decided to do a crew neck by knitting a ribbed collar and folding it, anchoring the edge inside where the yoke meets the collar.

Her first attempt yielded too tight a bindoff so we had to figure something else out. I invited her over to my place so we could solve the issue. After another failed attempt on my part, I realized we needed to do a stretchy bindoff at the same time we were attaching the edge of the collar to the inside. This is the bindoff we used:

Knit 2 sts, slip the first stitch over the second one, do a yarnover and slip the remaining stitch over the yarnover, leaving one stitch on the right needle. *Knit another stitch, slip the first over the second, then yarn over and slip the stitch over that. Repeat from * until all the stitches have been bound off.

The final task was to graft the stitches that were on holders under the arms. I showed, then taught Poppy how to do Kitchener stitch (grafting) joining two swatches together. 

Next I put the stitches from the two holders onto the two needles and started grafting a couple of stitches. I taught her the little chant, “Knit, slip, purl; purl, slip, knit”. Then let her do the rest of the stitches on the first underarm. We then got the stitches for the second underarm onto the needles and she did the whole graft by herself. Brava!

Then I showed her how to darn the holes on each side of the graft, running the darning needle around like a drawstring, then weaving the end in. 

She’s so proud of her beautiful Icelandic sweater!

 

All that is left to do is to weave in the ends and block it. We’re getting so excited for our trip to Iceland and Norway!

March Stitch Day

My guild has a stitch day the first Saturday of every month, all year long - even in July and August when we don’t have our business meetings. Yesterday I worked on two projects.

Cardinal’s Winter:

And Autumn Quaker:

Since I got the framing done on Live on Little, I can start a new project. I have The Light of Winter all kitted up and the fabric selected. 

I’m pleased to have found someone who wants to take my piano. I dreaded having to send it to a dump as it had sentimental value for me. My mom had purchased it from a friend when I was in high school and heading to post-secondary music studies, needing to upgrade my piano skills to an acceptable standard. My mom gave it to me when I moved into my first house - glad to have it out of her house. It has been in my houses for the past 43 years. 

I have already found an electronic keyboard on Marketplace that is very portable and won’t take up a lot of room wherever I put it. I still have most of my sheet music and look forward to hauling it out again and noodling a bit on the keyboard. There is so much stuff to get rid of. I’ll keep plugging away it it bit by bit.

Finally Framed

 I ordered the frame for my Live on Little piece over a month ago. The frame arrived in a couple of weeks but the non-glare plexiglass and foam core did not. After another couple of weeks I contacted the company asking for the status of the balance of the order and/or a refund. I did hear back with an explanation that there was a manufacturing issue, that the order would be shipped as soon as it was possible and they were refunding me the shipping costs.

The order arrived two days ago. Today, I took the time to mount the piece on the foam core and get it into the frame. 

I thought I was all done and had it up on the wall when I realized the fabric was slightly skewed to one side on the bottom quarter. I had to take everything apart and re-mount it. I think it's good now.

It took me a couple of attempts to sign the piece; decisions about what colour to use and where to put it.

I love the mermaid and her mirror.

And how could you not love whales, fish, and lobsters in a sampler?

The flags at the top of the mast are my initials in nautical flags.

I charted the Canadian flat to replace the US flag. I also reversed the colours on the star as the lighter colour didn't contrast enough with the fabric. When I stitched the darker colour I stitched straight lines from the center out. I also made a mistake with the colour of the birds' wings. I like my design choice better with the darker floss.

It's all ready for me to take to show off at my stitching day tomorrow.

I Got Ahead of Myself

 I neglected to post the finished Musselburgh I knit with Crazy Zauberball yarn.

I didn't use up all the yarn after all as there was well over 400yd. There was ample length to turn up the brim.

It is very cozy. 

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all these hats. Which ones I'll keep, which ones I'll find worthy owners for. 

I'm halfway done my Sweet Sheep Musselburgh. Excuse the crappy photo. I took it to send to Poppy as we were trading knitting progress photos this evening. She's on the home stretch of a pullover with an Icelandic design for our trip. She plans to embellish it with a bit of embroidery.

I'll take a better photo after I knit some more.

Speaking of texting back and forth, Jen1, Poppy, and I discussed several burning issues about our upcoming trip to Iceland and Norway via text tonight - topics such as transfers to and from airports, what to wear, where to pick up our tour in Iceland, etc. We're getting very excited.

I'm also considering another Christmas market tour, this time on the Rhine River between Amsterdam and Basel. I'd like to go this year and am working on finding a roommate. Another trip I'd like to take is a guided birding tour in Costa Rica. Ideally during one of the winter months.  Arne and Carlos just got back from a knitting cruise to Antarctica and are planning one again for next year. I already have a roommate selected for that cruise. When one gets to be 'a certain age', one realizes there is going to be a limit in one's ability to travel abroad at some point. I have a sense of urgency so as long as I am healthy and ambulatory, I plan to go go go.

