Tagged: kh940

The pieces of a stripy sweater laid out on the floor as if they were sewn together. The stripes are gray, blue, and green - on the sleeves the gray stripes are wider, and on the body the blue stripes are wider.

In Which the Pirate Has Pieces of a Sweater.

Well would’ja look at that, it’s a stripy sweater! All four pieces are done. I basted them together and tried on the sweater, and it doesn’t not fit! It may be one stripe longer than necessary, and there may be a little weirdness with slight tension differences between the blue yarn and the others, but I made a sweater! Well, almost. I still have...

Two white and two navy blue skeins of sock yarn. They are neatly tied and folded, but the yarn is squiggly from having been knit and unraveled.

In Which the Pirate Swaps Stripes.

Remember that time I knit a sanquhar-inspired scarf with little skulls hidden in it? It’s not that it was a bad idea, it’s that my execution was off, and so was my estimation of whether I actually wear scarves. I’ve been looking at this thing all winter going “okay, but it’s too long and too thick to be comfortable, and not only does my...

Tension swatches of yarn in medium gray, kelly green, and navy blue.

In Which the Pirate Starts a Sweater.

It’s (finally) time for a machine-knit fingering weight sweater! I chose three yarns out of my stash – two skeins of gray, one of a bright kelly green, and one navy blue. First, swatching. I tried each of the three yarns on tensions 5 and 6, and decided that T5 felt better, and was less see-through, without being so stiff that it won’t feel...

A wrap-around baby sweater in tonal aquas and blues, with two bright yellow crocheted buttons.

In Which the Pirate Knits a Tiny Sweater.

I actually knit this sweater early last year, but the baby only just made an appearance a couple of weeks ago, so it’s been a secret ’til now… The pattern is the Lilly Sweater, which seemed like a good way to use a skein of cotton-blend sock yarn and practice machine knitting all at once. I used Plymouth Sockotta, which I used to knit...

One pants leg, unseamed, lies at full length on a wooden coffee table. The stripes are an incredibly garish collection of 1970s colours: mustard yellow, brown, steel blue, and some jacquard-looking stripes as well.

In Which the Pirate Attempts to Knit Pants.

Seven years ago, I bought the world’s ugliest yarn (I love it though) intending to knit a pair of EZ’s “Nether Garments”, because what could be cozier than woolen long-johns? Except it never happened, possibly because every time I thought of starting the project, I thought about how long it would take… and put it off again. Then I got a knitting machine, and...

A pair of red socks with blue toes and heels, and a band of skulls and crossbones at the cuff.

In Which the Pirate Finishes the Pirate Socks.

These socks have been an absolute journey. My first attempt was too small, and I didn’t realize it until after I’d knit down past the heel. My second attempt, after recharting the skull and crossbones section to have eight more stitches in it, was upside down – and I still wasn’t happy with my fine gauge colourwork on DPNs. (Uneven. Puckery. Not nice.) I...

A ball of yarn with the green-blue-green gradient visible on the top edge.

In Which the Pirate Finds New Ways to Foul Up.

This hat. This hat has been giving me so much trouble. I ordered the yarn online and was hoping for blue-green-blue, but what I got was green-blue-green. Four rows into the knitting, I made the rookie mistake of picking the project up inside-out and knitting in the wrong direction. So I started over, knit the ribbing, and… not only was the hat coming out...

A scarf in navy blue and white, folded over to show that one side is the reverse colors of the other side. Each section of the colourwork is a different traditional Sanquhar pattern.

In Which the Pirate Seams a Scarf.

It’s finished! I seamed it by hanging it sideways on the knitting machine with the wrong sides together (right-side out), and pulling loops through both sides, then binding off those loops. It’s so squishy, just the right length for me, and I think it’ll be very warm – though I’ll have to wait ’til winter to find out, of course. I need to weigh...

The Sanquhar scarf in progress, showing the front side.

In Which the Pirate Designs for Machine Knitting.

Inspired by Sockmatician’s Sanquhar Scarf, but unwilling to do that much double-knitting with sock yarn, I decided to design something similar to knit on the machine. I began by using Excel as graph paper to fill in squares, which is probably not how its developers ever imagined a spreadsheet application would be used, but it works! Then Michael helped by writing a magic spell...

The Puppies wrap folded over at the bottom so that the front and back sides are visible in the same picture.

In Which the Pirate Knits with the Machine.

I’ve wanted to knit Puppies since I got the knitting machine. Last year I bought four cones of laceweight yarn for it, and promised myself that I wouldn’t buy any more yarn until I’d knit the thing. So… I knit the thing. First, I made a swatch and attempted to felt it (not entirely, just a little bit) in the washing machine. I have...