Knitting Post-Production

My first mother bear is has reached completion.

If you are wondering why its legs are stubby, the reason is that I missed a line in the pattern that would have added an additional 14 rows to both legs. I sort of love the stubby legged version of a mother bear, and I have it confirmed by the mother bear organization that they are okay with the change. Still, this may be the only dwarf-sized bear I make, if only because it was created due to mishap rather than intention. The pattern itself is simple (barring missing entire lines of instruction), but it does necessitate a lot of finishing, namely grafting or faux grafting, picking up stitches, a running stitch along the neck, “pinching” the ears, and embroidering the face, as well as stuffing the bear through its head opening before the rest of finishing can proceed.

Finishing

There are books out there about the gloriousness of finishing, and I’m half convinced the authors of those books are on psychotropic medication. I don’t see how else they could think finishing is anything but a necessary evil.

Finishing is something I don’t really spend a lot of time thinking about when knitting. Generally, I despise seaming, picking up stitches (though not as much as I hate seaming), and blocking. Essentially, the only part of knitting that I actively enjoy is the actual knitting. I also love seeing a finished object I have cared enough about to go through the tedium and time-consuming task of finishing. Oddly, I have a fondness for embroidery and duplicate stitch, nonetheless.

Even so, finishing is just as important as the knitting itself. I have botched more than enough instances of grafting to know that no matter how lovely your stitch definition is, your sweater will look plain bad if you don’t have patience in the sewing up and picking up at seams and collars. I’ve had to frog many a hasty arm hole sleeve starts due to speedy negligence. I cringe to think how my sweaters would have turned out if I had simply went with the first finishing attempt.

Here’s the right way to do it: Knit all the pieces, and then, do not sew them up right after you get done. Wait a day and start the task with a fresh rather than frantic mind. Learn the technique required, and if you miss up, rip it out and start again.

Have a rough idea of crab stitch and plan to make your best guess? Back off. Instead, research the technique until you understand it thoroughly. Take the time to practice if it has the potential to ruin all your hard work if you do it wrong the first time.

And by Thor, if there is a noticeable mistake you can’t live with, go back and redo that bit before finishing. You can’t go back after, and you will never forgive yourself later, no matter how much you want to hold a finished object in your grasp.

As for my mother bear, I stuffed it and I sewed up the head. I threaded thin strands of black yarn on a sharp tapestry needle and I used satin stitch to embroider pupils and nose and backstitch to do the outline of the eyes and the smile. I loved the stubby legs so I didn’t worry about my bear’s dwarfism. Every bear’s unique, after all, just like every person is.

Then, I rushed the ears. I didn’t sit and really get what was implied in “pinching” them, despite my prep work before I started in on the bear pattern in the first place. I admit that they didn’t turn out like a lot of the ears I see in the mother bear website pictures, but they do look like ears. Plus, I have learned a valuable ear-making lesson for when I start in on my second bear.

Even so, I’m happy I didn’t rush the finishing on the Austen baby bonnet. It is all finished now, right down to the string that ties at the baby’s chin. I sat on the instructions for making that string and just thought it out until I got it. Then, it hit me. I was trying to figure out how to attach the string to the base of the bonnet, near the neckline, but the instructions clearly say it goes at the cast-on edge. You may recall, as I did then, that the main section of the bonnet was done top down, starting with the faux-picot edge eyelet trim. I twisted three sections of the yarn until they plied together, then I knotted them together at both ends and slipped the whole string through the empty space between the eyelets and the caston edge. That cast on was made for that string to fit right in, like the string in a sweatshirt hood. To the very end, I was thrilled with the level of genius incorporated into that hat.

Finshing: I may not like it, but I like the look of a finished object when it's done right.

Preparing to Knit: the Simple Steps to Take Before You Ever Cast On

The Beloved Baby Bonnet is just about at its end. All that’s left is the blocking and the drawstring. The blocking is supposed to come first, but I’ve been putting it off because I need to have a place set up for it to dry properly, not an easy task in my apartment. The drawstring, I’m actively avoiding because I don’t quite understand what the pattern is saying in regard to its existence as an attached piece on the hat.

