New Yarn, New Designs

Luscious Llama

A lovely new yarn, what fun! The summer spent designing and knitting.

The yarn is 100% Baby Llama and soft as a baby’s butt. The yarns runs through the fingers like melted butter, oh joy! And it shows off knit&purl patterns as well as lace or cable.

With only 50 m / 55 yds per 100 g skein, I’ve concentrated on smaller projects.

On the other hand, 16 lovely and versatile colors makes it easy to go overboard and knit not only one but two or three or more things.

The yarn is a fiest for the eyes and the hands and the ears…

Fanny

This set is all about romance. The hat, I call it a hat because its shape resembles the cloche hats favored a century ago, is flattering and there are matching fingerless gloves which also add to the romance. Super soft Luscious Llama provides the warmth.

The knitting is a bit of a challenge; knitting around with reverse stockinette as the background stitch is hard, especially on projects with a small circumference. Solution; using 2 circulars (any length), one for half the stitches and the other for the other half of the stitches. Knit with only one circular at a time and the knitting becomes a breeze.

The pattern is given in the form of charts only.

2 skeins of 100 g each are enough for both projects and 1 skein may be enough for just the hat – if you’re lucky.

Moira

This one is for me, and possibly anyone with a small head who has had trouble finding a flattering hat. The set provides easy, everyday elegance, your go-to set for the cold season. Quick and easy knitting in super soft Luscious Llama, its all knits and purls.

The basketweave pattern has written instructions only.

2 skeins are enough for both projects and 1 skein may be enough for just the hat.

Ziggy

Here are some fun small projects that pop with color and textural interest.

The pattern offers easy knitting and big drama with plenty of opportunities to play with color. I’ve made three “sets”, one consisting of a skinny loop, wrist warmers and a headband, one with bigger neck warmer and wrist warmers and the third just a long loop that can be pulled up and worn as a hood.

The instructions have three different versions of the zigzag pattern so that you can scale your chosen pieces up or down in size.

Sized for women, you’ll need one 100 g skein in each color for each “set”.

Micah

A cute beanie for both guys and gals. Sizing is changed in part by changing needle size. The beanie is super simple, knitted in the round. The matching fingerless mittens are fairly easy, but if you eliminate the thumb gusset, they are super simple too.

The cable pattern is charted only.

One skein may be enough for the beanie, but buy two to be on the safe side.

Sian

Classical, comfortable, cool; this set of scarf, wrist warmers and / or neck warmer is suitable for both women and men. The smaller wrist warmers are sized for women and the larger for men.

The cable and block patterns are charted only. If you find cables daunting, the block pattern alone would create a nice texture.

Easy and fun knitting.

You’ll need 2 skeins of 100 g each for the scarf, 1 skein each for wrist warmers and neck warmer. For a longer scarf each additional skein will give you 24 in / 60 cm more in length.

Here is a bonus project for the Sian design; a neck warmer in the same cable and block pattern as the wrist warmers. The wrist warmers shown next to the neck warmer are the smaller size in the pattern and here you can see the half blocks meeting on the palm.

You’ll need one 100 g skein for the neck warmer and, of course, needles and gauge as in the pattern (possibly you’ll want a small circular here). 

Neck warmer

With larger needles, cast on 72 sts and work in the round. Place a marker at the beginning of the round. Work in Cable Pattern according to Chart A. Work 7 blocks and bind off in pattern.

You can increase the circumference by sections of 8 sts and the length by any number of blocks if you so desire.

So here’s a mixed bouquet, I hope you’ll find a favored blossom!

Happy Fall Knitting!

Photos, as always, Anders Rydell.

A new kitchen

A new kitchen dictated a need for new potholders.

Since potholders are basically smallish squares with a loop for hanging, potholders can be used for experimenting with new techniques. Now, I wasn’t really in that place, too much going on in my life. What I needed was zen knitting.

And this is what I came up with; using garter stitch and modular knitting it became fun and I ended up with a new (at least to me) way of picking up stitches along garter stitch edges that makes the fabric more reversible. Here it is:

A more reversible method of picking up stitches along garter stitch edges

Insert a double-pointed needle (I used a circular) into the little knotsat the edge, created by the garter stitches, 1 stitch to each garter ridge. You may have to add the last stitch in the form of a loop.

Pull the needle through so you can start knitting from the correct end of the work.

Knit (you’ll need to knit into the back loop of the stitch on the first row)!

That’s all there is to it.

My Hempathy yarn is very suitable for kitchen duty; sturdy, washable and slightly antibacterial (in a natural, non-aggressive way) thanks to the hemp content, but too thin. So after a couple of trials I decided to use three strands held together. The potholders are somewhat slippery until they’ve been washed.

This is he first pair of potholders knitted to match my new kitchen. I will post more versions later on (I ended up knitting several for friends and family). This is a perfect gift and the design works for many styles from ultra modern to more traditional.

Here’s the recipe:

Potholders / Hot pad

Knitted with 3 strands of Hempathy on US size 8 / 5 mm needles to a gauge of approximately 18 stitches and 36 rows to 4 x 4 inches / 10 x 10 cm. Note that this means the same number of stitches and rows. The gauge isn’t important; a lloser gauge will make the potholders larger and a tighter gauge will make them smaller. What is important is that they are thick and firm enough to isolate the heat.

Each potholder is 32 sts x 32 garter ridges (64 rows). The cast-on row is counted as row 1 and you’ll bind off on row 32.

I’ve used 2–3 colors and each potholder weighs just under 50 g, so 3 balls of Hempathy would make a matching set of 2 potholders and a hot pad. This is also a perfect way to use odds and ends.

Cast on 18–22 sts and work 62 rows of garter st (31 ridges). Bind off but do not break the yarn. Pick up 1 st in each garter ridge (see above) until you have 32 sts.

Now work 20–28 rows of garter st (10–14 ridges).

The total number of stitches + rows should be the same in each direction, in this case 32.

Bind off all sts but do not break the yarn (except for the hot pad). Now crochet 15 single crochet. Pull yarn through and fasten to make a loop.

I hope you’ll have fun playing around with colors, striping, and different widths on the different sections.

Photos as always, Anders Rydell