What I did with Santa's gifts - part 1
 

Well, as you know, Santa brought me some lovely yarn.
Attachment 63123
When yarn is in a skein it can get tangled while you knit with it, so the first thing to do is put it on a swift:
Attachment 63124
and wind it using a ball winder:
Attachment 63125
into a neat ball ready for the next step.
Attachment 63126

It's good to have the right tools.

You have neat balls. :blush:

I also like Limey's balls.

I love that colour!

Yes, BigV hit the spot with that, for sure!

Here we have some more tools. The beads are in my grandfather's old inkwell (ideal to prevent accidental spillage). And the world's teeniest crochet hook. I don't crochet but it is the perfect thing for adding beads to knitting as you go. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...17e8eaffab.jpg

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And here we have some beads knitted into the knitting. I shall have to work out how to show you the process. It's a little fiddly even without trying to take photographs! https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...cf898d617b.jpg

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Wow, that looks tedious. Not something that you can add to multitasking. :headshake

Goes well with audio books, radio plays and music. Though we were listening to some rather distracting early polyphony just as I was getting started which didn't exactly help ...

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Ehrmagerd, beards!

limey, I'm delighted to see you making such beautiful things with the materials I gave you. It makes me happy. I wish you could visit the shop where I got the stuff (the fibers, that is. The music shop is not nearly as impressive but just as local and independent.) The proprietor told me she'd dyed that skein herself very recently. I doubt there's a freshness value to it but I did like the fact that she'd done it. I like meeting the makers, the builders, the artists.

I'm excited to see the progress of your artistry too!

as for how... I know bupkis about knitting but I won't let that make me stick to my own... hahahah


It looks like you push a bight through the bead and then carry on knitting/purling (just words I parrot without knowledge), instead of threading the yarn through the bead like pearl on a necklace. That makes sense to me since where would you start with the threading?? At the beginning and then keep pushing them up toward the ball until you need just one? That doesn't seem workable.

Anyhow, I look forward to more pics of your work in progress. I love progress pics!

Your bupkis assessment is about right. I use the teeny crochet hook to pull the “bight” (that’s a nice nautical term! We knitters say “stitch”) through the bead. Yes, some knitters thread all the beads on the yarn before they start knitting but I’ve NEVAH been able to get my head round that ...



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Here are a couple more progress pics. You can begin to see the pattern emerging. And the beads are nicer than they look in the pic - a sort of matt iridescent blue and pink. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...f762d51c40.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...c0fce178bb.jpg

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Good grief, how in hell do you keep track of all those patterns at the same time?
You've done this knitting stuff before, haven't you. :haha:

Loverly!!

What I did with Santa's gifts - part 1
 

Yes, but they *are* patterns. The left and right edges are mirror images of each other, and the bit in the middle is an eight stitch repeat. I have two stitch-markers to remind me where the edges meet the middle section (you can just see one of them in the top pic, the grey loop at the bottom of the pic). They hang on the needle between the stitches and are simply slipped from left to right needle in the process of the work.


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Thank you, bbro!
Knitting patterns can either be “written out” or “charted”. I prefer charts as they are a visual representation of what you have to do.
Here is a tiny section (don’t want to break copyright) of the chart for the left border showing left slanting decreases as \, yarn-over increases as O, and bead placement as the green squares.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...7e438f623b.jpg

And here is the corresponding but of knitting.



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https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...85b0acbac1.jpg

Oh sure, piece of cake. :rolleyes: :facepalm:

My mother knits and crochets, but I haven't been able to pick it up. I get distracted too easily. Oddly, I can cross stitch like a machine.

I may give crocheting another go. I just always loose count of my stitches

Just go with freeform crochet and you’re onto a winner straightaway!


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I've been enjoying myself. Each bead used to take 15-20 seconds but I've got it down to about 10 now I think.
Second pic shows one of the stitch-markers to show me where the edge pattern meets the centre pattern. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...79d7c19975.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...78461d46b4.jpg

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Wow, limey, you're very talented - it's beautiful!

*want*

WANT!!!

That IS Mr Limey in there, you know!

So he DOES have plenty of reason to take it off. :blush:

I thin k I said this the first time I saw that union suit...

Just seeing it makes me itch.

Yeah, but after all that itching think of taking it off for Limey.:blush:

:jig:

Looks like the Engineer's space suit from Prometheus.

♫ I want you to come on, come on, come on, come on and take it
Take another little piece of my heart now, baby
Oh, oh, break it ♪
♫ Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Oh, oh, have a
Have another little piece of my heart now, baby
Well you know you got it, if it makes you feel good ♪

You can make a 1940's style Perky Snood...

I’ve not forgotten this thread!


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Plenty of time when you get your fanny home. :blush:

The knitting was completed some time ago.
We are now at a stage called "awaiting blocking". Traditionally this stage takes anything from a few months to several years while the knitted item languishes unremarked in a bag in a corner because blocking is a faff and knitting something else is much more fun. However I will try to short this stage as I know you are keen to see the FO (Finished Object).https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...ae86bdb6c5.jpg

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I'm delighted to say that blocking is complete.
It involves soaking the item for around 20 minutes in warm water. Extremes of temperature can cause felting, as can too much agitation of the item in the water; twenty minutes is time enough for water to soak right through to the core of the yarn. You can see here that the yarn "bled" a little. This often happens with artisan dyed yarn.
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Then you wrap the sodden object in a towel and squish as much water as you can out of it. The aim is to have it just damp, all the way through. This means you can stretch the item out and pin it into the shape you want.
I took pic of this stage but accidentally deleted it, I'm afraid.
The blocking process, as well as setting the shape of the piece, evens up the stitches a treat! The reason your grandma's knitting looks so neat and even is because of the numerous times it's been washed. All that gentle shoogling of the stitches evens out the wonky tension between them.
The result:
Attachment 63668
I'm a happy bunny. Thank you BigV! x
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Nicely done!!

That is gorgeous, befitting your classic beauty. :beer:

In post #37, I swear I thought you'd knitted yerself a thong.

Knit yerself a thong.:D

some of those were my thoughts too. :eek:

-it's beautiful, Limey.