(Bonnet modeled by angry Red Wings Octopus Pillow Pet)

This is what I get for not pre-reading the finishing paragraph. I did not read this paragraph for two reasons.

1.      I’m not a fan of finishing.

2.     It usually has no real bearing on how the pattern itself is knit so why preread? (Answer: To make sure it’s understandable, so you don’t spend a month knitting a hat only to get stumped with the finishing.)

This brings up two key but often overlooked aspects of knitting that don’t get talked about enough: prepping and finishing. Finishing, I’ll address in the next knitting blog, so stay tuned.

Prepping

By this, I mean finding all the required materials (or appropriate substitutes), swatching, and pre-reading the pattern. These are the types of things that really help avoid your knitting biting you in the butt later. I’m not good with the swatching usually. I don’t have a washing machine or dryer at my disposal that a. works 100% of the time and b. doesn’t require inserting a quarter. This means I have never washed a swatch. Not ever. I’m also fairly cheap and don’t want to buy extra yarn unless I have to. Instead, I’ll knit a swatch, unravel it after measurement, and reknit it as the start of the project. This is terrible, terrible practice and I’m lucky I have yet to end up with a sweater than would clothe only a small boat or a mouse, depending on the direction of mathematical error. What you should do: Knit the swatch, wash the swatch, and keep swatching until you get gage. Period. Will I ever do this? All I can say is maybe one day I too will own a washing machine. (I’ll ignore that I could easily have at least hand washed my swatches, because that wouldn’t give me my needed excuse.)

Finding all the materials ahead of time and pre-reading the pattern is something I’m usually very good about, baby bonnet incident aside. I have a feeling this has more to do with my hatred of the act of casting on more than it does my dedication to preparedness. Much as I love knitting, I despise casting on and this might partially explain how I manage to avoid accumulating five hundred half-finished projects due to startitis. Lord knows there’s enough patterns I plan to knit eventually.

Gathering the materials is easy enough as long as you do it. When the pattern says to have two half-inch buttons, you should have those half inch buttons before you cast on and you should have them in one location with all the other required materials for the project at hand. If you don’t have any half-inch buttons, you should go buy some and put them in that same said location (probably a bag dedicated to the project at hand) before you start knitting. That way, you don’t get all done, get ready to finish things up, and realize you’ll have to wait a week before you have the free time to run out to the store to buy buttons. And inevitably, the store will have no half-inch buttons and you’ll have to wait another two weeks for the buttons you purchase online to arrive in the mail. This waiting will not help anyone, least of all the project, especially if you have a babyshower deadline in three days.

As for pre-reading the pattern, the importance of this cannot be overstated. Not all patterns are created equal. Not all patterns are even necessarily legible as a pattern. The only way to know you have a good one is to read it, start to finish. You get the added benefit of learning if the pattern requires learning a technique you don’t know. Even better if you know you never want to learn it, because then you know to pick another pattern before heartache has been inflicted upon you and/or your knitting. What I like to do is take the pattern, which is often written in a longer format that might be necessary to explain techniques and stitches, and rewrite it in a spiral-bound notebook. Once you know the spiel, though, you don’t need to carry six pages of techniques around, so it condenses things to a more manageable size. What’s more, it is contained in a convenient carrying case that will protect it and provide it some excess weight so it doesn’t blow off your lap on a windy day at the park. Usually, with my own form of notation, I can cull a six page pattern down to two pages. If I get tripped up, there’s no rule that says I can’t go back and look at the original pattern, but most of the time, it’s not necessary.

I followed all these steps (except for the swatching) right after I received my mother bear patterns in the mail. I purchased the knit-in-the-round and the seamless crochet versions, though I will accustom myself to the process first with the knit pattern. I gathered my yarn, a sweet ducky yellow acrylic of indeterminate origin that I inherited from my grandmother-in-law. I found the needles. I contemplated what would work best for embroidering the eyes and made sure I still had enough of it left. I double checked that I still have seventy zillion tapestry needles (most of which were also inherited). Then, I rewrote the two-page pattern onto one page of my notebook and spent some time contemplating some of the odd finishing techniques (what exactly is entailed in “pinching” ears into existence? Not much by the look of the many youtube tutorials available). As of today, I have finished ten rows of my first mother bear.  This first one I’m doing all in one color, but it will be a happy yellow so I don’t think the recipient will mind.

