Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Knitting the Knitter's Almanac - August

I'm long overdue for an update on my Knitter's Almanac project.  August's title is called Christmas Fiddle-Faddle, and the chapter details the construction of ornaments which one could use on a tree: an angel, a star, an evergreen tree and a net for holding fruit.


Star front
First up is a star.  I knit mine in some leftover yellow roving I had in my stash.  It was a pretty straightforward design knit in the round with regular decreases which make the points.


Star back
Front of tree
Next up  was the evergreen tree.  This was a bit more complicated.  It still used the technique of regular decreases to make points, but then when it was the right width, short rows were worked on half the stitches at a time to fill out the center.  Then it was folded in half and woven.  The last time short rows were used in the book (in the Maltese Fisherman's Hat), I forgot to do them properly, so they left a weird gap where the work was turned each time.  This time I remembered to wrap the stitches so the work is more seamless.  I again used left over yarn in green and white to make my snow covered tree. 

Back of tree
The next ornament was a net for holding a piece of fruit.  Very few people still put actual fruit on their trees these days, but these nets are for that purpose.  Personally, I don't think knitting was the right medium for making a net.  Crochet netting is far easier and looks better.  This pattern was not only difficult to follow but also difficult to execute.  Though the fact that I made it from leftover gold metallic thread probably did not make it easier.  Basically the net is knit by adding and then dropping stitches.  And since it's done on double pointed needles, there's a lot to keep track of at once.  But after several attempts, I managed to make something resembling a net.
Knit net holding a lime


Angel
The final project was an angel ornament.  Again, I used left over yarn to make this.  A small cone is basically knit into the top of which I stuffed a ball and then tied off.  A small cord is knit and threaded through for arms.  The whole think is pretty basic and I thought it would make a good dolly for my yarn loving cat.  She plays with it, but it hasn't diminished her love for all the rest of my yarn. . .
August was a pretty easy set of projects.  I was done them all in three days.  The shaping techniques were interesting, and I'm sure I'll be exploring them in the future, but there was not a whole lot new here. 



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