Thursday, August 12, 2010

Still working !

Still working on the Jacket. Decided to make a few changes... so a bit of frogging (done) and re-do (not done yet). Overall it will be much better and easier to write the instructions for. Hoping to perhaps submit for publication so no photos...

Also working on the example swatches for two new classes I'll be teaching at Twisted in the Fall. Double knitting and Slipped Stitches. September is just a few weeks away!

I've got a trip to Seattle for work coming up and someone else will be driving! What a luxury to have all that knitting time. Looking forward to it.

Am also adding back in the Level II of the CYCA Teaching program. So there will be swatches to do there as well as some smaller projects.

All in all still plenty of knitting projects.

Oh! And I'm starting to photograph my stash-- its up on Ravelry for sale... a bit at a time. Nice to see it going to good homes.

Monday, July 5, 2010

Wool Jacket on the needles

Even though summer is finally starting, I'm still knitting a new design of mine--in wool. A slipped stitch jacket out of Cascade Yarns Soft Spun and Cascade Yarns Jewel Paints. I'm really loving it. But its taken a long time to get here.

The process of designing for me quite often starts with the yarn. Then a desire for a particular garment. Sometimes I see just a detail on ready-to-wear that I think is particularly clever.

In this case, I fell in love with a turtleneck I had-- more the color than anything else. A kind of lavender-blue. So when I received a couple of gift certificates to Happy Knits here in the neighborhood, I decided to see if they had some like it. I found what I wanted in the combination of colors in the Cascade yarns. I bought what I thought was plenty (and it has been-- at least so far so good).

That was just after Christmas. In February, I had "noodled" on the yarn long enough, and I started planning and swatching. Certain portions of the jacket have been knit two and three times as I worked out how I really wanted the shaping... sometimes I found a mistake and had to frog and re-do. Of course, I only have a limited time to knit, but I do try and work a couple of rows each day.

Its modelled as sort of a jeans-jacket look, but longer and with a peplum. There are cable insets that aid the shaping and pockets (one of the things I love about my jeans jacket).

I'm knitting the bottom hem now... still have a belt, front closures and collar to finish. After that, I think a matching hat would be great... we'll see how much yarn I have left. If there is enough, a matching skirt would be just the thing for fall.

Right now I'm hoping to have it complete before we leave on our vacation-- Alaska cruise in 2 weeks!