Posts from the ‘Knitting’ category

Free Knitting Pattern: Mushroom Pulse Warmers

on April 2, 2007

mushroom pulse warmers modeled
I’m a hand model!

Get the pattern.

SUPPLIES:
YARN: Rauma & Røros Lamullgarn- 1 skein each of #11 (MC– white), # 43 (CC– red) and #15 (CC2-black), 250 meters/50 gram each. 2 ply 100% lambswool –OR– approx. 15-25 grams of MC and very small amounts of CC & CC2 fingering weight wool yarn
NEEDLES: Size 0 US, or size needed to get gauge
BUTTONS: 4, approx. 3/4” in diameter
SIZE: S (M, L, XL)
TO FIT: 5”- 5.5“ (6”-6.5“, 7”-7.5“. 8“-8.5“) -measure wrist over wrist bone
ACTUAL MEASUREMENT: 7” (8”, 9“,10” ) long and 3” high
GAUGE: 9.5 sts. and 11 rows per inch in chart pattern.

mushroom pulse warmers

A bit about colorwork, for those unfamiliar:
In my experience, holding the background yarn in the right hand and the patterning yarn in the left results in a much clearer knitted design. This pattern has 3 colors used in the same row, so I held the black under the red in my left hand and the white in my right. It’s not awfully difficult or anything, but you do want to keep the strands organized, particularly in a sticky yarn like this, or you’ll end up with a painfully tangled mess, complete with hissy fit (or is that just me?).

Here are some links that deal with knitting in more than one color:
Knitting in Color
Fair Isle 101

About gauge:
I know there’s going to be resistance to swatching for this project- I mean, the thing is the size of a swatch. My thoughts are that I’ll give you a gauge for this yarn in stockinette in the recommended needles and you can guesstimate your gauge that way, or, if you know your usual sock gauge, you can adjust needle size from that and just forge ahead. Just don’t blame me if you’re off! This is absolutely not guaranteed to work. The garter edges are knit flat, so why not work one of those and then take your work off the needle, lay it flat, and be honest with yourself about the size?

The gauge I got for this yarn in stockinette on size 0 needles is 8.75 sts. per inch.

See the pattern for discussion about gauge, yarn, and steeks.

18 Comments

Steeks, Yarn, and Cutting

on March 30, 2007

Firstly, thank you, everyone, for going to the trouble of measuring your wrists for my poll! I’m a little surprised by the results- 74% of us have wrist measurements within an inch of each other. Huh!

The poll is a great help in making the pattern, which will be ready in a couple of days. Just a little drying and math and some photos and it’s good to go. Before then, I thought I’d write a little about steeks and cutting and choosing yarn for a project like this. These pulse warmers are a GREAT first steeked project, but you want to get a few things right.

Yarn:

I used what’s known as a “sticky” yarn for this. Shetland yarns are perfect, as is the Lamullgarn I chose to use. Harrisville makes Shetland yarn, as does Jamiesons, and Jamieson and Smith. You can see the fuzzy hairs sticking out of the yarn in the photo above. You can also see how the yarn sticks to itself as soon as it touches. This is ideal. If you use yarn like this, you won’t need to reinforce the steek at all, just cut it and pick up stitches, which is what I did.

The steek stitches just curl under a bit and stay together very well, because that yarn is so sticky. If you like, whip stitch that little rolled edge to neaten it. You could also whip stitch a strip of ribbon over the cut edge. That would be lovely.

If you want to use yarn left over from another project (great idea, since these don’t take much at all) or use a smoother wool like Knit Picks Palette (great idea, because, hey, CHEAP!) you should probably reinforce the cut edge somehow.

I’ll let Eunny show you how:
Unreinforced Steek
Hand-Sewn Steek
Crocheted Steek

That Eunny. She does more knitting for a tutorial than I do for a whole project. :P

9 Comments

Measure For Me, Please?

on March 29, 2007

mushroom pulse warmers

I’m going to be offering the pulse warmer pattern in several sizes, but want to be sure I make them to fit a good range of wrists. Since my wrists are the size of a 4 year old’s, according to the standard sizing I’ve found, I worry my sense of scale is off kilter and I’ll end up leaving an important size off the pattern. Would you mind measuring some wrists and taking the poll below? I’m thinking women and children are going to be the only ones interested in wearing this particular pair of pulse warmers, so let’s stick to them for the poll. If your wrist is 3″ or 17″ or something, leave a comment, please!

[poll=2]

Thanks a million!

29 Comments