A couple items from my inbox.

Question on Justin's Counterpane

Cindy wrote to say she was having problems conceptualizing how the pieces to make my Justin's Counterpane pieced blanket fit together. This particular blanket is a large scale intro to white cotton/lacy knitting. Only twelve main units are needed to complete it - six keyhole shaped motifs, and six whole octagons. Ten triangles are used to eke out the sides and make them straight. An optional edging finishes the thing. They're put together like this:

I did not use additional triangles at the corners to make a true rectangle because it's easier to go around a more gentle angle without mitering than it is to go around a 90-degree turn. And I didn't want to go through the bother of mitering my corners.

Because of the relatively few units used and the simplicity of the classic pinwheel motif, I think that people wanting to make a first item in this style might find the pattern useful. Being a blanket, it doesn't have to fit anybody so gauge is a guideline, not a mandate. It can be worked in any cotton or cotton blend yarn you like. The yarn I chose was a very inexpensive DK weight, but by using the appropriate size needles, a piece of usable dimensions could be made in anything from sport to worsted. Much heavier than that though and you'll get into weight issues, cotton being quite a bit massive than its equivalent thickness in acrylic or wool. (You could even work this in standard wool or acrylic, but I think the design will be crisper in cotton.)

In any case, some basic guidelines for knitting and seaming together pieced counterpanes include binding the motifs off especially loosely; blocking the units before assembly, by wetting them down and pinning them out while stretching them to their maximum extent; and using whip stitch or when possible, mattress stitch done in half of the edge most stitch to sew them together. Back stitch or mattress stitch done further into the motifs will make the seams too dense and rigid, and may introduce cupping.

Bargain Hunters' Blocking Boards

Rachel and I had an eMail chat recently. I think it was over on one of the knitting-related boards at Live Journal. She was looking for advice on blocking. In specific, she was looking for low-cost alternatives for blocking. We went through the standards - pinning out on carpet covered with towels or on a padded table or bed, but she wanted a rigid surface that was easy to stow in addition to being inexpensive.

I recommended getting a half-sheet of drywall from the hardware store, taped around the edges to reduce crumble, and topped with a flat sheet through which the pinning happens. I also suggested scouring yard sales or opportunity shops for the squishy/spongy foam pattern/alphabet block floor tiles or play mats favored by the parents of toddlers. They're indestructible and often outlast the toddler years, landing at second-hand venues. Top those with a sheet and pin away, happy that you've found a modular, easy to store solution that as a creative recycle, nibbles away at the waste stream.

Rachel decided to go with the play mat idea. She sent me a note of thanks, and included this shot of her shawl blocking:

(Photo is hers, used with permission). She also notes that she got her mat at WalMart, and it was less than $20. Love the shawl, Rachel, and as ever - I'm delighted to have been useful.

Deadlines turn out to be intense but manageable, leaving me a bit of time to get some knitting done. The hat is progressing well, although I had to recast my yarn choice to something lighter. Two thicknesses of K2P2 ribbing in worsted seems too heavy for comfortable wear. So I dug down in my yarn boxes and came up with some lighter leftovers brazenly liberated about ten years ago from my mothers' stash.

Unger Britania was a Shetland-type yarn of exceptional quality - lofty, soft, stretchy and supple. It's native gauge covers the range between fingering (knit way down, compressing the loft) to DK (knit very loosely, letting the loft fluff out to fill in the stitches). It worked best at sport weight (6 spi). Mom had done an adult size Intarsia piece with it (possibly an Argyle) but ended up ripping it completely out and re-knitting most of the yarn into something else for a smaller individual. The leftovers are evenly divided among the colors with some virgin skeins, and a few balls made up of short lengths of about 5 yards each. Some fragments are longer, some shorter. I'm starting with the leftovers, spit splicing the short yardage pieces. I am also spit splicing color joins so that there will be no ends to darn in on this one-side/two-sided piece. My striping is rather haphazard. I knit until I run out of a color bit, then decide if I want to splice on the next same-color piece of unknown length, or if I want to shift to the next color.

I'm about a third of the way done, and due to the smaller gauge am more or less winging it, holding onto the dimensions and shaping proportions of the original pattern, but blissfully ignoring stitch count directions. For the record, I'm getting about 8spi in very stretchy K2P2 rib, on US #4s.

The result, given the 1970s color set and random width striping pattern the result looks rather Whovian. My target nerdpal will be ecstatic.

