Felted little things..

 I've got heaps of feltable scrap yarn, left overs from dozens of slippers I've made. One evening I decided to use it all up and made little knitted felted purses. The plan is to add cute embroidery to them all.

Here's a little sneak peek of what's coming up this summer on Knit 'n Pearl..

Embroidered felt slippers

Finland
Population: 5,374,781
Number of people super excited at the moment: 5,374,781
Number of people super excited about winning Ice Hockey World Championships: 5,374,780
Number of people super excited about my new felted slippers: 1

I'm in a slight minority here. While the rest of the Finns celebrate victory over our hockey-enemesis, the Swedes, I'm rejoycing after finishing another pair of felted slippers. These ones are without question the prettiest I've ever made! When I even think of my slippers I find myself smiling like a split wiener, they've brought me joy far greater than is reasonable to expect from foot wear.

The pattern is the same old from Novita's Anne-Maija Immonen (see my translation in English or the original in Finnish) but what makes these ones so special is the embroidery. I normally start loosing interest in knitting around spring, knit-wise I hibernate practically the whole summer. But mixing things up by adding a bit of embroidery to the plain old knitting makes it all exciting again.

The embroidery is made with DMC Pearl Cotton (doubled) using 3 shades of purple on the flower and mixing 2 different shades of green on the vine and leaves. The motif is completely improvised. I'm not much of a stitcher and my needle work isn't very refined or exact. But the great thing with working with thick felt is that you don't have much of a chance to redo the stitches (at least without fear of making a mess), forcing one to just let go and have fun with it, come what may. The key to success here is being fearless in one's spontaneity, the work is easily ruined by over thinking or -planning, as it may lead into overly cautious (=boring) results.

To top the whole thing off I sowed seed beads at the center of the flower in 3 shades of purple and green 2mm bugle beads on the vine and leaves. Perfection, if I may say so myself.

Jane Austen Boob-hugger

Found this great free pattern for a mini sweater (aka boobholder, aka The Jane Austen Boob-Hugger) from Ravelry. Couldn't wait to give it a go, never knitted anything from the top down before and after knitting this I'm never starting from the hem up ever again! It was super easy and super quick. Plus, I got to use another 2 skeins of the lovely Katri yarn by Novita. Still about a gazillion skeins in the closet..

Long story short, here's the link to the Mini sweater by Stefanie Japel.

Yarn: Novita Katri (100g = 160m, 100% acrylic)

Skeins: 2

Needle: 4mm

Only few little modifications: I wanted short puffy sleeves so instead of the suggested 5 increases I did about 11 and after parting the sleeves I skipped the stockinette rows and went straight for the 5 rows of garter with K3 K2TOG on first 2 rows.

Oh behold, Jane Austen, never were thine boobies so gently hugged!

Baby pants in action

Last year a friend of mine comissioned me a pair of green baby pants. Her baby hadn't been born yet, but she probably thought if she asked me early enough she'd have the pants for the baby when he is due. Few weeks later I finished the pants. Around December her son was born. Late in February I finally managed to send her the pants she had ordered almost half a year ago. (Yes, I do tend to forget to do stuff.) But ta-da, here is the proud owner of my hand knitted pants! Isn't he adorable :)

Find the pattern here, modified from Novita pattern available here (in Finnish)

I Totally Could've Knitted (T)Hat!

I have a bad habit of staring at people's hats while waiting for trains and such. When standing idly among crowds I find my brain going to sleep mode, automatically calculating stitches on anyone's head wear who happen to stand close to me. "6st cable twist to the left, purl 4, 2st twist to the right.. guessing 5mm needle, nice yarn..". I thought I was getting pretty good at guessing at least which hats were hand made. Normally you can tell from the yarn used. ("Oh, there goes another Novita Crystal!")

Last week I saw one of our HR girls at the station. She was wearing a really interesting beanie with thick cables and little bobbles and since I know roughly who she is, ventured to ask permission to take a closer look (which I don't do to complete strangers at stations, though many a time have been tempted). I complimented her hat while examining it quickly and asked if it was hand made. She let out a little incredulous laugh and refused. Oh yee of little faith! Think not cute beanies can not be hand made!
 
From that day on I saw the same beanie everywhere. At the Pasila station. On the A-train. On the Z-train. It was as if cosmic forces were egging me on, saying "come on, have another look, you TOTALLY could've knitted that". So I did.


Hat Number 1 (white)

The first version I did was made out of some anonymous scrap yarn. I begun by casting on 70st on size 4mm double pointed needles and switchin to 5mm 40cm circular needle after few rows of rib. There's 5 pattern repeats and I repeated the rows on the chart 1,5 times (37 rows of pattern) and started decreasing.

