…your enemies closer, and your knitting tools…closer yet!
Knitting tool necklace
While I’m working my Peekaboo motifs, I need stitch markers, and a cable hook for working the brioche 4 stitch decreases. I’m not always sitting next to a table, so it’s easier to wear my tools on me.
This is just a silk cord with a hook finding (it’s half of a necklace fastener; there’d be a little ring to slide onto that silver J). It can hold stitch markers that I use to note where a motif begins and ends. The gold cable hook can hang on the silver J, too, or in the little loop that the silk cord is threaded through. The decorative pink stitch marker is for weight, so that the necklace hangs down instead of flopping around.
Each of the motifs on the Peekaboo Cowl had me using the cable hook. Having that hook on my person kept it handy!
The same is true for the Peekaboo Shawlette (coming soon).
How do you keep your cable needle/cable hook handy? I don’t use one for most cabling, but when I need it, I need it!
I finished the knitting on this entrelac piece, but I haven’t decided if I want to seam the ends for a loop cowl, or keep it as a shortish scarf. The light and airy fabric doesn’t want to be a single loop, so I’d have to make sure it’s long enough to be a double loop. Or I could leave it as a shortish scarf, held with a shawl/scarf pin. I think that would show more of the little squares, which is the whole point of this piece! So I may have just talked myself into a scarf. Onward!
I’m still on my brioche + pooling kick. Yarn Snob’s Black Orchid is so pretty! I chose Silver Fox to go with it, but after I started knitting the two together, I’m not so sure about the combo. The black is really more like a deep dark purple, and the gray feels “cold” next to it. It doesn’t help that I haven’t actually seen my knitting in daylight! But I think I’d like it better with Winter (cream) to warm it up a little. I’ll have to take one more look in the morning before frogging. I do have Winter waiting in the wings.
In the meantime, I also have this yarn from A Chick That Knitz; it’s Hibernation, with a choice of either Caramel or Silver Fox (yes, another Silver Fox!) to go with it. I’m starting with Caramel, but as you can see, everything is up in the air until the swatching is done.
Are you gift knitting for the holidays? I’m shopping my samples; that takes a lot of pressure off!
Cherry Blossom Wrapture, Trailing Leaves, Star Flower, Nymphaea
Thank you for your response to my sample sale! Most of the smaller items are sold, but the bigger ones are a little slower to move. Incentive time! I’m dropping the price of the remaining items by $10, so it would be equivalent to free shipping. I’m planning to mail everything out at the end of this week, so this is your chance for handmade gifts, without having to make them.
We had a wonderful Thanksgiving, with all of the DH-side relatives meeting up in St. Louis. It’s been a few years since we’ve all been together for Thanksgiving, so it was a treat. We managed to successfully prepare Thanksgiving dinner in our Airbnb kitchen, and then transport it to our party room at Mom’s assisted living center.
The gang’s all here
I think the best part of these trips is that the next generation gets to spend time together, and we get to spend time with them, too.
I didn’t have a moment to knit until I was on the plane headed home. The entrelac is close to yarn chicken stage; I’ll be finished soon. (Is it cheating if I use a scale?)
My sample bins are overflowing! It’s been 8 years since I had a sample sale, and it’s time to make some room. Now you can have PDXKnitterati originals, and you don’t have to do the knitting!
Items are named clockwise from top left in each set. The names are hyperlinked to the pattern pages so you can see more pictures, not necessarily in the color/yarn that’s being offered, but it helps to know the shape.
$10 shipping and handling to USA addresses, or local pickup if you’re in the Portland area. Leave a comment if you’re interested in a particular piece, and I’ll email you. (I can see your email address; you don’t have to leave it in the comment.)
You know I love assigned pooling. And I love brioche. Test knitting is under way for my new shawlette.
I’m designing another shawlette using brioche and assigned pooling, and the pooling was starting to…pool! At the ends of the row, over and over again. This left a big center with no stars.
Highly annoying.
So I frogged back to where there were just two stars at each end, and then I skipped a bunch of yarn so that the next star would be in the middle of the row.
It took me two tries to get it right, so I’m glad I didn’t cut the yarn first. I’ll leave this big loop on the back until I’m fully committed.
I think of assigned pooling as a dance between the yarn’s suggestions and what I want. But ultimately I’m the boss. If we have a disagreement, I WIN. I make the rules for this game!
Have you tried assigned pooling? Who’s the boss of YOUR knitting?
Oh, one more thing!
I’m teaching Thrill of the Thrum, my Thrumbelina thrummed slippers, this Sunday at 2 pm at For Yarn’s Sake in Beaverton. Come learn how to make and knit fluffy thrums into your knitting! This is an in-person class, the better to get a feel for those squishy thrums. Register here.
I love my little peekaboo motif so much. I couldn’t let it go yet. Brioche plus assigned pooling is my current obsession. (Did you see my Peekaboo Cowl?)
With a little fiddling, I can work it from the right side *and* the wrong side. Again, reversible, and different yet attractive from either side. This shawlette is knit with two skeins of fingering weight yarn, one of which is dyed for assigned pooling. I used Singles Fingering from A Chick That Knitz in Forget Me Not (pooling) and Glenhaven. It’s light and cozy at the same time.
I’m looking for a few test knitters for this shawlette. Are you interested? Let me know!
The Peekaboo Cowl is a 2 color brioche cowl, knit in the round. It features assigned pooling/algorithmic knitting motifs that peek between the brioche ribs. The pattern includes a video tutorial for the Peekaboo motif.
