Simple socks for forgetful knitters.

It has been a while since I picked up a pair of knitting needles to make something. One of my favourite things to knit is socks. I have two pairs of hand knitted socks already and these are far more comfortable then than machine knitted ones. I prefer to knit on bamboo knitting needles as they more friendly to my hands. The steel needles make my hands ache after using them for a while.

As I said it has been a while since I picked up a pair of knitting needles. I wanted to revisit knitting socks using 4 DPNs since my yarn stash had some lovely German self patterning wool just perfect for making socks. Perhaps you have heard of OPAL sock yarn? As you knit it the pattern appears without you having to use fair isle techniques or multiple yarn bobbins.

So what to do with this lovely self patterning yarn? Of course it already has a lovely pattern so a fancy textured sock pattern was not suitable.  As a forgetful knitter a simple plain sock pattern was what I was looking for. Just my luck to find a sock knitting book on my local library shelves. I used a pattern from The Big Book of Socks by Kathleen Taylor called Basic Fingering Weight Tube Sock on page 21. She offers an excellent tip when using self patterning yarn. Make sure you start your next sock at the same point in the yarn pattern as the first sock. Otherwise you will end up with a pair of socks not exactly the same!

Although this book is written for the American market it is quite easy to find equivalent yarn weight exchanges. Here's my approximate guide for swapping American yarn weights for UK yarn weights we use here in Australia.

US Yarn Weight = UK Yarn Weight
Fingerling          =  can be baby yarn, sock yarn, 3 or 4 or 5 ply yarn

Sport weight     = Double knit or often called 8 ply yarn and is quite often knitted
                            with size 6 needles.

Worsted           = 10 ply or Aran weight and may be knitted on size 6-9 needles.

Chunky knit      = 12 ply knitted  on size 10 or 11 needles.

Extra bulky       = 14 ply and usually knitted on size 13> needles.

I liked this pattern because after the ribbing which I always have trouble with because of the need to count stitches. It was fairly mindless as the pattern used only stockinette stitch knitted to 14" then a star toe decrease method to finish.

I really liked how this pattern shows up the lovely stripes and spots created by the Opal Sock yarn. I think the orange, green and very bright pink are a good contrast in the over all design.  The socks are comfortable, how ever I do need to watch my tension as the one thing I do not want is to have an open ribb were I change needles. That said, I will get more practice this year as I dive into my yarn stash and knit some more socks and perhaps another simple pattern from this or another sock knitting book. Do you have any suggestions about sock knitting pattern books to try? Leave a suggestion at the end of this post with the title of your favourite sock knitting book and which pattern you loved the most.

Making silk flowers using French techniques.

Making artificial flowers in silk fabric is almost a lost art. However, it is being kept alive by milliners who are interested in creating customized decorations for hats. I learned this technique in Melbourne at the 2010 conference of the Millinery Association of Australia (www.millineryaustralia.org). We learned how to prepare silk fabric, patterning, tooling and construction of artificial flowers. Recently I was asked to make some silk flower pins for an ambassadors of the National Year of Reading. The National Year of reading aims to encouraging and improving literacy in the Australian community through programs in partnership with the library community www.love2read.org.au

There are some great silk flower kits out there and I would like to thank Waltraud Reiner for her excellent modern reference materials (Torb & Reiner) Her kits helped me to remember what I had learned at the millinery conference.  I am fortunate to own a couple of vintage pattern books that are no longer available. These helped me decide how to design and construct the daisy pins. This required some thought as the vintage pattern books insisted on using wool looped into a tight ball for the centers. I decided to go with a flat center instead. As it would look like the love to read logo daisy my clients wanted.  Thanks goes  to Angela of www.jaspercatdesigns.com for her suggestions about how to finish the pins. It is great to have other millinery friends to able to chat about problems and come up with solutions. If you are looking for vintage pattern books you could try my friend Bernadette of www.needlewitch.com.au who helped me with finding reference material on making silk flowers. 

Just to top it off a good renaissance costume needs a muffin cap.