Decrease rows:
1st row: Slip the first stitch of each decrease rows (will be used as the last stitch of the row).
*SKP1, P2, SKP1, K2, K2TOG, P2, K2TOG* Repeat *-* 5 times. (Use the first st of the row as the last to be knitted together with previous stitch.)
2nd row: *Sl 1 st to cn and hold in back, K1; K1 from cn, P2, K4, P2*. Repeat *-* 5 times.
3rd row: *SKP1, P1, SKP1, K2TOG, P1, K2TOG*
4th row:  *Sl 1 st to cn and hold in back, K1; K1 from cn, P1, K2, P1*
5th row:  *SKP1,  K2TOG, K2TOG*
6th row: *Slip 1, knit 2 together, pass slip stitch over the knit 2 together* Cut the yarn and run the end through the remaining stitches. Block if necessary.

As I wasn't happy with hat number one, I had another go and made hat number two, which is a lot more like the original source of inspiration.

Click to enlarge

Hat number 2 (fuchsia)

Yarn: Novita Tempo (100g = 115m, 65% wool, 35% acrylic)

roughly 1 skein

Cast on 72 st on size 5mm dpns. Knit rib 1x1 for 6 rows. Switch to size 6mm circular needle and add 48 stitches evenly around the 7th row  =120st. Begin working according to the chart. The chart is divided to two parts, the first 4 st repeat a 4 row honey combe pattern and the remaining 16 include the big cable and bobbles. Together these 2 patterns form the 20 st pattern that is repeated 6 times around. Begin decreases after knitting 34 rows of pattern (making sure to finish with row 2 on the honey combe).

Decrease rows:
1st row: Slip the first stitch of each decrease rows (will be used as the last stitch of the row).
*K2, SKP, P3, SKP, K4, K2TOG, P3, K2TOG* Repeat *-* 6 times.
2nd row:*K2, SKP, P 2, SKP, K2, K2TOG, P2, K2TOG.*
3rd row: *K2, SKP, P1, SKP, K2TOG, P1, K2TOG*
4th row: *K2, SKP, K2TOG, K2TOG*
5th row: *K2, Slip 1, knit 2 together, pass slip stitch over the knit 2 together*,
6th row; *K2* for the remaining stitches, cut yarn, run the end through the remaining stitches and darn in the end.

Click to enlarge

Lazy Sunday Cowl

Oh lazy sundays! Was rummaging through my closet in search of inspring scrap yarn for a quick and easy sunday knitting project. And praised be the Infinate Closet; among other treasures I found a scarf I started knitting about gazillion years ago. The project originally frogged cause the super bulky yarn would make a scarf too massive to wear. But today I picked up from where I had given up and voilá, it's a cowl!

The cowl goes so beautifully with my turqoise overcoat, love the way the colours clash so bad it's almost harmonious. Perfection! Great things come to those who stack goods in their closets over the years, hoarding does pay off!! Now all I need is a lovely cowl pin.

Yarn: Novita Mambo (100g = 100m, 70 % wool, 30 % acrylic)

Gauge: 11st & 15 rows = 10cm

Needle: 8mm

The patterning was picked up from Novita cabled jacket pattern by Arja Viitala. Here below is the chart for the part I used. I cast on 38 st, slipped the first stitches on each row (right side knit wise, wrong side purl wise) and repeated the pattern for 14 times. Before casting off the stitches quite tightly I did another cable twist row to finish.

Click to enlarge

Dreaming of a Cowl Tunic

I've got massive amounts of yarn, hopes, dreams and plans for a tunic. What I lack is the skill to design one. The patience to try. The time to patiently try over and over again.

If I learned something while making The Raspberry Cardie is that big projects like these inevitably take loooooaaads of time from an non-pro knitter like me. I've knitted most of the parts on the Raspberry Cardie 3 times and I'm still not happy with it. I finished it a month ago, just gave up and darned in the ends, thought it was as good as it would ever get. But I haven't worn it once and am now considering unravelling the whole top part down to the arm holes and doing it again. That'd be so much work! But as it is now, it just isn't right.

So I don't want to repeat my errors again and wish to plan this project better. Or find someone to plan it for me. What I want is a mid length tunic with a massive cowl neck. I'm thinking maybe 1x1 rib all the way to give it a bit of stretch, as I wish the tunic to be well fitted on the top part. I'd like to see a horizontal cabled piece under the chest holding together the separate top and bottom parts.

If I ever manage to gather patience to try these plans out, I will start by knitting a narrow piece with a nice cable pattern and measure it around my waist (1.). Then I'll pick up stitches from around the "belt" working my way up to the shoulders (2.), the parts that gave me such head ache with the Raspberry Cardie. After finishing the top part I can see how much yarn (=nerves) I have left and use the rest on the bottom part (providing I still feel motivated enough after struggling again with the shoulders), picking up stitches from the foot of the belt and start knitting towards the hem (3.). To add a bit of umph and shape to it I'll keep on adding stitches along the way down for some bit. Once I've used all my skeins but 1, I'll cast off and use the rest on the cowl (4.). Sound easy? I wouldn't count on it.. Stay tuned for more, maybe one day this plan will come to life..