Peekaboo is reversible; the motif looks completely different on the inside. You can wear it with a bit of both sides showing, for maximum fun. I do!
Choose 2 skeins of fingering weight yarn, one of which should be dyed for assigned pooling. You can make the cowl close to the neck, longer for double looping, or anywhere in between. I knit a short cowl because I wanted a quick project!
The Peekaboo Cowl pattern is on sale 15% off through October 29, 2024 with coupon code PEEKING. The pattern is available through Ravelry, link here. This pattern is also available through Payhip, link here. You can use the coupon code on either site.
This pattern has been professionally tech edited. Thanks also to test knitters Ann Berg, Carolyn Crisp, Diane Kay Gelder, Rhea Kohlman, and Diane O’Brien. Thanks to Keith Leonard/Yarn Snob for the beautiful yarn for the design.
I’m working on more brioche plus pooling…can’t stop, won’t stop!
I left town before dawn last Thursday to teach for the Minnesota Knitters’ Days retreat. Our topics for the weekend: brioche, more brioche, and assigned pooling. All my favorite things!
Look at all the smiling brioche knitters! We worked on Brioche Pastiche, my choose your own adventure pattern for hat or cowl, plain or embellished. (I’m teaching this class again at Hook and Needle on Saturday; if you’re local and want to learn to knit brioche, please sign up!) We also worked on Whale Conga Line, as an introduction to brioche knit flat and syncopated brioche. That’s a lot of brioche!
Ursula and Beth finished their hats over the weekend.
And Janet simplified and fancied up the cowl pattern. I love it!
On Sunday morning we played with assigned pooling, which was a great palate cleanser. It’s fun to let the yarn boss you around…a little. You’re still the boss of your knitting, overall.
The knitters were a great group, with lots of mad skills! (Thanks to Stacey for recommending me; she was in my class at YarnOver Minnesota a couple years ago, and here too.)
Kris’s purple sweater on the left is amazing; I love the lively ribbing pattern on the collar and cuffs.
Sheryl (on the right) is the organizer of this well-run event. This is the 40th anniversary of this retreat; Sheryl was a long-time participant and took over when the previous organizer retired. Many of the participants have known each other through this event for a very long time!
Sheryl’s show and tell sweater was a fantastic example of yarn color dominance. Those stripes aren’t ribbing; they’re 1×1 stockinette stripes.
Linn brought her cardigan to show me what she did with Yarn Snob Keith’s Cabana Boy pooling colorway. I love how the white stripes lightened things up; you can see on the bottom band that the colors are pretty intense! And look how the hot pink pooled on one sleeve, and the orange pooled on the back of the other. You could never get it to do that if you were planning it.
Cabana Boy yarn
We were at a Franciscan retreat center in Prior Lake, and the grounds were lovely.
Labyrintha quiet place for tai chiOne of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakesSame sunsetMount Hood on the way home
Why yes, I choose my seat for the Mount Hood view! And now I’m home, and prepping for this weekend’s classes. Brioche Pastiche at Hook and Needle, and a stranded colorwork class at For Yarn’s Sake on Sunday, based on the Shetland Wool Week Islesburgh Toorie.
I was so blown away by the lovely colors that I forgot to do the phone trick. There’s not much tonal contrast between the Peony and Cameo, so I’ll use the Yorkshire and Peony together. I may need to downsize the pattern to make it work with these two 50g skeins, which is easy to do.
But what about that tote bag? Nash Yarn Fest will be MDK’s first foray into hosting a fiber festival. It’s happening March 14-15, 2025, and tickets go on sale TOMORROW, October 1. There are lots of ways to participate: Festival only, opening night party, after party, workshop with Arne and Carlos, or a longer destination travel getaway. Read all about it here.
Last goodies: Two MDK field guides; one for brioche, and Renewal, which is a collection of textural sweaters and accessories by Norah Gaughan. I don’t have time to knit a sweater, but I may knit these lovely mitts!
Austen Mitts, photo from Renewal field guide
Norah has such an inventive mind, and she’s a delightful person, too. She was the other teacher and my cruise buddy on the Vogue Knitting cruise to Canada and New England in 2022.
I taught a steeking class at Hook and Needle yesterday. I’ve been teaching my Sheepy Steeky Coasters class with a crochet-reinforced steek, no sewing machines for me. Too hard to carry to class! Also, I don’t trust a machine to not eat my knitting.
Boxed Hearts Coasters
I knit an additional sample this week so I could demonstrate a couple more reinforcement methods in class. This is my Boxed Hearts Coasters that I designed for a class with the Knitting Circle during the pandemic. I knit it while watching video classes the other day; can you spot my oopsie? If not, no big deal. It was fine for class!
I added a hand sewn backstitch reinforcement for students to practice, and a felted steek. Everyone got to poke all stabby-stabby on this sample, down the center red stripe. It’s already been felted in the picture above; the front looks completely normal.
But you can see that the backside is all fuzzed up. This edge isn’t going to fall apart when it’s cut!
Completely stress free. From there, the process is the same. Pick up and knit stitches along the sides, then knit the garter stitch edge that matches the upper and lower borders. Just like a buttonband. After that, sew everything down.
I love small projects for teaching new techniques. It’s much less fraught to cut a coaster than to cut a sweater as your first steek project.
Find my patterns on Ravelry: Michele Bernstein Designs
Here are some of my favorites, and the newest. Many of my designs are also available through my Payhip store.
PDXKnitterati 