This is an out of print pattern I have in my collection McCall's 4806 medieval and renaissance hats.  I made view D the muffin cap and added some bling with silver and black gimp braid, brown velvet ribbon and an ostrich feather. You can curl feathers using the back of closed scissors and running the blade long the feather's spine.

This hat has a band and a large circle of fabric to form the crown. I had to piece the crown together using to semi circles as I wanted to use up scraps of materials left over the skirt. I made a small pocket in the trim to hold the feathers and stitched the pocket closed to hold the feathers in place.

Renaissance project finished this year!

I never thought I would finish this project just in time to see in the new year.

Well this is how it turned out. I know that my patience ran out at a few stages during construction may be resulting in a less than perfect finish. However, what are you going to do when you have university deadlines, planning for Christmas and organizing a social club? Do the best you can with the time you've got. To a costumer, there are a couple of things that you keep in mind when  making a project. Do you want it wearable? Do you want it perfect? Do you have enough time to make it to the standard you want? If you don't have enough time you have to sacrifice construction standards and make it so that it is presentable and wearable. So that's what I've had to settle for with this project. Although most people liked it who have seen it are not sewers and may be only have experience in sewing on a button. But I am greatful for the encouragement.  I must add that all of the trim had to be sewn on by hand as there is no machine foot that I know of that will sew gimp braid to satin or brocade.  When making up the skirt I used a wide zig zag stitch and some 12 gage embroidery cotton with a cording foot to make gathering a one step operation. Leave a long tale on the embroidery thread and wind around a pin and start stitching with a back stitch. Then as you stitch just inside the seam allowance feed the embroidery/upholstery thread through the cording foot's guide. End once again by back stitching and leave a long tail on the upholstery thread. Pull the long thread tails and adjust the size of the waist band and the gathers.  Secure the thread tails and attach the waist band. This way is so much easier than doing a double row of 5mm stitches and trying gather by pulling the bobbin threads.   This skirt does differ from the pattern because of the box pleat in the brocade panel. This was necessary because the brocade was thick and difficult to gather.  I also used a trouser closure bars on the waist band  instead of the standard eyelets and lacing because this skirt is quite heavy. To make sure the skirt placket stays closed I used a press closure so that no surprises happened while dancing and feasting.

New sewing project gets me excited.

It's time to make the matching renaissance skirt for the black velvet and silver brocade bodice. I have just finished copying the pattern pieces onto poly trace to make a toile for fitting. The fabrics chosen for this skirt is black satin and the silver brocade.

Here is a line drawing of McCalls M4090 and it's view C that's being made. Opposite it a photo of my calico I have made of view C with the trim pinned on as an experiment in placement. I hope to have this finished over the Christmas period.

Sydney Fabric Shopping

One of the walls of trims at Pitt Trading.

I was in Sydney today and was able to visit one of my favourite outlet stores. Pitt Trading in Ramsgate source their stock by buying fabric over runs from designers and manufacturers. They have the greatest range of trims in Sydney. I was so glad that I went there today as I picked up some lovely lace yardage for an under blouse for a Titanic tea gown project for next year. Also I bought some lovely black medium weight satin to make a skirt for my renaissance bodice that is just about complete. I do so love creating matching outfits and it's certainly challenging to get the project under budget and cut down my fabric stash.  So when I go to Sydney the prices there are readily better than what I find in Canberra. As we only have 3 fabric stores here and the prices can be disappointing when creating on a budget.  

Renaissance & Fantasy bodice just about finished.

As mentioned in my last post I had begun assembling a renaissance & fantasy bodice for a vacation sewing project in June.  I am glad to say that after nearly 3 months snatching time in between studying that it may be finished in October 2011. All of the silver and black gimp braid has been applied to the silver brocade and black velvet bodice. The trim gives it such a nice sparkle and lifts it out of the ordinary.

I am very new to working with fitted garments and have decided to work with a dressmaker to get my measurements and fitting formula fine tuned for future projects. So check back every now and then to see what I have learned.