a method of weaving in yarn ends

last year a fellow knitter showed me a way of weaving in ends I hadn't come across before and haven't come across since. I don't know what it's called but it's relatively quick and easy so I like it a lot. I don't have a way of making a video but I took some photos to illustrate. hopefully this will make sense!

when done in the same color yarn, this method is almost invisible on both the knit and the purl sides. it works best with a tightly-knitted gauge and a grippy yarn.

the basic idea is that you wrap the yarn end around one side of a column of stockinette Vs. stick the needle from right to left around the right leg of each V and work your way up for a couple of inches, then turn, move the end to another column, and repeat in the opposite direction.

this can also be done on the purl side, but while it is invisible on the knit side, it does show up on the purl side. instead of going up a column of stitches, you work from side to side, catching the purl bumps from right to left.

here are some pictures of how this is done on the knit side of stockinette.


bring the end to be woven up through the middle of the V of a knit stitch.


stick the needle under the right leg of the stitch above, working from right to left.


bring the needle tip around to do the same to the next stitch above.


like so.


continue wrapping the stitches for a couple of inches.



pull yarn through and then give the fabric a tug to smooth it out.


like so. bring the yarn up through a stitch in the next column and repeat in the opposite direction.

when you're using the same color yarn the result is fairly invisible on the knit side and the purl side, but if you're using a contrasting color yarn, it's not invisible on the knit side but it is on the purl side.

here's how it would look with a contrasting color.

yeah, not so good.

so work it on the purl side. here's how.


bring the end to the purl side.

stick the needle through a purl bump from right to left. I see the bumps like parentheses. some look like ( and others look like ). you can weave in the yarn on either type of bumps, but stick with the same type for each row.


I picked the ) bump for this row.



aim for the next purl bump of the same sort.



keep going for a couple inches.



pull the yarn through and tug at the fabric to smooth it out.



turn and work in the opposite direction on another row of purl bumps. I like to change directions at least twice.



this is how it looks in a contrasting color. not invisible at all but it doesn't show up on the knit side. and if the knit side is the right side, then that's all that matters.

so that's one method of weaving in yarn ends. if anybody uses it and likes it or knows what it's called, let me know!

Rogue from X-Men scarf recipe

(I'm writing this up to put on Ravelry. I figure that if I'm going to put pattern notes in the project I might as well write up the pattern recipe.)

recently I came across a couple scarves I had made several years ago. I had based them on a long, skinny purple scarf that Rogue wore in the first X-Men movie. she seems to have at least two of them, one more sparkly than the other. they both seem to be knitted in a very loose stockinette stitch and allowed to curl.

materials:
50-100 grams of dark purple sport to worsted-weight yarn (50g should be enough but if you want the scarf extra long, you may need more.)
knitting needles, much larger than what you would normally use. US 11, 13, or possibly even 15.

recipe:
cast on about 20 stitches. work in stockinette until the scarf is long enough to wrap around your neck two or three times and reach down to your knees, or however long you want it. bind off.

for the first scarf I made, I only had 50 grams of light worsted wool and cast on 15 stitches. for the second one I had 100 grams of Cascade Pima Tencel color #2493 and cast on 20 stitches.

so far this is the best picture I've found of Rogue wearing the scarf. in the movie it looks more purple.



I might try taking screenshots.

gauge should be nice and loose. keep in mind while you're knitting that it will look much wider than it will end up when you wear it, as the fabric will pull down, curl, and become narrower when it is worn.


the left side is more like how the fabric will look when the scarf is worn; the right side is more like how it looks when you're knitting it.

finished scarf:


edited to add screenshots.

it looks like she could have 3 different scarves, the sparkly one, a non-sparkly one, and possibly a mostly non-sparkly one with sparkly sections. or the non-sparkly one has the sparkly sections but they don't show up all the time. the scarf also looks like it would uncurl to be much wider than the ones I made.

sparkly throughout:




not sparkly:


closeup of loose stockinette stitches:


very curly edges:


another no-sparkly closeup:


sparkly patches? (see also magazine scan above)

traveling socks, part 2 and other stuff

well basically now that I have a Ravelry progress bar widget I kind of don't feel the need to post blog entries with photos of my projects. ah well. but here are some non-project things.


