Berries and Butter

I just spent the past week and a half in the land of misery, first accompanied by a painful sinus infection, which later in the week traded places with a wheezing cough. It is said that you’re supposed to stay positive because mental anguish keeps your immune system down, but that’s not so easy when you can’t do any of the things that make you happy! I did manage to finish a pair of socks I’ve been working on though, toe-up with a k2, seedstitch 2 pattern in lovely Sundara yarn which I snagged while it was available from Pure Knits.

The color is called cupid, but I’ve named my socks Berrystain Socks because they look like they were stained by smashed blue-, rasp-, black- and strawberries. Hmmm, berries…. I also started the back of Buttercup after I received my exchange yarn, pale grey-blue Ripple. Kim Hargreaves does have excellent customer service, they didn’t charge me for shipping (I only paid shipping the yarn back to them) and my yarn got here so fast. So nice. But (oh why does there have to be a but), the pattern leaves me with questions already. It’s a bit vague sometimes. When you’re supposed to do a k3tog for the armhole decreases (at beg and end of one row), why would you not do k3togtbl at the beginning of the row and the k3tog at the end? I mean, I know I don’t have to follow the pattern exactly, but is there a reason for doing it this way? And when it says: continue in pattern after the k3tog, is the pattern only the pattern repeat, or does that include the k2 with which you start and end the row? And if it does include the k2, wouldn’t it be better to k1, then k3tog, then k1 before going into the repeat, to make seaming nicer? Have I confused you yet? Maybe I should wait until I'm off the medicine.
Here is the back so far:

If you're thinking of ordering a kit from her website, check the size diagram closely, you might be able to save some money by ordering your right size. I ordered the medium but ended up casting on for the small, thanks to a lucid moment where I compared the back measurements to a fitted cardi I have. My gauge was so spot on I measured twice just to make sure.
Thanks for all your input on the quilting! It's been very helpful and I've decided to make a baby quilt first, that way I can approach it with a different eye. My sewing machine is in the repair shop right now, the weekender bag left some scars and it refuses to stitch anything other than straight stitch. But until it gets back home I've got plenty of time for fabric shopping. My eyes are glazing over at the very thought.

Fabric on my mind

Or to be more precise, the combination of patterned and solid fabrics and squishy batting into a quilted object. I've been reading The Modern Quilt Workshop over and over, and leafing through Denyse Schmidt Quilts at the bookstore. I would love to make a quilt, but find it rather intimidating. Not the sewing and quilting part, though I'm sure I'll complain if I ever get that far. I'm just having a really hard time in choosing colors and patterns that look good together. I've been collecting pictures of fantastic quilts I found on the internet and just marvel at how beautifully they work. My favorite has to be the verb quilt by Jane. This surprised me as I always think of myself prefering subtle colors, but the simple squares and the vibrant combination of the red and soft blues takes my breath away. It's beautiful. Very different, yet equally stunning to me are these wool& cotton quilts on Denyse Schmidt's website. They remind me of some of Mark Rothko's paintings.
Whenever I get into something new I often make it hard on myself by starting out with something difficult, which in the end gets tossed into a corner for lack of success. I'm getting tired of these sad ufo's taking up space and decided on starting with a small object. Man, I think I'm growing up! My hot-water bottle needed a cover, I'm sure some of the funny dreams I have come from my toes touching the cold wobbly rubber in the middle of the night. I got some cheapy cotton fabrics at Joann's, all in pink and aqua (my current obsession), made a pattern by tracing the outline of the bottle and added three or so inches on each side. It's a bit misshapen. But here you see my dilemma with the fabrics. It's too bland. I think it's the fault of the top print, because its background is the same pink as the solid on the bottom. What do you think?

Let's not even talk about the quilting. At that point, I just wanted to have a one-night project, hence the boring squares.