Back on the home front, I have selected the style and colour of my new kitchen cabinets and quartz countertop. My designer had some great ideas to maximize counter space and make cupboard storage more effective. It will be so nice to have this improvement finally done after almost 29 years in this house.

The frame for my Live on Little piece finally arrived today at long last.  I contacted the company last week to ask for the item or a refund. They said there had been a manufacturing holdup and refunded the shipping costs. One of my tasks tomorrow will be to stretch, mount, and frame it so I can take the finished item to our guild's stitch day on Saturday.

Scooter is enjoying his working holiday in Europe. So far he's been in Portugal and Spain. He'll work his way over to northern Italy then further north over the next couple of months. He seems to have the desire to go go go as well.

Another Start Before Finishing Something

Last week I mailed my latest Musselburgh hat to Andrew in Manchester, England. He got it on Saturday and seemed quite pleased with it.

Being fine merino wool, I gave him very specific washing instructions. How often does one wash a hat anyway?

Now that I’m back in the habit of knitting while I watch TV, I cast on another Musselburgh. The yarn has been in my stash at least 15 years. It's from the now defunct The Sweet Sheep Yarns in the Tidal Wave colourway.

It’s a 80/20 superwash merino/nylon sock yarn. 

I haven’t done any more on the cardinal project but did start the Primrose Cottage Autumn Quaker. I’m using a remnant of fabric I bought years ago at the now defunct Judy’s Stitching Nice in Harlingen TX. It’s 32ct Platinum Belfast linen.

It’s coming along nicely except for all the miscounting and unpicking while at stitching this morning.

Tomorrow I’m heading to Cobourg to begin picking out the style of my new kitchen cupboards. My 42 year-old one are more than ready to be replaced. I don’t have a lot of counter space so we’re looking at putting the microwave oven above the stove and to add a bit to my floor space, I’m going to get a counter-depth fridge. These improvements are long overdue. But finally they’re getting done. 

Another Musselburgh

I mailed off the Malabrigo Musselburgh on Monday and started another one on Tuesday It’s a prefect project to knit while watching TV. I grabbed a. Ball of Crazy Zauberball yarn that I purchased probably more than a decade ago. I know it was a long time ago because the price tag was $19.99 and when I checked the current retail price it’s now $29.99.

I plan to knit it extra long again, kitting a second crown near the end of the ball and graft it onto the ‘tube’.

It is not the softest yarn but won’t be overly scratchy, either. I seem to be obsessed with kitting these hats.

Last night at guild Jeanette had a stitched piece on display that wasn’t fully finished. So I whipped out my ‘All is Calm’ and put it on the Show and Share table, too. 

While I was watching Teresa Kogut’s floss tube, she mentioned the quote, ‘Do small things with great love’. I thought I’d add it on the bottom of the piece. 

I did a search on Pinterest for some alphabets and graphed the text with my upgraded version of PCStitch. I had to stitch one over one to get all the words on. I agonized over what colour to use for the text and picked white. 

I still think I’ll turn it into a little pillow. 

I had someone over today to finally discuss replacing my kitchen cupboards. I’m not doing a major renovation - just keeping the same footprint and ditching the 42 year-old cupboards.

He noted that I was a knitter from my email signature. I told him I was also an embroiderer. He said his mom was, too, and that she was in a group that got together to stitch every Monday morning. Turns out that’s MY Monday morning stitching group, too! Small world. We also bonded over having attended Western, albeit graduating 12 years apart. He lived in the same dorm I did and hung out with Faculty of Music folks - the same faculty I was in. Small world!

• Watched ‘Book Club: The Next Chapter” on Prime - lots of fun bits, it kinda lost its way par way through but i would still recommend it
• Last night I watched the documentary about the Toronto woman who lost her memory in 2022 due to a series of head traumas. “50,000 First Dates”. I’m not sure why I hadn’t ever heard of her. In the media but it was interesting. I would recommend it.
• I also watched ‘Miss Potter’ on Prime on Teresa Kogut’s recommendation. It’s about Beatrix Potter and would recommend it as well.

Waiting for the Snow to Stop

Another dump of snow started last night. This was the snow meter yesterday morning, 

last night, 

and an hour ago.

It’s still snowing at but should let up in a couple of hours.

In the meantime I’ve been finishing up the Musselburgh hat.

I grafted the crown to the ‘tube’ - 124 stitches. I keep my fingers between the two needles to keep the grafting stretched out. It’s so easy to pull too tight and create a ridge.

This is all the yarn I had left from the 100g ball.

The brim is nice and deep for extra protection over the ears.

It’s a very clever, yet simple design - a tube closed at both ends. Then the one end is shoved into the other end.

I’m pretty proud of the grafting I did.

I started this so long ago (June of last year) that I couldn’t remember it was Malabrigo sock yarn in the Abril colourway.

I’m not sure why they call it sock yarn as there’s no nylon in it for strength. The heels would wear through so quickly without something to reinforce the yarn.