I finally got a ball winder!


I also got a tabletop swift.

here is a gratuitous sky pic from January.

(click to embiggen)

and some more traveling sock photos. not click-to-embiggenable because I am lazy.

bending at a windmill


not a walk in the park


socks harass trees


socks hug a tree


at airport 1, observing plane 1


at airport 2, observing plane 2



brrrrrrr...


frosty toe


a highway with no one on it


long way from home...

and some new yarn.

Malabrigo Lace, Purple Mystery


Trekking XXL colorway 146


Malabrigo Lace, Teal Feathers

and some new photos of an old project:

traveling socks, part 1

so I am in the process of moving across the country. I love Southern California and am sad to go. anyway, the colorway of the wool/bamboo socks I'm working on reminds me of a rocky bit of beach so last week I thought I'd take them there. then I thought I'd take them to some other favorite spots too. that way I got to see them again without having just the sadness of the finality to dwell on. I can knit my memories into the socks and be warmed by them in days to come. that's the idea anyway.


off to a running start with a gratuitous flag/sky/ocean/sparkles shot.


I don't golf, and even if I did, I don't imagine I could afford to golf here. but there are paths that are open to the public, and it's a beautiful place to walk around. I sat and knitted while a group of people did yoga. I wanted to get a shot of the socks harassing the sign.


yep. harass harass.


socks observing a golf course


socks harassing the clubhouse


socks behold a cliff


socks sat down upon the churchhouse steps. this is a tiny glass chapel. viewers of The O.C. might recognize it as Julie and Caleb's wedding chapel. also Caleb's funeral chapel. I don't watch The O.C. but have seen some eps. not the ones with this chapel though.


The sOCks (don't call them that) sat where Seth sat.


I edited the composite of two exposures to have less blurriness of doom. anyway, the socks behold a sunset and the rocks that they remind me of.
memory: the path of sparklies on the rippling water looked like a phalanx of tiny flames trying to march to the shore. they got more orange the lower the sun sank, and finally they drowned.


these are the rocks. when the tide rolls over them the tumbling sound echoes awesomely against the cliffs.

resting on a driftwood bench behind a rock wall


the rocks are rounded and some have holes in them. some look like eggs and some look like pickles and some have stripes. I never get tired of looking at them.


time for a gratuitous sky/cliff/moon shot.


and an awesome purple mohawk. rock on, punk. or, punk on rock.

where will the socks go next?

first post of the year

oops. I hadn't realized that I hadn't posted since the end of the year.

here's my short list of things I'd like to try this year:

argyle socks
entrelac (at least try out the technique even if I don’t make a whole project)
lace shawl
non-stockinette socks (I know I am capable of knitting them, but I just love plain stockinette socks and haven’t felt inclined to make fancier socks.)
complete a doubleknitted project
fingerless gloves or convertible mitten/gloves
illusion knitting
the moebius cast-on
a sweater in fine-gauge yarn
something in brioche stitch

it's not like a huge goal or anything, and whatever doesn't get accomplished this year will either carry over to the following year or be bumped off the list.

so let's see...here are some things that are newish, at least, relative to the last time I posted.

the wool/bamboo socks in progress.


the posh cloth

this is the organic, undyed cotton. I always make these too short. I guess they shrink lengthwise in the wash a little bit.

the finished pi binkie

I didn't block it so the edges still curl. that is a penny for a beauty mark and to indicate size. I love this binkie and use it every day, hence my reason for not blocking it. I don't know if I've just been really unlucky or what, but my bed is always against an outside-facing wall, and in the winter time my pillow greets me with a chilly kiss. you know what combats this? a soft woolen blanket, still warm from your lap, placed over the freezing pillow. yes. you heard it here first. unless you didn't.

the finished Dumbledore socks

sometimes I get lazy and don't make my images embiggenable upon clickage. this is one of those days. do you know, I insist upon typing the html tags myself? feel free to complain. anyway, these are my plain purple socks that I would have given Dumbledore for a gift. you know, because he always gets books but he would really like thick woolen socks. and he wears purple robes. socks for Dumbledore ought to have a silvery mohair cable or something up the sides. maybe next time.

