Knitting For A Dog

My brother and his wife have a pup that rides around in his kennel every where they go.  Not to say he spends his whole day in the kennel, but when it's not appropriate for him to be out like at restaurant he's in.  Yes, my brother and his wife are those people.  I guess I'm one of those people too in that I don't mind a bit if they bring him.  I don't bring my dog hardly any where, but I'm a homebody.  We're usually home together.  My brother when questioned at a restaurant says it's his gym bag.  Amazingly, he's very quiet and hasn't got us kicked out of a restaurant yet.

My brother and his wife work.  So, Winston goes to work with my brother.  He's not welcome at my SILs work.  He's really not welcome at my brother's either.  His bosses really like him and know he's responsible, so they don't say anything.

Anyhow the comfort of Winston the dog came into question when my SIL would come to my brother's work to pick up Winston at the end of the day.  She would find Winston laying in his kennel with his comfy towel balled up at the back of his kennel.  SIL would get agitated that my brother wasn't smoothing out his towel when he messed it up.  Despite my brother reminding her “he’s a dog I’m sure he’s fine the short amount of time he spends in the kennel.” (Winston has a pacemaker, so naturally she worries.)

To ease his wife's mind and to get him out of the dog house :) my brother asked me if I could make sort of a knitted fitted sheet like piece to go over the bottom plastic insert of the kennel.  He gave me the dimensions.  I picked an acrylic yarn which could be washed if need be. I knitted a swatch washed and dried it to get an idea of what size I needed to make.

I knitted a rectangle that was slightly longer and wider than the plastic insert.  It was then sewn to resemble a fitted sheet.  It slips over the plastic insert and Winston can't scratch it up and kick it to the back of the kennel.

As you can see Winston and my SIL are very happy with the results.

Winston is a Poodle/Pomeranian mix.

Machine Knit Tuck Scarf

I have been in a machine knitting slump lately and decided to do an easy project on my standard gauge machine.  I tend to try and do most things on my bulky.  My bulky and I are great friends.  My standard wants to be my friend, but I've been a bit resistant and I've decided to stop that.

I picked out Patricia Tan's "Tuck and Enjoy" pattern for a scarf.  It took a few minutes to understand how the needle placement should go.  The below picture shows what I finally decided.  It helped me a lot to look back on my own pattern for a tuck scarf to figure it out.  Since they were very similar.

What I found is you need to use lots of weight.  One also needs to be vigilante about moving it up.  This pattern goes quickly and before I knew it the weights were behind the ribber and that's too low.

I also experimented with russel levers on russel lever off.  On a Studio 700 the russel levers allow for needle to be all the way out and in nonworking position (NWP).  This creates the tuck.  In the past I manually pushed needles back into WP.  This time I turned off the russel levers each time.  I did find it saved a bit of time even if it was for 2 rows of the pattern.  I only forgot to pull them back on once and that was when I was knitting late at night.  I know better.  Usually after I make a series of mistakes (my russel levers being the last straw that night) I'll stop knitting.

In the end I made this beautiful scarf.  I used one skein of Tosca Light.  The scarf came to 47 inches.  I decided to try the Twisted Fringe idea for the ends.  (Another Twisted Fringe) I had run out of the Tosca Light and bought some Lion Brand Amazing in a matching color for the fringe.  I just love love love the twisted fringe.

Good Words of Machine Knitting Wisdom

I love this article at "Needles to say..." blog.  She is talking about what advice she had for new machine knitters.  I have to say I agreed with all of it.  I especially loved #4.   "Make the same pattern over again a few times."  When I find a pattern I like I make it a few times.  I usually do it at least twice as the first one had a problem or two.  Then I'll do it maybe a 3rd or 4th time, because it has a technique I need to practice.

Knitting Machine Museum?!... I'm in heaven

I was over checking out the Woollen Yarns blog and Andrea had this link on her blog.

Welcome to the Virtual Knitting Machine Museum

How cool is that! I don't have a lot of time to check it out head to toe right now, but wanted to make sure Andrea's find gets around to us Machine Knitters.

Have fun!

My Tools

When I'm using my tools I move the set I want standard or bulky and snap the 3 tiers so it's on the top.

I keep it sitting on a little box I'm using as a make shift table.  It's the perfect height for me to reach the tools and yet they are out of the way of the carriage when it's moving.

The bottom is basically miscellaneous items I use and items I seldom use.

Pool The Tools

This is my new game plan after talking to fellow experienced machine knitters.  I got confused, because I have a knitting machine that has no tools.  Yet I also own that same machine with complete tools.  One is my home machine set up with a ribber.  The other I bought to travel to machine knitting meetings.  I often show up forgetting that it has no tools with it.  Then I can't really use it with no tools.  Fellow knitters are very generous and will lend me tools, but I hate bothering them.  So, I started thinking I'd buy tools for it.  Yet I have a complete set of tools for it at home.  Why buy another set?  "Does not compute, does not compute" would often go on in my brain.

I started taking a poll and talking to fellow machine knitters about how they handled their tools.  What I found out is more knitters than not keep their tools in a tool kit rather than keeping a set with each machine.  This idea kind of bothered me too.  I was worried about loosing the tools I have with each machine.  YET the idea of pooling the tools kept coming up.  I decided to give it a go.  I wanted a tool box where I could have an area for standard tools and and area for the bulky tools.  I didn't want to mix them.  I also needed a tool kit that wouldn't be too heavy to carry.  I also told myself I'd use a Sharpie to label the tools with which machine they go to in case I want to put them all back.

I found the above organizer at Target.  It has three levels and is a very good size for the tools.  I labeled the tools and put them into it.  I carried it to my first meeting.  It worked out great.  It wasn't too heavy.  What I found out later was it works great at home.  More than great really.  I'm very clumsy with my tools when I'm working.  I put them onto the lid of the knitting machine as it sits behind the machine on the stand.  Problem is I don't put them down in the same spot.  They get under the yarn.  Under the pattern.  Who knows where they go sometimes.  I spend more times looking for tools than knitting.  Well, at least it feels like that.  With this new organizer I use tools out of it and place them back into it.  I only have to look in a 6"X 9" area.  It's been such a relief to find my tools when I'm concentrating on a machine knitting project.

Easter Egg Dyeing A Sock

I would love to give this a try.  This video follows a sock blank through the dyeing process to an actual sock.  Several interesting machines used that I would love to have.