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Another descent into deadline hell looms on my imminent event horizon. Now in the past faced with something like this I've dropped all knitting, hung up the blog, ignored wiseNeedle, and pared my life back to the basics: work, do what family maintenance I can, eat, sleep. In that order of precedence. This time I'll try not to disappear completely. At the very least I'll farm wiseNeedle, even if I don't have time to blog. Also I intend to keep a small project going as a stress valve. (Better that than loll in caffeine and chocolate).

I need something that's pretty mindless, but not so totally dull as to be totally boring. Something new so that there's a modicum of interest. Huge needles (huge for me at least) so progress is tangible. Socks are right out. Perhaps a hat. An unusual hat...

In fact I think I know the very thing. I make no secret that I fall on the geeky side of normal. I'm an aging grrlnerd with lots of friends who would wear Star Trek Underoos if they came in adult sizes; guys and gals who find joy in mathematical humor, and who view visual puns as an ultimate art form. (I say this with affection and respect, because as a group they exhibit amazing creativity, and wit, and are just plain fun to be around.) So if one of them - a self-described and documented ubergeek - deserves a special gift, what better than a Klein bottle hat?

Some of you reading this are saying "Hey! Cool! I want one, too." Others are wondering what the heck a Klein bottle is. And I'm sure a couple of you are curious as to why one would need a hat. One might even ask "Where would a Klein bottle wear a hat?" The answer of course being "On the outside."

(Bottle image shamelessly borrowed from Acme Klein Bottles, a source for all your topological oddity needs.)

There are far more erudite and far more scholarly explanations of what exactly a Klein bottle is than I could ever offer. It belongs to the same family of topological oddities as does the Möbius strip, another one-surface entity. In effect unlike spheres, cubes or pyramids that form an unbroken skin around an interior space, it's a solid object that instead of having an outside and an inside, has only one side - the outside. Or the inside. (Which one is present in a Klein bottle is open to debate, but whatever the answer is, there's only one of them.) The artifacts you see are actually representations of the Klein bottle concept because as a multidimensional trick played on the universe, one can exist as thought but can't be truly built in the paltry three spatial dimensions we inhabit.

I am far from being the first person to knit up something like this. Acme has a nice selection of ready made Klein Bottle hats. There are several patterns on the web if you want to knit your own. Knitty did one; a good pattern but it's not my favorite. I think it looks more like a teapot lacking a spout than anything else. There's one by Sarah-Marie Belcastro, whose joy in her own mathematical geekitude is contagious. (She's got lucky students). It's very cool looking, but I think the intended recipient would find it a bit too massive. And there's another all-prose pattern that I remember being offered as a holiday gift exchange pattern was back in the ancient days of the KnitList, circa '94. Woolworks has it on archive.

The one I am taking for inspiration is none of the above. It's by Nathanael Berglund, the sketchiest pattern of all but with a pleasing and recognizable shape. I think it's conceptualized just enough to provide me with fodder for (minimal) thought. The simple shaping will be just complex enough to keep my interest, yet not so daunting as to require me to slavishly knit to the pattern. And at a DK or worsted gauge will go quite quickly.

So I as I trot along the sorry slope to yet another personal hell, I'll be trotting along with an air of distraction. Not exactly overjoyed, but glad to know that my ultra-nerdy destressing mechanism is prepared in my backpack, sharing room with my computers and waiting for the least bit of "hurry up and wait" time to be appreciated.

Technorati : knitting

My ultra quick 1941 vest project is finished. That's 7 days from cast-on to finishing off the final end. Considering I only knit an hour or two a day, that's lightning quick. Although The Resident Male declines to model, the evidence is here:

The fit is a bit different from most contemporary patterns. For one, the shoulders are wide and shaped, and the armholes aren't gappy. My tiny cut-out at the back of the neck rides well with a golf shirt's collar, and the length is just what he wanted. The fabric is soft and lofty. Since I rarely knit for him and the few times I have the results haven't been optimal (mostly too big or too warm), I'm delighted to have produced a winner.

On the yarn - I think Cascade 220 is a yarn that's overlooked in the mad scramble to Merinos. Yes, it's not a Merino, and doesn't have that silky hand. But it's not an itchy or stiff yarn, and knits up quite nicely. The number of ends to finish off are minimized because of this yarn's superior ability to spit-splice, and the 220 yard skeins. In terms of care, it's quite pill-resistant. I've made several things from it, and have never found any flaws in it. Not so much as a knot. So pause a bit in your haste to knit this stuff up only if fulling/felting is your goal. Try some out for a non-shrunk garment. I think you'll be pleased with the result.

