Happy New Year! I hope you began as you mean to go on. For us, New Year’s Day was spent with the (grown) kids. They came for brunch (cinnamon rolls, cheesy scrambled eggs, mimosas, fake bacon) and then we headed out for a visit with a troll.
Ole Bolle, and a human scale door
This is Ole Bolle, one of a series of oversized trolls by Thomas Dambo. This is the only one in the Portland area; the rest of this series are around the Puget Sound in Washington. But there are over 100 around the world!
He’s made of recycled wooden pallets, and he’s BIG.
I love how he’s peering into the house, looking for snacks.
Don’t look now!
We extended our outing with a 3 mile walk along the Rock Creek Greenway, a wetlands area. Lots of ducks and evidence of beavers (gnawed tree trunks and limbs).
Wouldn’t this plumage pattern make a great sweater yoke?
A little bit of knitting, and the day was complete. How did you start 2024?
I forgot to add the biggest knit thing I did in 2023, which was also a second chance: I re-published my sold out, out of print book, Brioche Knit Love: 21 Skill Building Projects from Simple to Sublime! It’s for sale through Amazon.com and through select yarn shops including For Yarn’s Sake and Northwest Yarns and Mercantile. Get a copy and enjoy brioche knitting!
To ring out the old year and ring in the new, I’m having a sale on my 2023 individual self-published patterns on Ravelry. These are the eight designs you see above (not the book, which is not on Ravelry). Here’s a link to the Ravelry bundle so you can find them easily. Get 20% off any of my 2023 patterns from now through January 5, 2024. Explore assigned pooling, play with brioche, or just have a simple knit and let a gradient yarn walk you through Ebb and Flow! (If Ravelry is not accessible for you, message me and we’ll work it out.)
Happy new year…are you doing something fun for New Year’s Eve? We’re staying home with the cats. That’s enough excitement for us!
These are my finished designs of 2023; there are still 3 in the hopper that will be published in 2024. Assigned pooling was definitely a big part of my year! Pooling is a Cinch, Firefly Trails, Fanfare, Starfall, and the Star Flower Shawl were my pooling pieces.
I started the year with the Aspen Leaf Coasters, which were a brainstorm off my re-worked Aspen Leaf brioche scarf for Knit Picks. Because what if you only had to knit one leaf instead of a whole scarf?That was a fun idea, and I designed them so I could use them for a class on brioche increases and decreases. (I’m teaching it at Red Alder on February 16.) I finished the year with the Aspen Leaf Brioche Cowl (center bottom) because I love that leaf motif. I’m back to my beloved brioche and leaves after my assigned pooling detour.
27 finished projects in 2023
I counted up all my projects for the year, and there were 25 FOs. Two were from other designers, the Sink Mates mini washcloths by Lorilee Beltman, and the Buggiflooer cowl adapted from the Buggiflooer Beanie by Alison Rendall (for Shetland Wool Week). The other 23 were from my own designs.
I knit several of these pieces more than once while developing or revising the designs. I love second (and third) chances, don’t you?
Ebb and Flow in variegated, long gradient (pink), mini skeins (blues/greens)
I designed Ebb and Flow to use a souvenir skein of Moss Fibers yarn from Knit Maine 2022. Then I knit it again with the long pink gradient. I loved the color, but I think the yak/silk blend doesn’t have enough bounce to help it hold its shape (it didn’t help that I made the neckline wider, but that was a good thing to learn for the design). And then I knit it with mini skeins, and that was awesome.
I knit two more Starfall cowls for the upcoming knit along with Knits All Done/Yarn Snob, and found that a bigger, fuller star was ideal based on Keith’s dyeing patterns, along with an extended lace edging due to his generous yardage. (I had to knit through an entire skein to make sure there would be enough.)
Second chances can add a lot to an experience, whether it’s knitting or something else. While we were on vacation this month in Hawaii, we took advantage of two second chances. I had gone rock hopping with the kids at Wawaloli Beach in 2018, but we never came to the wave crashing tide pools that were pictured in our guide book.