the John Henry scarf still in progress

I finished this last night and hand felted it. it dried overnight so I've been wearing it all day. no photo of the finished scarf yet. it looked bedraggled in the sink but after it dried it's a little puff of wool and steel and silk. it's just light enough to keep my neck warm but it doesn't feel like I'm still wearing outside clothes.

the finished armwarmers

the colors are truer in this photo taken in the sun. you can click this one to hugify it.


here you can see the armwarmers on my arms. I set up the tripod for this but stood in the shade (it was too hot to stand in the sun and wear these) and lightened the photo in photoshop. it is hard to photograph how beautiful these colors so you will just have to use your imagination. also imagine the softness and warmness. don't you wish you had some?


have another picture. this one will embiggen upon clicken, but not hugify. don't ask why I am being arbitrary about this. okay, you can ask if you really want to.

the frogged runcible hat

so I didn't even write about this. I wanted to use my leftover malabrigo to make a neckwarmer. I had seen various neckwarmers made from hat patterns, just without the crown shaping. so I used the Noro hat pattern for what I called a runcible hat. of course it is not a real hat but that is the charm of the runcible hat. it ended up too wide for my neck and too short so I frogged it. I still want to make some kind of odd non-hat and call it a runcible hat. unless you beat me to it.

I started a raglan pullover. the yarn is handpaintedyarn's bulky handspun. I love the deep red color but it is hard to photograph. here it is in afternoon sun.


a bunch of my knits enjoyed the sun this day.


I want to tell you about this sweater. it says hi.


this was the first second sweater I ever made. I made it about 10 years ago. don't ask me why I made it so boxy and short; I don't have a good answer for that. more notable about this sweater is that I had spun the yarn myself out of wool I had sheared from my own sheep. (their names were Annelise and Huldah.) I also steeked the neck opening. don't ask me why I made it so deep. even though I don't wear this sweater, I'm pretty proud of what accomplishments it represents. I had actually made another one before this, just like it, but the yarn was bumpier and I frogged it a couple years ago.


here is the neck opening. it was steeked! I said that already but yeah. also my first sweater had a steek too. now I am scared to steek. not of the actual cutting, because I know it works, but because if it turns out that I don't like the garment, it would be pointless to frog it since the yarn has been cut.

anyway, I think that is enough for now. I am swatching for another pair of Fred and George socks. I have one fifty-gram ball of light gray and one of dark gray so what else is there to do?

response to Yarn Harlot's end-of-year question

today Yarn Harlot asked some questions in her blog, and I thought that if I'm going to end up being long-winded I might as well make a blog entry and just leave a link rather than an essay in her comments.

"Today I'd like to hear what you think the best thing you knit in the last year was. What was a stellar project...and why? Was it the yarn? The pattern? That you learned something good...or that you found out that you're a much better knitter than you thought? Did you surprise yourself with your skills?"

Juno gets the 2007 award for Best Knit of the Year. like many other bloggers, I saw the one over at Coloursknits and was smitten. eventually I ordered the book with the pattern and began creepy-stalker activities for the yarn. I had my heart set on Rowan Yorkshire Tweed and finally found someone who wanted to destash a bag in the colorway I wanted. I love the pattern and the yarn! er, actually the pattern had errata and I didn't care for the in-pieces construction, and I don't actually like knitting ribbing. but I love the way the sweater looks--the cabled collar is divine! I also learned a bunch of good things, such as, consult the errata before casting on. especially if you're going to "be smart" and knit the body in one piece instead of three. also I learned how to cable without a cable needle. and I came across a free charting program to translate the written instructions to a handydandy chart. I learned how to make beautiful seams, which made me hate seams less, so this is huge!

my failure to consult the errata before I cast on made me realize that I am not such a good knitter as I thought, but the other stuff more than made up for it. I might do dumb things, but I can learn a lot of things too. I might have to frog a bodice after nearly completing the shoulder seams, but I can get over it and make it better. some mad skillz might come through osmosis (i.e. stalking blogs and Ravelry comments) but nothing beats hard work. okay, maybe osmosis beats hard work senseless. but it doesn't leave the battle scars. and battle scars are cool. right? if you have battle scars you can tell tales of horror and woe. well, whatever, as long as I end up with mad skillz.

