Golden Kasha and sewing buttonholes after the fact

I thought I'd never be done with this cardigan. Not only was the lace pattern fiddly (with 5 to 1 on purl side), but it needed lots of parts to all come together. But I'd say it was all worth it. It's one of my proudest knitted creation.

One of the reasons it took so long to complete is because I forgot to make the button holes as I was knitting the front. To be more precise I thought I was knitting the right front when in fact I was knitting the left and only realized the mistake about a half way through. 

I deliberated until the end whether I should make the cardigan snap closure or figure out to make the button holes afterwards. In the end, to keep the details authentic I chose to try making it button closure.

I discovered after thought buttonholes on the internet, but I didn't think the 5/8 width ribbon I used to back the band was wide enough to accommodate horizontal buttonholes. Also having to snip a stitch scared me and I was worried I'll ruin the whole thing. After much deliberation I decided to sew the buttonholes directly on the ribbon backed button band. After all, that's how people make buttonholes on knitted fabrics, so it should be doable, right?

I did practice first with a scrap ribbon and an extra button band that I knitted up for this. I just hoped it'll look neater when it's done with a matching ribbon and thread.

Being ever so impatient, I decided I was ready to go with the real deal. I backed the band with ribbon first, and then marked the positions. And then I ran them on the sewing machine one by one.
I did notice that the thick knit snagged the buttonhole foot, making it miss the turn. To mitigate, I sewed extra stitches around the button hole position (after painfully picking a couple of button holes).

It all worked out alright in the end. I'm so pleased with the result that I'm wondering whether this should be how I make button holes from now on, since it's deucedly difficult to space them correctly while knitting. It's also much sturdier.

I also tried making the shoulder pads as directed in the pattern. But alas, they looked great on the dress form but not on human. Next time I try something like this, I'll knit one side first, try it on properly, and then knit the other one to prevent wasting time and yarn.

The pattern is clever in that when it's sewn up, the diamond lace parts fit together like puzzles and look seamless.

Overall, it was great experience. I tried a bunch of new skills - backing button bands, sewing button holes directly on the knitted garment, and making shoulder pads even though it didn't get used. This is going on my Etsy shop as the yellow doesn't look good on me, but I'm thinking to make another one for myself with the yarns I dyed with avocados.

You can see more details of the project on Ravelry.

Claret Clara

Clara had been all finished but for the buttons for a few days. Finally, last night when I got back from work I spotted a package from Etsy waiting for me. It's always a gamble to buy buttons online, but all the buttons I could find offline weren't exactly right. 

Thankfully, these ones worked out perfectly. The buttons are translucent dark brown colours which aren't too dark or too bright, and it compliments the vintage feel of the jumper.

Looping the buttons was much more challenging than I expected. I started by knotting them, but it came undone too easily. In the end I braided the yarns, and then sew the ends in. It doesn't look as neat as I had hoped, but it's sturdy.

I kept all the details in the pattern such as the tabs, but made the bodice slightly longer to make it easier to wear. The original pattern called for 11" but I lengthen it to 14". That was the only modification I made, and I'm very happy with the result. This will go up on Etsy like most of my creation nowadays. I'll write about my motivations for doing that some other time. 

Clarel, Kasha, and introducing my new friend

Even though I haven't really finished any projects, I wanted to log some updates since I haven't posted anything for a while. I do try to post at least once every month.

I have been out of town for the last 3 weeks, and what glorious 3 weeks they were. I was at a conference in Denmark for a week, followed by 2 weeks holiday in England. One thing I missed a lot was English countryside, so Sean and I did lot of hiking in Peak district and Cornwall. I love moorlands, and poor Sean had to tag along to 3 different moors. Below was Bodmin moor, which I didn't want to ever leave.

Much as I love the country, I wouldn't visit England without visiting London. I splurged at Liberty and bought 3 different Tana lawn. Now I have too much Tana lawn in my stash which I suppose is a good problem to have. The one on far right is a rayon I bought from Sew Over It. I'm thinking to make Sean a shirt with the green lawn on the left.