As promised, here's a modern pattern for the thing in Size 46. To make life simpler for us all, I've used Sweater Wizard to construct it.

Man's 1941 Style Vest in Garter Stitch, a Redaction from Minerva #46
(c) Kim Brody Salazar, http://www.wiseneedle.com

Needles: 7, plus size 6 circs or DPNs for finishing armholes and neck ribbing. One stitch marker.
Gauge:4.5 sts10 rws per 1" Estimated Ydg: 1212 yards standard worsted weight yarn with a native stockinette gauge of 5 stitches = 1 inch.

Back

With rib needle, cast on 102 sts. Estab rib pat on Row 1: *K2 , P2. Repeat from *. End K2 . Work 29 rws. On row 30, increase as below. [2.75"].

Rib-to-Body Inc Row
6 incs total done this way: Work 14 [inc 1 in next st, work 13, inc 1 in next st, work 14] 2x. [inc 1 in next st, work 14] 2x. (108 sts) With body needle, work in pat st until piece meas 14.5"[row 118].

Armhole Shaping
Bind off 6 sts at beg of next 2 rws. Dec 1 st each side, every other row 5x. Cont in pat st until piece meas 25.5" from start [row 228].

Shape Shoulders and Back Neck
Bind off 7 sts beg of next row. At beg of next row, bind off 7 sts, work 14 sts, attach a second ball of yarn and bind off 42 back neck sts. Complete row. At beg of next row, bind off 7 sts and dec 1 st at each neck edge.Bind off 7 sts beg of next row. Bind off 7 sts beg of next 2 rws. End off.

Front

Work as for back, including all shaping,and, at the same time when piece meas 16.1" [row 134]

Begin Neck Shaping
Work to center, attach another ball of yarn and complete row.Turn. Work both sides at once. Dec 1 st at each neck edge every 2nd rw 3x, then every 4th rw 19x. Cont in pat st until piece meas 25.5" from start [row 228].

Shape Shoulders
Work shoulder shaping (at shoulder edge) to correspond with back.

Armhole Edging
Seam sides. Seam shoulders. With smaller size ndle, pick up 108 sts around armhole edge. Work in K2, P2 ribbing for five rows. Bind off loosely.

Neck Finishing
With smaller circular or dp needles and RS facing, pick up 48 sts from back neck, pick up 60 sts from left neck edge, place center marker, pick up 60 sts from right neck edge, place end of round marker. (168 sts).

Round 1, 3 and 5 - Work first round in K2, P2 rib until two stitch before the center marker. K2tog, slide marker to right hand needle. SSK, continue in K2, P2 ribbing taking care to match the sequence immediately after the centermost decreases to the sequence immediately before them.

Round 2 and 4 - Work in established pattern.

Bind off. Darn in all ends.

Technorati : knitting

As you can see, I've finished the back and front. I have sewn them together, and done the bit of ribbing around the V-neck. I'm now working on the bits of ribbing around the armholes.

The sleeve area on the right looks constricted because it's on the needle right now. The ends of that circ are out of the shot. That's also why the lower edge on the right is drawn up.

Seaming and picking up along garter stitch edges can be problematic, with the texture of the final stitches in the ridge and valley rows being difficult to pierce evenly. I cheated by using selvage stitches, both on the to-be-seamed edges and on neckline and armholes where ribbing stitches were to be picked up. This allowed me to do a more even pick-up, although the K2P2 rib texture off of garter stitch at this gauge will never be totally smooth.

In this detail of the neckline you can see the pick-up edge, plus the center front decreases that form the V:

When I did the side seams, I used mattress stitch on my selvage edges. I also did one cheat that made the waist ribbing a bit more even. In my stitch count, the ribbing for the back began and ended with a K2 section. When time came to work up the front, I made sure that the ribbing on the front began and ended with a P2 section. That way when the two were seamed together, the ribbing at the waist is not interrupted.

One more evening of sleeve ribbing, plus another to end off and another to do a light post-finish blocking (yes I was bad, and didn't block my pieces before assembly).