Wawaloli Beach tide pools…found ‘em!
These are great for wading, if you’ve got kids. The calm pools that we saw before were full of interesting sea life, including shingle urchins.
It was definitely worth going back and doing it again for the short Coastal Trail; the tide pools were full of interesting fauna. Why do sea urchins put things on themselves? Camouflage, maybe?
Looking back from 1871 Trail at lava shelf/tide poolsLooking north, 1871 TrailGoats!
I was a little sorry to learn that we were going to be on vacation during the new moon, which meant no moonsets. But after several days of waking at 5 AM by accident, I decided to have my coffee in the dark on the lanai.
Orion, December 15 (amazing to capture with iPhone)
The sky was perfectly clear, and I saw Orion setting over the ocean. A green shooting star dropped from his shoulder. I saw six more meteors in the next half hour as Orion sank to the sea. Apparently the Geminid meteor shower happens at this time of year, who knew? Gemini is near Orion in the night sky. There is also an Orionid meteor shower, but that one peaks in October.
Do you knit/do things more than once? I do! And learn a little more each time.
Knitted Wit Summer Slubbing, Sakura and Unicorn Dreams
As I said in a previous post, I took this yarn with me on vacation. I was originally planning a 2 color top down crescent shawl.
Sunset slubbing, color not true
Well, I did the math and swatched the stitch patterns I wanted to use, and tried a couple needle sizes. Then I cast on. And I decided…that my design required too much counting and thinking. I was on vacation! Also, I had swatched with the pink yarn, and the stitch patterns didn’t show as much as I wanted them to in the variegated yarn. I love the variegated version (Unicorn Dreams). Summer Slubbing wants to be an easy-going knit. Nothing complicated.
So I frogged it and started over. The knitting is now plain enough that this nubbly, bubbly yarn is the star of the show. This will be a single skein asymmetric triangle, knit on the bias. Shawl? Scarf? We’ll see how big it is when we get to the end of the skein!
Do over!
I like how it’s going so far. My yarn scale tells me I am close to finished; I just have to decide what I want the end to look like. Sometimes that’s the hardest part.
You’ll learn to create simple shawl shapes in class. From there you’ll get pointers on how to apply stitch patterns and design your own shawls. Registration for Red Alder is here. This is a good time to let you know that pre-registration for Red Alder (and other events) is important! Classes get canceled if registrations are low. Next week is the cut week for Red Alder. My shawl shapes class could use a few more knitters, so if you’re interested please register. I blogged the list of my classes here.
We’ve added Pooling is a Cinch to the Starfall KAL, so now it’s a PDXKnitterati Assigned Pooling KAL!
Starfall cowl
We’re kicking off the knitalong on January 9 via Zoom. I’ll be there to demonstrate some techniques and give you pointers on how much more you can do with Starfall and this fabulous yarn!
The Starfall pattern is available through Ravelry, link here. It is also available through Payhip, link here.
Check out Keith’s colors here; choose a color that works for assigned pooling in 100g fingering weight for Starfall. There are a lot of pooling colors to choose from. Your yarn purchase will get you on the Zoom invite list. Order your yarn by December 27 so you can knit with us in January!
Pooling is a Cinch in Times Square colorway
UPDATE: We’re adding Pooling is a Cinch to our KAL; if you order this yarn (it’s worsted weight, so an even quicker knit) from Keith, you’ll get the Zoom invite, too. Wednesday Dec. 27 is the last day to order to get your yarn on time for the January 9 Zoom. Jump into the pool with us!
AND! I’ve opened a thread in my Ravelry group so we can discuss both of these projects and the KAL. Here’s the link. Hope to knit with you in January!
Those two Starfall cowl samples that I knit recently? I’m having a knitalong with Keith Leonard’s beautiful Yarn Snob yarns!
Starfall in Wine Mom colorwayStarfall in Keith’s Irresistible Iris colorwayNew colors, and the colors I used
We’re kicking off the knitalong on January 9 via Zoom. I’ll be there to demonstrate some techniques and give you pointers on how much more you can do with Starfall and this fabulous yarn!