On knitting front, I'm making good progress on my latest knitting project. I found this Clarel jumper pattern on Free Vintage Knitting some time ago, and was instantly smitten. I envisioned it in tweed green or brown, and it had been in my queue for ever so long. In the end, instead of buying new yarn I used Drops Alpaca Tomato that had been in my stash for over a year. It's my first cable project, and I can see why people love this technique.

Eek look at all the ends! I've ordered some ball buttons from Etsy, and cannot wait to see whether they go well with the jumper. The tabs are just placed on top, not sewn in yet. The sleeves were as always a pain, and I had to redo the sleeve head 3 times, but at last they're done and being blocked. This will make a nice Christmas jumper.

I'm also making headway with Kasha. Pictured below with another Liberty fabric in my stash.

When I started the project I was intimidated by the lace pattern. I thought I would never get the hang of it and feared I'd have to refer to the chart for every row. Well yes, I do have to refer to the chart for every row, but the lace pattern is surprisingly memorizable. The danger is when you begin to think you got it and start to relax. That's when the mistakes inevitably happen.

And last but not least, a small cause of excitement - I finally bought a dress form! I've been stalking Craigslist since last year, and finally spotted one that fitted the bill perfectly. I don't think I'll use it for fitting, since the measurements are 'a little' different from mine (the ridiculously small waist, for one). But my goodness, is it fun to model my handmade items on it. They look 10+ times better than on me.

Shetland Slipover: My first steeking

Steeking had been one of those techniques that I always thought about with a bit of dread and a sense of obligation. Obligation because as a fairly frequent fair isle knitter, it's something I felt I just had to try. I decided this complex fair isle was as good a chance as any, so bit the bullet and had a go at it.

I followed the (very minimal to say the least) instruction of Hillhead Slipover, and cast on additional 12 sts for steeks. At fist it felt as if I was overdoing it, as most instruction for steeking I found online had 5 additional sts, but later on I was very thankful for those generous additional sts.

As for steeking and picking up stitches, I found this instruction by Quince & co easiest to follow. Diagrammes FTW.

It did look quite a mess after I cut the steeks. And this was when I really saw the value of those generous extra sts.

I couldn't find detailed tutorial for finishing steeks. This article has good inventory of all the options, but is rather slim on the actual 'how to do it' part. In the end I chose to finish the seams with blanket stitches. It does the job, but it's not the tidiest finish, so I think I'm going to try my hand at faced finish next.

So what's the verdict?
On the debit side, Reinforcing, cutting, and finishing the edges was a pain. Although cutting the stitches was quite satisfying in a wrong way. And I won't be able to frog and reuse the yarns.
On the credit side, not having to purl the fair isle was a big big plus and it's this that has me convinced that steeking is the way to go.

It was a labour intensive but satisfying project. The pink and yellow yarns were hand-dyed, with avocado and food colouring which made this project even more rewarding.

Ambitious Fair Isle + Steeking

I aim to steadily improve my knitting skills and broaden my range of experiences. One technique that I haven't tried but has been on my radar for a while is steeking. I've been reading The Art of Fair Isle Knitting by Ann Feitelson and learnt that steeking has been the traditional way of shaping the armholes and neck openings in Fair Isle. Since I'm a sucker for doing things the old way, I've decided to bite the bullet and try it out.

I collected suitable yarns from my stash and thankfully I didn't have to buy any new yarn with some improvisation. The brown-pink yarn and the pale yellow one are hand dyed. The pink yarn was first dyed using avocados and then over-dyed with red and yellow food colouring.

I'm going to use the Hillhead Slipover as the base, but follow a different fair isle pattern, traced based on an item I saw online.