My Weekender Bag

After a 10-hour sewing session on Saturday and a few more hours on Sunday, I finished my Weekender Bag. I can't find the words to express how thrilled I am to have finished this and to be completely happy with the outcome. Seriously, it took me ten minutes to write that last sentence and I'm not even sure it's grammatically correct. But enough stammering, here you go:








I started this bag 4 or so weeks ago, enamored with its cute vintage look and oblivious to how much time this would take to make. The outside fabric is from Amy Butler's Sunbloom line, for the lining and piping I got cocoa colored denim at my local Discount Fabrics. If you make this bag and want to center and match up your pattern, I suggest getting at least 2 yards of the main fabric. Instead of timtex I got peltex, which the sales lady claimed to be the same. I wonder though if it's not a bit thicker, as my bag is pretty sturdy and keeps its shape very well. Buy more than one big roll of thread and buy extra needles as well, I broke so many trying to go through a 3/8" layer of fabric. Because I couldn't find a 30" non-separating zipper in the color I wanted, I got a 36" separating zipper, sewed a zipper stop at 30" and chopped the rest off. It works perfectly. While the pattern instructions are easy to follow, they often didn't work for me and I used this book to help me especially with the zipper. After many failed attempts to have my pieces lining up correctly I stopped the pinning and sewing method. Instead I pushed the pins straight through

then handbasted the layers, then sewed. Basting everything all the time through such thick layers takes a lot of time, but it was worth it, I had to rip and redo a lot less than in the beginning.
I would have liked some more explicit instructions on the cording/piping as well, instead of just "don't crowd the cording". When I made the piping, I sewed app. 1/4" inch from the raw edges, with my needle positioned in the middle (my sewing machine has a dial to adjust the placement of the needle, 3 is the middle, 4-5 move the needle to the left, 2-1 move the needle to the right). After you make the piping you will have to sew twice more, always to the left of the previous stitching line. When it came to sewing the piping onto the panel, I moved my needle to position four, while my zipper foot still sewed 1/4" from the raw edge. When you sew the last layer on with a 1/2" seam (the piping is now sandwiched between two layers), I moved my needle to position 5, my zipper foot still aligned to the raw edge (but the distance from the needle changed from 1/4" to 1/2" from the raw edge). I hope this is helpful. I'd recommend this project if you have patience. Mine was just about to run out, but my happiness over it now is already clouding the bad memories.

Hmpf.

My Kim Hargreaves kit came yesterday.


And this is how I feel about it:


I don't like the color. I've seen it before in the store and remembered it as a rich dark pink. In reality (the photo didn't bring it out well) it looks like a strange faded bubblegum pink. Maybe it needs to grow on me.
The weekender bag is getting there. I made Saturday my deadline.

Sewing and sewing and sewing

is all I've been thinking about this weekend. I've looked at my yarn in a daze wondering how big of a needle I would need to get it through the sewing machine. Then I remembered I've used two to five sticks to make loops out of yarn. Knitting, hmm, I can't get my mind around the knitting lately. Instead of frogging, there's lots of ripping going on. Every step of the weekender bag requires at least two or more runs to come out acceptably. I'm not following the steps outlined in the pattern, because I still haven't made up my mind about what color piping I want to use as contrast. This is what I've done so far:

Sunday was zipper day. And let me tell you, pinning a zipper and then seaming it was just not working for me. Pinning isn't working for me most of the time, because as soon as I stick pins in the layers, they shift. As a result, I've been hand-basting everything before sewing it together, which is cumbersome as there are so many layers, but worth the trouble. I managed to put a decent looking zipper in! Hooray!!!

I actually thought I would finish it this weekend, haha! At this rate we might be looking at another two weeks or so. But it's fascinating to watch it take shape.

This is a view from above, with the zipper disappearing into the small side pocket.
BF's mom was admiring the bag and wondering if I worried about getting it dirty. Did any of you weekender makers treat your fabric with anything to make it stain-resistant? I probably didn't pick the most sensible colors, but I don't really care, I love the green and white print. While I was sewing, the handles landed in the wet soil of my potted palm and got dirty, but a quick rinse under the tap took it right off.
During one of the few moments that my brain wasn't occupied with the weekender, I succumbed to ordering this from the Kim Hargreaves website. Shipping is free until the end of April!