Technorati : knitting

I'm tooling along on the vest. I've got the front completed up to just a row or two below the point where the stitches at the bottom of the armholes are ended off. I've also looked more closely at the width of the shoulders and back of the neck. I've decided that at this point I really don't want to make the back of the neck wider, nor do I want to make the armholes deeper. Therefore the shoulder pieces are going to remain the width they are now. Of course, if I get the thing assembled and TRM doesn't like the fit, the possibility of ripping back and reknitting both pieces still exists. But for now I will carry on just carrying on.

Now, my original shoulder and back of neck widths are predicated closely on the width of the original pattern's V-neck. Although I've sized up the rest of the sweater, doing the math indicated that the original opening would be adequate. Were I making this in an even larger size I would probably play with these proportions, but for this quickie redaction, I'm keeping the neckline's progression of decreases more or less the same. I am however moving the entire unit down just a tad. Since that makes the thing deeper (but not wider) there will be a little bit of plain knitting with no neckline forming decreases at the top of the opening near the shoulders. If you look closely at the original pattern you'll see that it also sports a similar coping strategy. My extra .75 inch isn't going to make a huge difference here.

So I arrive at my pre-armhole point. Poised to begin the simultaneous shaping of the shoulders and the V-neck; well on my way to finishing this project in about 2.5 weeks. Pix tomorrow when there's something more interesting to see.

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As you can see, I've made a fair bit of progress on my 1941 man's vest. Here is the completed back:

The color is a bit darker and more heathered with a touch of gray than is the virulent cranberry reported in the photo.

Now to go from the original size 30 to my customized 46, I did a couple of things. First I measured The Resident Male and one of his favorite store-bought vests. Then we sat down and discussed what he liked and didn't like about the historical vest. We came to this set of observations

• He liked the ultra simple garter stitch texture
• He liked the wide waist ribbing in contrast with the narrow armhole edge and neckline ribbing
• He liked the K2 P2 ribbing texture
• He liked the close fit
• He wanted a deeper V because he'd be wearing the thing over golf shirts, and not over dress shirts with ties.
• A closer look at the dimensions of the original rather than the photo revealed that the piece was longer than we originally thought, so no adjustments there were necessary.
• He didn't like the straight edge at the back of the neck, and preferred a tiny bit of contour there

So comparing his measurements and the original I come up with

So I plugged my measurements into the original pattern, multiplying by the original gauge (which I achieved), and came up with the piece above. I knit the back first so I could become familiar with the armhole and shoulder shaping before adding the complication of the vee neckline. I also knew that because it has no vee, the back would take more yarn. If I consumed more than half of my yarn while knitting it, I'd know that I needed to buy another skein. As it was, I used two and a quarter skeins out of five, so I should have enough to finish.

To confirm my noodling (and because I had the tool at hand), I pulled out Sweater Wizard and typed my measurements into that, too. I came up with a pattern that was very close to my own hand-tinkered one - minus the erasures and bogus false starts. If I end up sharing the redaction, I'll use the Sweater Wizard product for clarity and ease of use.

One lingering worry - the shoulders. They seem wide although they are comparable to the target store bought favorite vest's measurements. I may go back and rip them out, increasing the width of the back neck and decreasing the width of the shoulders to about 4.5 inches. More thought here is required.

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Because they are in irreplaceable source of knowledge.

I swatched out several yarns that I had here in stash, trying out possibilities for my 1941 vest. Everything ranging from some navy/maroon ragg style Bartlett worsted (circa 1998) to a recent find from Webs - a tweedy garnet. The Bartlett is really an Aran or light bulky. I achieved gauge, but the sample stood up like cardboard. The Webs 2/4 Highland Tweed purports to be Aran to worsted in gauge (4.5 to 5 spi) but it knit up like a DK. Again I achieved gauge, but the sample looked meshy and sparse. I suspect that it would have bloomed a bit after I washed it, but in an added complication, TRM mentioned that he liked the color but hated the tweedy flecks. So it was off to my local yarn shop on a fishing expedition.