well I guess I didn't wind as long as I thought I might. I realized that I don't have to rehash every detail since folk can just click on the Juno tag for those.

knitting from the fifth dimension

so awhile back a non-knitter mentioned that if he tried knitting and watching a movie at the same time he'd end up with something that looks like it came from the 5th dimension. since then I have been thinking about planning (or not planning) such a project. I looked at stuff written about the fifth dimension but I couldn't begin to understand it. so I my idea comes with a disclaimer: this isn't really meant to represent actual knitting from the fifth dimension. anyway, my idea is to start out knitting, say, a hat and then give it a toe...and a sleeve...and a heel gusset, stuff like that. at first I thought maybe add bad knitting, like random yarn overs and split yarn, but I think it would be much more amusing if it were stitched well but just made wrong. there are so many ways this could be done. I have fun thinking about it, but I doubt that I will actually commit time, effort, and yarn to do it. it might be handy though. like if you want to learn a new heel shaping or two-colored cables, you can just knit it onto the fifth dimension project. I think there should be two different kinds of 5th dimension projects, one haphazard and knit-it-as-you-go, and another one that is carefully planned. I think the planned one would end up much better. but it's hard for me to think in such a way.

similar to this idea is another one I have for knitting a glove-hat. a hat in the shape of a glove. I believe the sock-hat has been done already. I don't think I've ever seen a sweater-hat. that should be easy though; just find a baby sweater or a doll sweater that fits your head. a mitten-hat. I don't know why I like thinking about these things.

Aloo, world!, some state flags, and goodbye, year!

December needs at least one more post.

I bought myself a very nice pile of yarn with some Christmas money. usually I save such gift money so that, later in the yarn when I see something nice that I want but normally wouldn't buy for myself, I can justify it with "oh, I never spent that gift money..." but this year I wanted to buy Stuff For Me...NOW! I didn't want to plan in advance what I was going to get but I did have an idea of stuff that haunted me. (yes, yarn haunts me.)





Aloo, nettle fiber from Nepal

We were raised in the nettles
And they showed us how they grow
Where a poison comes to settle
And what a poisoned man comes to know
- Hem, "Carry Me Home"

the fiber comes from a relative of the stinging nettle. I have been stung by stinging nettle enough times that just thinking about it makes me feel stung again. this yarn might be rough and twine-like, but it has a beauty all its own. and it doesn't sting. even if I don't know what I'm going to make with it, I like knowing that it is there; I can touch it and plan to make something functional and beautiful with it.


banana silk

this yarn is made from the fibers of banana leaves and is very similar to recycled silk. I found recycled silk to be beautiful but hard to knit with--it hurt my hands--but I still want to have some of this yarn in my stash. just so I can say "I have banana yarn!" and because it looks beautiful as is.

bought more Malabrigo, like I knew that I would. here is one of the state flags in my nation of knitting.

I am never satisfied with the way my photos of Malabrigo turn out. they look out of focus but maybe it's just the fuzziness of the yarn? I don't know. but Malabrigo is love.
the brown is for an armwarmer idea. and the olive and burgundy are to have on hand. who knows, I might find an unselfish moment and decide to make a gift with the burgundy Malabrigo. which, by the way, is a color that my camera does not like. it is too dark in the flag picture and too orange in this one.

but it's reallyreallyreally pretty.
the next Malabrigo I buy should be enough for a sweater in one color though. I am making this a rule.


handpainted sock yarn in a blend of superwash wool, bamboo, and nylon. I started my standard toe-up socks already. the yarn is so soft and shiny and the subtle shading of the colors are a delight. no pooling so far. I want to think of a name for these socks; they deserve a name.

and I fell in love with this organic undyed cotton from Peru. no dyes. look at the colors! the cotton grows that way! and it is so very soft! I just wanted to hug it and hug it.


another state's flag.









it amused me that these cakes look like round bales of hay. or maybe the brown can be straw.

well that is all for now. thanks to all who read and especially comment on this little blog. have a safe and happy new year.