Weather-induced insanity

Normally I'm not a big complainer when it comes to weather as I figure there's nothing I can do about it anyway, except dress appropriately. But I'm really glad the Bay Area is having a short respite, because my online shopping has gone overboard. See, normally I don't enjoy shopping, going downtown is always accompanied by pangs of anxiety due to crowds, and I don't like accumulating so much stuff because of my nomadic lifestyle (less stuff means easier moves), but the rain has kept me staring at the computer screen instead of out the window, and for the last few weeks little packages have arrived containing old buttons and vintage fabric from ebay, more fabric from Reprodepot.com, an out-of-print book by my favorite photographer, Sarah Moon, and yarn!!! Not just any old yarn, but four skeins of Sundara yarn, ordered from Yahaira's new online shop, Pure Knits.

From top to bottom there are two skeins of cupid and two skeins of bisque sockyarn. Opening the package was like unwrapping a present, so beautiful in pink and brown tissue with lovely ribbon. I sniffed the yarn, thought about Purly dyeing and Yahaira sending it, two fellow knitters whose blogs I've been reading for a long time, looking unsuccessfully for a little Simon or Eddy fur in there, and just felt the love. It is gorgeous, and the first time since last year that I've bought yarn without a project in mind. So yes, while the shopping has been most gratifying, the crafting has been all over the place with not much to show for. My top-down Big Wool cardi is still only a few rows long. I've spend a lot more time recently with this:

The weekender bag by Amy Butler (really though, this is more purse-size by my standards, all the stuff I need for a weekend would never fit in there!). I may be in way over my head with this one, but it is so cute I had to give it a try. Underneath the pattern is my main fabric, from Amy's Sunbloom line. If you haven't been to her site recently, she's just put out a couple of new lines that are very pretty, with muted colors that I like much better than some of her very bright earlier designs.
It took me two weekends to find all necessary supplies for the bag, though I'm cheating with some. Instead of Timtex I got Peltex at JoAnn's. It's pretty stiff and should work just as well. The next problem was locating a 30" non-separating zipper, so I ended up getting a 36" separating one which I'll just shorten. I found it in the parka zipper section, lots of color choices there, though mine is just plain white to go with the green and white fabric. Cutting all the pieces out is taking a long time, and I've been secretly fearing my sewing machine may not be up to the task of chugging through a quarter inch thick layer of material. I'll find out this weekend.
I wanted to add a thank you to all those who left a comment on my Kathy cardi, they made me very happy. I'd gotten so many emails from people asking for sock patterns, after Grumperina had posted about my Mata Hari's, that I was quite overwhelmed. I sent over a hundred emails to people, but the comment thank you's suffered. So, thank you :-)

Kathy Cardi

It's been gloomy inside and rainy outside, adverse conditions for a photoshoot, but last evening offered a few dry minutes. Here is the Kathy Cardigan:



Pattern: Kathy from Rowan's 'Cork Collection'
Yarn: 12 balls of Rowan Cork in 'Chilly'
Needles: US 10.5
The pattern calls for US 11 needles which I got perfect gauge with, but really, my stitches looked a lot better with the 10.5's and the gauge wasn't that much off. There is often a bit too much ease for my taste in Rowan patterns, so it worked out just fine. I shortened the front and back by about 4" and added some length to the sleeves. The sleeves are knit using two alternating skeins. I had purchased the bag of Cork some time ago and needed two more balls, which I found on ebay. It wasn't the right dyelot but at this point I was happy to have found that colorway at all. The new balls were a little lighter, but the yarn is heathered and you can't tell. Finishing took forever, there were soo many ends to weave in. I re-did the sleeve cap because it was a little short, the three-needle bind-off didn't look good with the ribbing so I undid both shoulders and used backstitch. Now I'm glad I did, the yarn is pretty stretchy and backstitch provides a little more stability. I'm happy with this jacket. Though it wasn't a love at first sight project, once I started I enjoyed the process so much. Cork feels a little crispy at first and my stitches looked wonky, but it blocks out very nicely. It's so soft! And warm, though the fabric is light.
What now? I'm feeling lost, like a dancer who just finished a great show and now sits in her dressing room in stillness, wondering where the magic went. The next project is already waiting for me in its bag, but somehow I can't start just yet, I need a little more time to...I don't even know what. Maybe I should finish my skirt for Isew?Iknit! so I can start planning the next sewing project, a bag. I've picked a pattern but I may be in way over my head with this one. More about this soon.