To finish up some old business, we finally got all our wedding pics a few weeks ago and here is an at-the-event shot of the veil:

...and World Peace

The baby bonnet I'm knitting progresses slowly. I've had to frog rows on different occasions because of idiotic errors for which I can blame no one but myself. I do partially blame it on the weather and a lingering chest cold I can't seem to shake. I also had the interesting experience of giving a great hayfevery sneeze one morning last week, and when I went to lift my head back to its upright position so that I might continue readying myself of work, alas, my neck protested with immense pain. Yes, I managed to severely strain the muscles in the right side of my neck with a single sneeze.

One doctor's visit and two prescriptions (for muscle relaxers and horse-tranquilizer-sized Ibuprofen) later, my neck still made it too difficult to attempt knitting. I got some writing done but looking down at lace-knitting was just beyond me and took a few days out of my knitting schedule.

Despite this setback, I finished the back of the beloved baby bonnet from the latest edition of Jane Austen Knits and have 17 rows done out of 54 on the main portion. This bonnet has a trick to it that made me feel quite clever while knitting it. The brim of the bonnet, which appears to be a picot edge, is actually the other edge of a provisional cast on, folded over and joined with the working yarn 12 rows down. This leaves the row in the middle of the cast on and 12 rows down, done in an over-other-stitch eyelet pattern, exposed at the top. The eyelets create the picot affect.

Provisional Cast On: 

Extra stitches get cast on to a piece of scrap yarn while the rest get cast on to the needle

The lace pattern is easy enough to memorize and so long as you keep a row counter handy and pay attention to your stitches, you can get away with skipping stitch marker use. I really dislike stitch markers, though I suppose this may be because I've never used the right kind. I've been using the little knitting time I've managed to acquire watching episodes of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple on Netflix. There's just something amusing about stitching up a bonnet while watching an old biddy solve crime by visiting the lys (local yarn shop for the fiber-uninitiated) in the area.

Despite the entertainment inherent in my current project, I'm developing a heavy dose of startitis I have thus far managed to hold at bay. Apparently, I am not alone in this. My favorite podcaster, Hoxton Handmade, explained the link between approaching cold weather and the need for knitters to "knit all the things" in her latest installment of Electric Sheep. I've discovered a number of pretty stellar podcasts in the last few months, the Sheep and Hoxton as well as Knit 1 Geek 2, 2 Knit Lit Chicks, and the Cogknitive Podcast. I've also listened to an episode of Craft Lit, which blends fiber discussion with audiobooks of classic literature. The particular episode I partook of reacquainted me with the first few chapters of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice.

Through 2 Knit Lit Chicks and Dr Gemma of the Cogknitive Podcast, I learned of the thing that has me so itching to cast on before bonnet completion: the Mother Bear Project. Mother Bear is a lovely woman who read an article about the hardships of children affected by AIDS in Africa (most of them orphans) and decided to show those kids a bit of love. To do this, she repurposed a teddy bear pattern from World War II. She started a charity that donates these knitted bears to children in need. For five dollars, you can purchase a mother bear pattern in knit or crochet, flat or in the round. The pattern also comes with a name tag on which the knitter (or crocheter) should write her name. The tag then gets attached to the finished bear, so the child who receives it will know it was made by someone who cares. It doesn't seem like a lot but there are stories of kids who risk being swept away in a flash flood rather than leave their mother bear behind. Often, the bear will become this kid's only possession. More than that, they see it as proof that they are loved by someone somewhere in the world. Heartbreaking, no?

