Sashay!

It's a beautiful frilly and frustrating lace yarn.  My machine knitting group ladies are making scarves with it "hand over fist."  What does that mean?  Ahhh it's a nautical term in reference to pulling a rope quickly and continuously.  Well, they are making them quickly and seems like continuously as every time I see them I'll get a report "I've made seven Sashay scarves."

I was told they were very easy and fast to make.  I don't know if it's that I'm a novice hand knitter or I'm easily aggravated, but I couldn't get into knitting one by hand.  The yarn confused me.  I'd get lost in the many different holes and then it all fell right off my needles into my lap.  That was it.  What in the H, E, double toothpicks was I going to do with 4 skeins of Sashay yarn!

I got to thinking I might be able to use my knitting machine to knit up one of these scarves.  I've been working with my garter bar lately and I thought hmmmm I might be able to use it with the pattern for this scarf.  I wouldn't be able to use the carriage and traditionally knit this yarn, but I could use the needles and the garter bar to get the look the pattern calls for.

The pattern calls for casting on 6 stitches and that's what my MK ladies have been doing. I thought the scarf was awfully long. I'm kind of short and it seems to hang pretty low on me.  There is the option of using 10 stitches, but I didn't want it too short. I went for 8 stitches.

I hung 8 holes along the edge skipping every other hole of the Sashay.  That was a tip given to me by every women in my MK group, but one.  The one said every stitch would give a nice filly scarf just fine.  She's kind of bossy, but what she knits is always gorgeous.  After the 3rd lady secretly told me to skip every other stitch I decided to go by the majority.  After Thanksgiving though I'm going to use the every stitch method and just see what the difference would be.

 

Yes, you heard it right I will be making more of these scarves.  Putting them on the knitting machine really helped organize the yarn for me.  I'd hang 8 stitches and then using my transfer tool handle horizontally I'd pull all the stitches through.  Then I used my garter bar to flip the knitting.  Once I got a groove going it went pretty quickly.  I'd say it took me a total of 4 hours to finish the scarf.

 

There is a gal on Ravelry that did not flip the work and even though the scarf had a definite right side/wrong side she said either side was lovely.  I wanted to follow the pattern on the wrapper though and it is one continuous circle to get this frilly scarf.

 

8 stitches was perfect for me.  It measures 46 inches.  It really have a nice frilly feeling, but it has substance.  Not too airy.

 

Looking a bit like a I'm wearing a clown ruff here, but really in person and with the right outfit it's going to be a gorgeous scarf.

Pumpkin Hats!

Using a mock rib technique these adorable hats can be made on a flat bed bulky machine without a ribber. It uses a tuck stitch.

 

 

Bonnie demonstrated the pattern to our group.  She punched the pattern in on her electronic machine.  The pattern comes with a chart to create a punch card if that's the kind of machine you have.

 

She made 2 adorable hats for her Grandkids just in time for Halloween and Thanksgiving.

This pattern can be found at Baby Jane Machine Knits.  It is called "Lil Punkin Hat."

The Dreaded Garter Bar

At least that's what I always thought of it.  I just recently started working with it as a member of my Sacramento Guild is doing a charity project.  She asked me to help out and she'd teach me how to make "baby doll clothes" as she likes to call them.  I call them doll clothes.  I have no reason to make baby doll clothes, but I'm always happy to help with a charity project.  I also thought it was a great time to finally dust off my garter bar and actually work with it.

It wasn't easy at first.  Had several rows that looked like this.

But once I figured out Becky's garter bar had a slight bend in the middle I was finally able to account for that and become successful.  I was teasing with my friend Bonnie, who had also joined the project and lesson that I was sweating profusely each time I had to use the garter bar.  And that I think I was getting a ulcer.  We figured that we needed to practice on something we didn't care about.  Messing up in the middle of a hat was too stressful.

 

As with anything learning your tools and practice I was able to successfully get a many rows turned for the "baby doll hats."  I think the garter bar and I will become friends in the very near future.

 

 

Once I get a hat and matching coat done I'll post a photo.

 

Knitting Again with the Knit Leader

Felt so good to machine knit today.  It's been a very long time.  Our Sacramento Guild was having a lesson on Knit Leaders.  I've seen them used, but have never used one.  I have one built into my machine for gosh sakes I should find out if it works and find out how to use it.  Carolyn gave a great explanation.  I didn't know I had to have a swatch, but we decided to use her swap and pretend it was mine.  That way I learned out to measure it and how to use the stitch guide, the rulers, the patterns, and the built in knit leader.  I should look up in my manual what exactly everything is called.  I brought the wrong manual to class.  Fortunately, Carolyn has my exact machine at home and knew how to use it.

Here I am all set up.  I just did a small portion of the pattern to get an idea of how it worked.  I did from about 2 inches below the arm hole shaping on up to the neck line.  It really worked out great.  Not a lot of thinking needed to be done with the knit leader in action.  It told me where to decrease and what needles to do it on.  I found it quite fascinating.