It's one third of the pattern I traced. I had to break it out since the software became unreliable with complex patterns. I'm also going to follow the tried and tested basic men's fair isle slipover pattern that I used for my previous projects such as Dunkirk slipover for the stitch count. I still need to figure out the decrease for steeking and I'll cross that bridge when it comes to it!

On top of steeking and the complex fair isle pattern, it'll be my first time to try out corrugated ribbing, so it's going be a handful. Wish me luck!

Some endings and some beginnings

 A lot has changed since my last post. I moved in with my boyfriend Sean to a new place. It's goodbye to my carefree days of living on my own, but we decided it was time.

One of the most exciting things about the new place, apart from the garden, is that I have a space to claim as my crafts room! I can leave things all over the place and don't have to clean up every time after sewing.

Thanks to the new space, I already finished two dresses since I moved in mid-March. 

It's the ever famous McCall's 6696 which deserves its reputation. It was my first time to sew shirt collars with a stand, and the instruction was easy to follow and things worked out perfectly! Next time I'll shorten the bodice just a tad, but otherwise I'm chuffed with this one. 

Next is based on the shirt dress pattern from Gertie's book of better sewing.

This one wasn't as successful. I don't know what I did, but the bottom of the skirt button band keeps rolling back. The instruction was also more difficult to follow due to the rough hand-drawn illustrations. I'd still wear it but this I'll get less use out of this one. 

And one day I might even get a dress form so that I can model it on something other than a cloth hanger.

Even though picking sewing back up means I'm spending less time knitting, it doesn't mean I've been completely neglecting it.

It was Sean's birthday just two days ago, and I finished this slip-on just in time! Once again I used the free Mens fair isle slip-on knitting pattern, but this time I knitted it in round. Now I know why people swear by knitting fair isle in round. It's so much less hassle.

I created the fair isle pattern based on a project I saw on Ravelry. It's quite straightforward and the simple geometry appealed to me. I named the project Escher, because it reminded me of his work Sky and Water I. You can see more details of this work on my Ravelry post.

As soon as I finished with the slip-on I moved on to another project. It's Bestway Tea Time jumper, something I have had in my queue for quite some time.

I'm using old Cascade Heritage Solid yarn for this. It was the 2nd yarn I bought years ago when I first started knitting. It was first knitted into a cardigan, then frogged, knitted into another cardigan, and then frogged again. Hopefully this time it will finally find its purpose because I'm not sure if it can stand another frogging.

A charming fair isle jumper - Run rabbit run

This is the first finished project in 2018. The highlight of the project was trying my hands at yarn dyeing of which I wrote more in details in this post. I enjoyed the dyeing so much, I've started collecting avocado skins and pits to try avocado yarn dyeing this year. I also have been reading up on all kinds of natural dyes. Yet another thing I want to learn more of.

The jumper itself is finished with three buttons on left shoulder. Crochet finishing was another first for me, and it was much easier than I anticipated. I'm not saying I'll be switching from knitting to crocheting anytime soon, but I can see myself getting more into it.

One thing that I find very satisfying is to see the uniform inside of a fair isle project. It's the mass that makes it appear more uniform, maybe, but it's very pleasing to see.

Lesson from this project was that if I add stitches to bodice, I have to take into account how it's going to affect the fit around the shoulders. I added 6 sts to the front and the back of the bodice, and the shoulder feels a little too broad for me to wear comfortably. If I knit it again I'll increase the armhole decrease to keep the original # stitches between the shoulders.

Start of Another Year: Maigret & Run Rabbit Run

It's New Year's Eve where I live, and I already dread of having to go back to work in 2 days. But until then, I'm taking advantage of the free time to enjoy being lazy and do nothing but knit, read, and watch Maigret.

I visited a local library on Thursday and discovered French Maigret TV series, so I borrowed 4 sets. If only I discovered it at the beginning of the holidays.

I've watched 3 Maigret adaptations, featuring Bruno Cremer (pictured above, 1991, France), Michael Gambon (1992, UK), and Rowan Atkinson (2016, UK).

