BLOG: knitting

Tips for Knitting Wingspan

April 12, 2012

Have you heard about Wingspan by Tri’Coterie? It’s a trending knitting pattern on Ravelry recently… and I’m seeing it pop up everywhere!

I just finished knitting my first one and I’ve cast on for a second. It’s no wonder it’s a popular pattern… Wingspan is both fun and easy, and it’s a great yarn for showing off long color-repeats.

In this post, I’ll share a couple of tips I’ve learned… so you can get started on one for yourself. (trust me, you want to!)

Choosing a Yarn

This pattern is fabulous because it gives you the option of making a fingering, dk or worsted weight scarf… meaning you have lots of yarns available to choose from!

My personal favorite is to select a self-striping or gradient yarn. Yarns with long colorways will give you a shawl where each wedge is a different color (more or less), resulting in a gradient-effect across the entire piece.

Some yarns with long colorways are:

Almost any Noro yarn: try Taiyo or Silk Garden Sock for fingering weight or Taiyo, Kureyon or Silk Garden for a worsted weight.
Zauberball (Fingering)
Knit Picks Chroma (available in fingering or worsted weight)
Play at Life Maki Yarn (available in a wide range of fingering weight options)

I’ve also seen some lovely versions on Ravelry knitted up with yarns with shorter colorways, or even in a solid color. Doing this makes the ‘wedges’ in the shawl less defined, but still results in a beautiful shawl. Check out all of the projects and see what strikes you!

How to skip using a traveling marker

I like to knit on the go… and so adding and removing a traveling stitch marker every row was too much for me. Fortunately, you can easily go without using one.

To accomplish the patterning for Wingspan, you basically want to turn 3 stitches before the last time you turned on the previous row. Fortunately (since the pattern recommends not wrapping before turning), you’ll see a giant gap in your work where you previously turned (the red arrow).

So, all you need to do for your current row is turn 3 stitches before that gap (at the blue arrow), and bye-bye traveling stitch marker!

I recommend knitting one wedge by following the pattern before attempting working without the traveling stitch marker. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll only to add one marker every time you finish a wedge… much easier to manage!

The Cast-On

For this pattern, you’ll need to cast on stitches to the end of a piece you’re already working. Since there are already stitches in action (with yarn attached), your cast-on choices become more limited (for example, using the long-tail cast-on would require a second piece of yarn).

For this part, I use the Cable Cast on. It’s a simple way of adding stitches to a piece you already have. Check out KnittingHelp.com or consult a reference guide (like The Knitting Answer Book) to find out how to do it.

Have you started yours, yet?

It’s a fun, easy and portable pattern. I’ve just cast on for my second… a fingering weight version where I’m using up all of my leftover sock yarn pieces to create a rainbow effect. I’ll keep you posted on my progress!

Best,
Stacey

Lessons on how to wear a long scarf

February 13, 2012

As you may know, I’ve spent this weekend at the Pittsburgh Knit and Crochet Festival… and I’ve been having a great time. I’ve learned a lot… but do you want to hear the most exciting thing I’ve learned all weekend?

I learned a super-awesome new way to wear a long scarf!

If you’re like me (well, at least the me a few days ago), your standard way to manage a long scarf is to fold it in half, and tuck the ends through the loop. Easy, but leaves a giant bulge around your neck. But, Steven Be, fiber stylist extraordinaire, taught me a new way to wear a long scarf! Squee! And I’m so excited about sharing it with you that I took photos of how to do it in the hotel lobby!

Super-stylish way to wrap a long scarf

First, fold your scarf in half:

And then put it around your neck (so far… just like the old way!)

Now, here’s where it gets new! Pull only one tail through the loop:

Now, scoot that tail up a bit, and twist the loop once. The first tail should be above the twist. Pull the second tail through the loop you’ve just twisted:

Pull it all snug… and ta-da!

It looks like an awesomely-intricate knot… and lies really nice and flat. Look how nicely it fits under my coat:

Hooray! I’m wearing my scarf like this every day!

Do you have any cool ways of wrapping a scarf to share?

Stacey’s in Knitty!

September 28, 2010

I’m very excited to announce that my pattern for an intarsia slouchy beret made it into Knitty! I’ve been nearly bursting trying to keep the news quiet… but the Deep Fall version of Knitty was released today, so I can spread the news!

I really wanted to make a slouchy beret that was an easy introduction to intarsia- but that looked really complicated. Combining self-striping yarn and a really simple intarsia pattern, you can get a hat that looks like you’re doing a zillion color changes… a great pattern to try if it’s your first time doing intarsia. The pattern has two versions: a fingering weight (my favorite) and a worsted weight version (a perfect quick-knit).

Click here to view the pattern! Hope you enjoy!

Free Knitting Pattern: Easy Peasy Socks!

June 15, 2010

I just designed a pair of socks for my beginning sock knitting class… and have made the pattern a free download! These socks are designed with the first-time sock knitter in mind. Sock knitting can seem daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. All you need to be able to do is work in the round, decrease and pick up stitches, and you can make these socks!

Click here to download!