Here's my little sweater experiment armhole.  I was quite impressed.  I also loved this little gizmo Carolyn's husband made her.  I'm talking about the board that is under my knitting.  It is a piece of wood with a piece of sandpaper glued to it.  It was too terribly rough, but had enough traction that when you lay a swat or in this case my sweater experiment it holds the knitting out rather than it rolling.  I liked that I could see what was going on without having to block it.  It's just an experiment and I will be unraveling it.

It felt so strange to be knitting.  My cast on and cast off skills were definitely week, but by hour 2 I was feeling like a pro again.  Time to knit myself a sweater.

Sorting Through the Machines

I've had several machines given to me over the past year and they are piling up.  I went for years with only the one given to me and the one I bought.  Then I was fortunate enough to have several given to me.  I was fine with my original set up, but was intrigued with the idea of playing with a garter carriage.  You know what that means?  I have to get a brother machine in addition to a garter carriage.  I was given a Brother 860 and 2 Brother 930s.  I was also given 2 93 garter carriages and one 89.  All in varying degrees of condition.  I was also given 2 disc drives for what I didn't know exactly.  My friend Bonnie was looking for a disc drive for her Brother set up and offered to come over.  She would help me sort out my mess of machines and decide what worked and what I should keep.

We decided the 860 was a punch card and I already have punch card machines.  I later found out through a chart on Daisy Knits that neither garter carriage was compatible with the 860 any ways.  So, good choice deciding to pass that machine along.  We plugged in the 930 I had set up on a stand and it worked!  I still need to clean it up and replace the sponge bar, but I didn't want to put all that work in if the electronics didn't work.

Next Bonnie went to testing the disc drives.  We found out neither worked.  They turn on and try and read the disc, but an error message comes up.  Bonnie had brought her 930 or was it a 960 along with a working disc drive that she wasn't sure she wanted to purchase.  She knew both worked great.  She tested my disc drives with her machine just in case mine wasn't working correctly.  Again error messages.  Then she tested her working disc drive with my 930 and it worked great and added a pattern.

By this time we were getting tired and decided to check out the garter carriages another day.  I'll get the 930 cleaned up by the time it's time to test them out.  Question now is which garter carriage to keep?  One 93 has no box, instructions, power cords and is in pretty rough shape.  One is pretty complete as far as I can tell, but is really dirty.  The 89 is pristine and looks like it was never used or taken out of the box.  I just need to figure out which works.

Sad Day Stripping My Old Friend

My traveling Toyota KS 650 got knocked over at a meeting a year ago.  It was just too twisted and bent to save.  I didn't want to give up on it.  It's been a year and I finally thought it's taking up too much space.  As I got my Studio 155 set up with ribber I realized I had gotten a new sponge bar for the knitting machine, but not for the ribber.  Light bulb!!  Why don't I take the fairly new sponge bar out of the Toyota.  It's time I thought to give up the ghost on that ole machine.  So, I got the sponge bar and finished setting up the Studio 155.  Then I began stripping all usable parts from the Toyota.  I got all the needles, the numbered strip, the tool box, and the carriage.  I asked DH to put the carcass in the trash for me.  Though not heavy any more it was just difficult to get rid of my first machine.

Looking forward to getting acquainted with the new to me machine.  Looks very much like my Toyota the learning curve I hope will be very small.

Wrestling with a Knitting Machine

I didn't win.  I got my Studio 155 back from the repair guy and was anxious to get it set up with it's ribber.  This meant taking down my Toyota 650 and ribber.  It had to be unearthed.  Patterns, yarn, tools and such were all over the place where it sits.  How on earth did I ever work with so much stuff around?  I finally got that place cleaned up and ready for the new machine.  I forget how heavy these machines are let alone the bulky machines.  This is a factor for me, because 17 years ago my neck was injured and lifting heavy items is not recommended.  Sometimes one just has to do what one has to do.

I got my newly refurbished bulky knitting machine on to the stand.  It was a wrestling match.  One side would swing off and I'd swing it back.  Then the other side would swing off and I'd hip check it back into place.  I broke a sweat just trying to get it clamped on.  Why was it giving me so much trouble?  Tightened the ribber clamps and decided that was enough for one day.  Stepped back and admired my "new to me" machine.  Then the whole thing flipped off the stand and on to the floor.

While cussing like a sailor I was trying to figure out how on earth did it come loose.  My hands were still throbbing from tightening the clamps.  Now I'm just mad, because I wasn't sure what damage had been done.  Using a tool and more hip checking and standing right in front of it I got it reclamped to the stand.  Now to access the damage.  I ran the carriage back and forth with many needle configurations and lever configurations and it seemed fine.  I do have 2 gate pegs wildly out of place though.  Frickety Frack!!

Will work on getting ribber on later today.  Wish me luck?  Maybe I need Hulk Hogan or The Rock here to help me.  They are more experienced with wrestling than I am.