I like the 2016 adaptation because of the production quality and of course, Rowan Atkinson, but equally the 1991 French adaptation because it's in the original language, French. I love the books written by George Simenon largely because of his writing style, and somehow the style comes across better in the original language even on the screens. Not that I speak or understand much French but still.

And now on the knitting front, I started a new project after finally finishing the Dunkirk fair isle vest. It's Weldon 528 fair isle jumper published sometime in 1940s, I assume. I decided to call it Run Rabbit Run, because of its delightful bunny ears fair isle pattern.

I took the colour inspiration from Home Fires. One of the characters whose name I cannot remember and too lazy to look up wears this exact jumper in this colour scheme.

This was also the first time I tried my hand on yarn dyeing, something I've been wanting to try for a long time. The original pink and blue Drops Alpaca yarns were a little too pale and baby-ish, so I decided to dye it just slightly using Wilton food colouring.

These are the original yarns.

Below are the pictures of before and during dye bath. I washed the yarn first using dish soap and then left it submerged in vinegar water overnight (1/8 cup vinegar for 50g yarn) because I wanted a really solid dye.

And here's after. The pink looks darker than it is.

I'm slightly worried that I'll run out of the pink and blue yarns and then I won't be able to reproduce it, but we'll see how it goes.

I looked up several articles and youtube videos to learn about dyeing yarns, but I found this article on Loveknitting very helpful, and this Youtube video helped me get a sense of the basics.

I love how the yarns came out and I enjoyed the process too. I think I'm bitten by the dyeing bug. I want to try dyeing with avocados next. So, here's to another year of crafting!

Dunkirk Fair Isle Vest

Ever since I started knitting and especially since I started getting into fair isle, I cannot watch a film without noticing all the knit wears.

Dunkirk has got to be the best film I watched this year in cinemas and I wanted to knit the vest that George was wearing, partly because I liked the pattern and the character and partly because I wanted to recreate and keep a small part of something I admire.

I used this 1952 fair isle vest pattern as the base, and created the chart based on this single still image I could find on the internet. This is the second time I used the vest pattern as a base, and I doubt it'll be my last.

(c) Warner Bros, Syncopy Inc.

I made a minor modification to the fair isle pattern because I assume the vest George was wearing was for a teenager, and I didn't want to have too many pattern repeats. I referred to 200 Fair Isle Motifs book to create the chart. 

I started the vest shortly after watching the film in August and finished on Christmas eve, just in time to give it to Sean (my boyfriend) as a Christmas gift. A nice way to wrap up another knitting year, I have to say. :)

You can see it on my Ravelry as well, for more details on the yarns and such.

A/W Knitting Plans

1. A jumper with trellis yoke design in Drops baby merino
2. Something with the navy merino fingering yarn. Maybe a square neck jumper with white trim

Rainbow Jumper

This jumper only took just over 3 weeks to finish, which is a record for me.
The pattern does knit up quickly, and colour work keeps it interesting. I like trying out new skills or stitches, and the slip stitch was just the perfect break from my fair isle projects.

I wanted to use up some odd balls of fingering yarns and this did the job.
It was my first time seaming puff sleeves and I had such a hard time. The finished sleeve caps are not perfectly symmetrical, but I'm hoping no one will notice when I wear it.

This pattern was originally written for 32-24" bust, so I added 4 stitches to the back and used US 5 needles for the bodice. In hindsight I think I could have done with adding 4 stitches to the front as well.
I prefer tight sleeves so I made the arm increase more gradual.

Here are my mods:
Back CO 113st, Armhole - decrease until 93st
Front CO 121st (next time CO 125st)

Welt: US 2
Up until the 7th colour(second light purple): US 4
the rest of the bodice: US 5
from second light purple after armhole shaping: US 4
sleeves: US 4 (next time just stick with US 5, to make seaming easier).

Sleeves - cast on 81st, increase each end every 4th row until 99 st. Increase each end every 4th row - whenever I start a new colour.