I went to Wild & Woolly in Lexington, MA - my knitting home-away-from-home. Now Jackie the owner is a knitter with decades more knitting experience than I have. She gave me an important bit of advice. When looking over patterns in these older booklets, don't go by the gauge any yardage deductions based on just one project. Look at all the projects in the book that call for the same yarn. You'll probably notice a discrepancy among them. So we did. A couple of the other patterns look closer to true worsted gauge than the light worsted/DK thoughts I had when I walked into the shop. To top it off she also remembers the Minerva (and later Columbia-Minerva) yarn specified. She steered me to Cascade 220 - which is slightly denser and less lofty than the Minerva but of similar gauge. The more airy nature of the Minerva is what threw me off, providing the extra yardage and making the stuff seem like a DK . So I bought some Cascade in a regal heathered burgundy and took it home.

I swatched it up and it was perfect. Spot on for gauge, with a soft hand and drape. So offering up thanks for the entire Wild & Woolly family I set to work on my vest project.

I measured the target recipient, plus one of his favorite store-bought vests that fits well. Then we sat down together and looked at the original pattern, pointing out fit and finish items that made it especially appealing, and other things that we might want to forgo. For example, TRM likes the depth of the V-neck, and the proportions of the waist and armhole/neckline ribbing, but is less enamored of the short length, tailored at the time to compliment pants worn with the higher, more formal waistline of the 1940s.

Then I looked at the pattern. I reproduce it here in its entirety, under fair use because I am using it to illustrate how to go about both reading an unusually formatted historical pattern, and how to go about redacting it for modern use.

You'll notice that the write-up is much shorter than a modern pattern. There's only one size given, plus a schematic with some notations on it and cursory working notes.

This pattern if translated straight would rely heavily on the schematic. The boxes represent a 1-inch square grid. Instructions on how to interpret notes like B-8 an D-1-7 are elsewhere in the pattern leaflet. Here's what I start with - my interpretation of the original directions, plus a bit of editorializing.

"Eckhart" - Man's 1941 Garter Stitch Vest from Minerva Hand Knits for Men in the Service, Vol. 62, size 30

Gauge in garter stitch: 4.5 st = 1 inch, 10 rows (5 garter ridges) = 1 inch

Back: Cast on 88 stitches. Work 3" in K2,P2 rib. Then switch to garter stitch. Work even until piece measures 13 inches from bottom edge. Bind off 8 at the beginning of the next two rows. Then decrease one stitch at the right and left edge of the work every four rows. Do this edge reduction seven times total. At the end of the armhole decreases you will have 58 stitches. Work these 58 stitches even in garter stitch until the piece measures 11 inches from the under-arm bind off row and you end ready to work a right side row. Form shoulders by binding off four stitches at the beginning of the next four rows, then bind off three stitches at the beginning of the next six rows. Bind off remaining 24 stitches to form center back neck.

Front: Work as for back EXCEPT place a marker between stitch #44 and 45. On a right-side row when work measures approximately 15.5 inches from the bottom edge, knit to two stitches before the marker, K2tog. Then attaching a second ball of yarn, and starting with a SSK, work the rest of the row. Note that this happens BEFORE you finish making the underarm decreases, so watch for it.

You now have each side of the top front on either side of the V opening being completed from its own ball of yarn. From this point on you'll be making paired decreases on either side of the opening on some right side rows, using a K2tog when indicated on the side that ends at the center, and a SSK on the side that begins at the center. Work three of these decrease pairs spaced approximately 1/2 inch apart (you'll probably be doing the decreases every 4 rows). Then work seven of these decrease pairs spaced 1 inch apart (probably every 10th row). You will finish these neckline-defining decreases at about the same point where you need to commence the shoulder decreases. Finish the shoulders as directed for the back.

Finishing: Seam shoulders together. Starting at a shoulder seam, pick up 132 stitches around the neckline, taking care to space them evenly, and work in K2, P2 ribbing. Count off the stitches to make sure that the center two that will be in the point of the V end up as a K2 pair, and place a marker between them. Work the mitered join at the center front point of the V-neck by knitting the last two stitches just before the marker, and working a SSK immediately after the marker - do this EVERY OTHER row until the ribbing measures 3/4 of an inch deep. Bind off. Sew side seams. Pick up 144 stitches around each armhole and work even in K2, P2 rib until ribbing measures 3/4 of an inch deep. Bind off and finish ends. If you wish, reinforce shoulder area with a strip of seam binding, sewn by hand to the inside of the sweater to cover the shoulder seams.

O.K. Clear as mud? Now for the kicker. I need to work a size 46, slightly longer, with a bit of a center back neck scoop out (he doesn't like the straight across the back of the neck bind-off). Plus I want to tinker with the depth of the V. How I do that alchemy is next.

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