The Starfall pattern is available through Ravelry, link here. It is also available through Payhip, link here.
Check out Keith’s colors here; choose a color that works for assigned pooling in 100g fingering weight. There are a lot of pooling colors to choose from. Your yarn purchase will get you on the Zoom invite list. Order your yarn now so you can knit with us in January!
Pooling is a Cinch in Times Square colorway
Keith’s colors are amazing. He also dyed the yarn for my first pooling pattern, Pooling is a Cinch. I love this colorway; I used it again for my Firefly Trails cowl. It would make a great Starfall, too. Tempting? Of course! Come knit with us!
UPDATE: We’re adding Pooling is a Cinch to our KAL; if you order this yarn (it’s worsted weight, so an even quicker knit) from Keith, you’ll get the Zoom invite, too. Wednesday Dec. 27 is the last day to order to get your yarn on time for the January 9 Zoom. Jump into the pool with us!
AND! I’ve opened a thread in my Ravelry group so we can discuss both of these projects and the KAL. Here’s the link. Hope to knit with you in January!
I just realized that I never told you that registration is open for Red Alder Fiber Arts Retreat! I was away in the woods near Mount Hood when registration opened, and meant to blog when I returned. Oops.
The retreat is February 15-18 in Tacoma Washington. It’s a lovely event at the Hotel Murano.
Starfall Cowl
I’m teaching Assigned Pooling using my Starfall Cowl as a backdrop for several bonus pooling stitches,
Favorite Shawl Shapes
Favorite Shawl Shapes (learn the construction of basic shapes and use them to design your own shawls),
Aspen Leaf Coasters
Aspen Leaf Coasters (intro to brioche increases and decreases, and knitting brioche flat),
Brioche Pastiche
and Brioche Pastiche (beginning brioche in the round and a little more: choose your own adventure hat or cowl, plain rib or fancy increases and decreases).
I also signed up to take Xandy Peters’ Color Blocked Brioche class. I love seeing what other designers are thinking about brioche. Come knit/spin/weave with us in Tacoma!
Alder?
A leaf (maybe alder) on the railing of the bridge over the creek, in the woods that I mentioned before…
Well, I didn’t get my swatching done for the When Harry Met Lucy KAL, but I have a good excuse. I went on vacation and couldn’t fit bulky yarn into my luggage!
Knitting on the go with qiviut and POG mimosa
But one ounce of laceweight qiviut, 200 yards, doesn’t take up much space at all. And yes, that’s a tiny yarn scale because I didn’t want to have a yarn chicken issue when coming to the end. I wanted to use as much of the yarn as possible.
No yarn chicken here!
I ended up with just over half a gram left, which was less than one round’s worth of yarn. Perfect.
Souvenir qiviut cowl
I gave it a light steam blocking. The top edge doesn’t wave as much as the bottom; that’s the nature of this stitch pattern (Old Shale). It doesn’t matter; the whole thing will collapse around my neck. I began and ended with a garter stitch edge to give it some heft, and to avoid curling.
Old Shale stitch pattern detail
I’m glad I chose this stitch pattern; it has just enough going on to make it interesting, but I was never fighting with not being able to see the stitches with this dark and fuzzy yarn.
Qiviut cowl
I’m really happy with how this souvenir qiviut cowl turned out. I didn’t have much use for this cowl on vacation in Hawaii, but I put it on right after we landed back in Portland. I was so glad that I had it with me in my carry-on bag! 36 degrees F which was quite a shock to the system. This cowl is so lightweight, soft, and warm. I love it.
Is it worth writing up a pattern, or should it just be one and done? It’s great for any precious souvenir yarn. This particular yarn began in Alaska and ended in Hawaii, the 49th and 50th states. It’s been a good knitting year.
I did bring some fingering weight yarn with me for a design project, too. It didn’t take up too much room!