These are worsted weight socks, which means that they’ll be warm, and work up quickly. They may not be the socks that you want to wear every day, but I think that you’ll be a less discouraged sock knitter if you learn the basics on a project that you’ll finish quickly. Save your pretty self-striping sock-weight yarn for your next pair.

Warning: This pattern is annotated with lots of helpful hints & notes… it’s sorta like a transcript of what a sock class with me is like. This is probably very boring if you’ve knit socks before!

Notes on the pattern for those interested in teaching: I designed this pattern to teach first-timers to knit socks, so there are a number of simplifying design features:

Short cuff, so it’s quick to get started learning ‘sock-y’ things
No leg, same reason as above
No need to keep track of ‘needle 1 and needle 2’ like some sock patterns… because everyone always looses track!
Heel flap is worked in stockinette, no fancy pattern to remember
Only one round to remember for gusset decreases, so you don’t need to keep track of what round you’re on
Worsted weight goes fast!

As with all of my patterns, you’re welcome to sell anything you make with the pattern. Please do not sell or repost the pattern itself without permission. 🙂

This sock pattern makes use of the ‘ssk’ decrease. This is a decrease over two stitches, and is not achieved by ‘slip 1, slip 1, knit 1’. If you are unfamiliar with this decrease, please check out this video.

Need more help?

Need more sock help? I recommend the visual-oriented learners take Donna Drachunas’s Knit Sock Workshop on Craftsy. It’s a video course, so you’ll learn everything you need to know!

Happy stitching!

Best,
Stacey

How to divide a ball of yarn in half

April 5, 2010

The other day, I started another pair of two-at-a-time socks. I can get one pair of socks from a 220 yard ball of yarn… but to do this technique, you need to separate the ball into two smaller balls of yarn. So, how do you get two even balls of yarn without using a yardstick to measure the yardage?

I find that the easiest way to divide a ball of yarn in half is to weigh the ball of yarn as you wind it into a second ball. A postage scale is great for weighing yarn, because it is often fairly accurate to a tenth of an ounce… something your regular bathroom scale won’t do.

For my socks, I was using a ball of Ella Rae, which weighs 3.5 oz. So, I pulled the yarn out of the center of the ball and began winding. I knew I would want to stop winding when the scale read 1.8 oz (which is close to half of 3.5… with rounding).

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Just to verify, I weighed the ball that I had just wound, and it was 1.8 ounces as well! An evenly divided ball of yarn!

Australia allows knitting needles in carry-on luggage!

December 26, 2009

Exciting news! The Australian government now allows knitting needles and crochet hooks in carry-on luggage, as of December 25, 2009! If you haven’t been keeping up to date, here’s a brief history. The US has allowed knitting needles and crochet hooks on the airplane for some time (although there have been some horror stories online about confiscation, they have been permitted by the TSA on domestic and international flights). However, Australia prohibited crochet hooks, knitting needles and even nail clippers from being carried on board any flight entering or leaving Australia (domestic and international). This was particularly sad for those of us taking the 14 hour flight across that little body of water called the Pacific). News came out earlier in December that the Australian government was going to revise the list of prohibited items, but early reports said that these changes wouldn’t take place until July, 2010. But, that date got moved forward!

Note, as always, that the security agents maintain the ability to confiscate items at their discretion (as is the case in the US)… but in my experience, harmless knitting needles and crochet hooks are rarely the source of wrath of security agents.

Great news for us travelers… it’s like getting an extra Christmas present!

Easy Cowl Tutorial

December 18, 2009

I’ve talked about dyeing yarn with Kool-aid… and now I have a finished project: an awesome cowl! Cowls seem to be everywhere this season, and I love them because they’re so versatile. As you can see in the photos above, they can be worn around the neck as a scarf, on your head like a hat, rolled up like a headband, or as a hood!

I knitted a simple stockinette cowl so that the color changes of the yarn were the main feature. It’s a fairly easy pattern that allows you to use any yarn you want! Here’s what you do if you want a simple cowl like mine:

Pick your yarn and an appropriately sized needle. I selected a fingering weight yarn, and a size 5 needle (slightly large for the yarn), to get a loose, soft fabric.
Knit a test swatch to determine your gauge (number of stitches per inch). Try to do a 4×4″ (10x10cm) swatch to get a good idea. My gauge was 6 sts/inch.
Measure your head and calculate how many stitches it will take to get around it. My head is 21″ in circumference, and I wanted a tight fitting cowl, so I aimed for a 19″ cowl circumference. If you want a looser fit, just make this number larger. To calculate, multiply the number of inches by number of stitches per inch. I needed 19×6, or 114 sts.
Cast on the number of required stitches (rounded to an even number).
Knit in a ribbing for an inch or so. I did a 1×1 rib (knit one, purl one, and repeat), but if you have a multiple of 4, you could do a 2×2 rib.
Knit in stockinette. I knit until I was close to using up the full skein, which ended up being about 12 inches… but you can keep going until you have the length you want!
Knit another inch or so of ribbing, and cast off.

That’s it! It’s a simple cowl that will show off a lovely yarn texture or color. I hope to enjoy my cowl all winter long!