I learned that the mother bear pattern also exists in a book called Knitting for Peace, so I checked it out of the library, just to make sure it was a pattern I wanted to undertake. Sometimes, as much as I love the outcome of a pattern, I just don't want to tackle it. This pattern looks easy to follow though, so I'm going to be sending in my five bucks (proceeds benefit the charity). I might send a ten and get the crochet pattern too. It's for a good cause. Obviously, I want to make a mother bear, like last week, but more than that, this book is full of patterns and charities that will distribute items if you knit them up for the less fortunate: lap blankets for seniors, security blankets for children suffering trauma, chemo caps for cancer patients, tiny knitted apparel for preemies. There's even a charity that collects small blankets for animal shelters. (Apparently, an animal is more likely to be adopted if it has a blanket in its cage. No one knows why.)

I too want to knit all the things. I love the idea of my hobby contributing to the comfort of the people who need it most. Now, that doesn't mean that I'm totally selfish in my startitis over here. I still have merino waiting to become an ice skating cape and several skeins of sock yarn that have yet to become socks. All in good time, I say, but first, I need to finish this baby bonnet and then make a mother bear 

Not Yet, I Want to Knit Like Jane Austen

What happened to Not Yet a Circus Scarf?, you might ask. Well, there was this yarn clearance and there was yarn with wooly fiber content that was bright and cheery, and my son proclaimed that this bright, cheery yarn must become a big fluffy scarf to keep him warm this winter. I love my son. My son is this tiny, growing person who has ideas and dreams. He's so smart and fragile, and I want to be able to protect him all the time, even though I know it's impossible. What better way to attempt the impossible than with this scarf he wants so much?

The problem is two-fold.

1. I really don't like the cheery yarn. It's loud and vibrant and it makes me wish my horrible nearsightedness didn't restrict my ability to wear sunglasses and see more than two feet in front of me at the same time. I hate this yarn. I want to throw this yarn in the dumpster out back and never look at it again. However, I can't do that, because my son loves this yarn and is expecting a bright, cheery scarf to unintentionally lose on the playground after the first snowfall.
2. It's been a ridiculously hot summer, and sitting on the couch with an extra-wide wool scarf draped across my lap is not going to help me not get heat stroke.

What this amounts to: I've put the scarf in a time-out. It's in its project bag with its required needles and all the remaining balls of yarn necessary to complete it. That bag will not be opened until the weather drops to consistently below 80 degrees, and I'm not going to apologize for it. Oh, I'll finish it and my son will either wrap it proudly around his neck or refuse to wear it's hated, hideous uncoolness. Just not now.

While I'm not working on said scarf, however, I do need a project to work on. Lately, that's been the multigenerational blanket. As I've been doing an extensive amount of lace knitting lately, it was a pleasant change of pace to mindlessly double crochet, with a slight pattern change every row. The pattern involves a four row repeat.

Row 1: Double crochet into every other chain, with a chain one in between each double crochet.

Row 2: Double crochet into every chain for seven chains, chain one, skip one chain, and repeat.

Row 3: Double crochet into every chain for three chains, chain one, skip one chain, and repeat.

Row 4: Double crochet into every chain for seven chains, chain one, skip one chain, and repeat.

I've just about finished up one of the two balls of yarn that were in the bag with the start of this blanket. After one ball is gone, I'll measure the length of the blanket thus far to determine if the one other ball will get it long enough. If not, I'll have to add a stripe of another color to the center.

That will not necessary be the next yarny endeavor I tackle, however. I don't count this blanket as my work in progress. It's someone else's and I'm just finishing it up for her when I have the time. The next project I'm planning is for the baby one of my coworkers is in the process of adopting. I'm thinking about the Beloved Baby Bonnet from the Jane Austen Knits Summer 2012 issue.

Jane Austen Knits, by the way, is a knitting English major's dream. This issue combines articles about the life and times of the late, great Jane Austen with knitting patterns inspired by the time period in which she wrote. There are bonnets, reticules, all manner of Victorian finery, all for your knitting pleasure. In particular, I'm taken with the Margaret Dashwood Shawl, the Middleton Waistcoat, Miss Jane's Hat, and the far more impractical A Book Cover for Edmund. If they just allowed yearly subscriptions to this particular publication, my order would already be in the mail. I want to make everything. I know this is a really unrealistic want.