It’s a lovely sweater, but I like it better on me than on him. I think it’s because this yarn (Berroco Vintage) is soft and drapey, and the sweaters that I like on him have more body to them.
I want to knit another sweater for him, and when I saw Paul Haesemeyer’s sweater in Knitty, I was smitten. Bonus: He’s having a KAL and it’s opening weekend right now!
When Harry Met Lucy KAL
The sweater is knit in bulky weight yarn, which should be relatively quick. The sample was knit in an alpaca blend, but I ordered Knit Picks Wool of the Andes Bulky in Mineral Heather, which should have more body, and be less warm.
why yes there’s a cat hair on it already…
I think I’ll make it with a relaxed fit, but not as oversized as Paul’s. DH is not a large person, and I don’t want him to look like the sweater is wearing him! I could knit it in the round up to the armholes instead of in pieces. Does it need the structure of the side seams? My favorite sweater that I knit for him was knit in the round to the armholes. I altered the drop shoulder construction to cut in at the armhole, and picked up the stitches at the shoulder and worked downward, instead of knitting the sleeve and then sewing it in. Hmmm.
On the other hand, knitting it flat would make it easier to swatch for gauge, and I could avoid the “keep knitting and figure it out” debacle that I just did gauge-wise on my recent Starfall sample. (Knitting in the round takes longer to figure out that your first instinct was a bad choice…) I don’t have to decide about the sleeves until later. And I could knit it with or without cables on the sleeves…
Anyway, I’m dreaming of how I want to modify it, and I haven’t even swatched yet. Stay tuned.
Remember these two beauties? I last posted about them, wondering which color I’d use to knit a Starfall sample. I have now knit three cowls with these two skeins. (You’ll see why/how in a bit.)
Wine Mom, first swatch
At first glance, I didn’t think there was enough going on with Wine Mom. And the color run was longer than in my previous Starfall cowl, so there was a lot of color on each side of the star. This swatch was knit on a US5.
Keith’s Irresistible Orchid
This colorway called my name. I was knitting on a US4.
Starfall Cowl, unblocked
I knit this over the Thanksgiving holiday, but I wasn’t really happy with it. The stars are pretty small, and the fabric is a bit firmer than I like. There’s a lot of color at the sides of the stars, too. I wondered if it would be better on a US5, even though I thought that looked a little puny with this yarn. What if I made 6 stitch stars instead of 5 stitch stars? Would there be enough yarn to finish the cowl? I didn’t want to frog the whole thing and reknit it, if it could mean losing at yarn chicken.
Of course that meant that I should knit an entire cowl with Wine Mom, just to make sure the yardage would work out. Behold, 6 stitch stars on a US5 needle.
Starfall cowl in Wine Mom
I love it. Which meant I had to frog and re-knit the first cowl. And that’s how I’ve knit three cowls with these two skeins of yarn. I re-knit the Irresistible Orchid cowl in 3 days. Don’t try this at home; my arms are definitely feeling some tendinitis. Oops. But I did binge watch the current season of Virgin River on Netflix, so that was fun.
Bisquee is ready to help with blockingStarfall encore
The stars are bigger and there’s less color leakage at the sides of the stars. And the fabric feels right, too. Winner! I also added one more 4 row repeat of the old shale lace at the bottom edge, because there was enough yarn left to do that. I would have added that to the end of the Wine Mom version too, if I had thought of it. It all depends on how much yarn you have left.
Blocked photos coming soon. And I’ll figure out if kits are happening with Keith, the dyer of these gorgeous yarns.
Oh! While I was knitting, I realized it would be easier for me (and you, the knitter), if I gave row numbers throughout the triangular increase section, instead of just telling you to repeats rows 2 and 3, 39 times. So I edited the pattern. If you purchased it through Ravelry, the updated pattern is available to you. I’ll get the Payhip version updated today, too.
Now I need to finish my qiviut cowl, and think about a sweater I want to knit for DH, and design something with some fun new yarn from Knitted Wit. Never a dull moment, right?
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 