Patterns For Sale

I am currently waiting for my testers to finish testing this sideway cardigan. It is knitted on my SK280 with my own hand dyed single ply superwash merino Mulberry silk yarn in a muted colour of the rainbow:  This simple cardigan has two rows of hand manipulated eyelets.  The eyelets stitches are different for the first and second row created by short rowing. The wrong side is equally pretty enough to be worn as the public side so I have designed it without a button hole band. A long i-cord is knitted as the front closure.  If you find that you do not like the large neckline, simply knit an i-cord long enough to thread through the eyelets along the neckline and gather before tying. This is a super fast project that can be completed in less than 5 hours!

The wrong side

This is another top that I am thinking of publishing as well:

Hope to publish these patterns soon!

My First Punch Card

Today I manage to knit a little swatch with a punch card that I have punched:

I have been trying for days to knit with this first card that I made:

Lots of mistakes there as you can see! This is actually a fashion lace card that is meant for a Brother machine.  A friend told me that it can be used for my Silver Reed SK280 machine since my lace carriage can transfer and knit at the same time just like the Brother lace card. So far no luck yet but I will keep on trying. 

I love this lace pattern and am thinking of using it for a top with this yarn:

 Maybe I will knit the lace for the hem and yoke or sideways from sleeve to yoke and then sleeve again. Will see which one works better. Wish me luck!

Trinity

I first cast on for this top in November 2009. Can't remember it was that long time ago! Finally, I finished knitting it on 15th January 2010. I used Jaeger Trinity Zest yarn which is a mixture of silk, cotton and polyamide fibre. The yarn is not so smooth and my arms just ache after knitting for an hour or two. That is why this is the longest time that I have taken to knit a top.

The original pattern is supposed to be a cardigan. I modified it to a short sleeve top and made some changes in the pattern too. It is knitted in the round from top down. That is my favourite part...no seaming! :) I also added crochet edgings for the neckline, sleeves and hem.

I am glad that it turned out well. I hope that my friend, Soon will like it!

More projects and stuff

I am sorry that I have neglected this blog for a long time. I am still dyeing, spinning, knitting and crocheting. Firstly, I would like to share with you my new stuff. I have made or rather my husband had made me two yarn swifts. The first swift is rather big and heavy. I helped to sand paper and painted shellac on it :





So my dear husband made me another new swift which is smaller and much lighter :)



I was using my pvc niddy noddy and suddenly it rang a bell. A pvc inch ruler! So there I go again to the local hardware store and came back with this :



It is perfect and I love it! So...what do I need next? Ah ha! A ball winder! I have been thinking of a ball winder for ages. My dear friend Donna helped me to buy this ball winder from Knitpicks.com. Thank you very much Donna! :)



I also hand spun and dyed this yarn :





I called it Emerald Dream and it is done using layering method in the oven. I spun it 2 ply before dyeing it. It is 111 gm of merino and the yardage is 421 m (460 yards). It took almost 3 hours to dye but worth it. I like how it turn out but not the colour. It is supposed to be a blueish green like the deep blue sea.







My latest project is called Elly because it is knitted for my friend Elly. This pattern was taken from Craft House Series 2 and it is knitted in the round from top down. It is knitted with double strands of crochet thread from Pyarn.com. She was too shy to model it, so I have to do it :)

Whew! This is my longest posting so far. There are actually two more projects that I have completed but still waiting for fitting and photos.

Now...I am thinking of blocking wires! Lol...

Cables & Lace

I always visit my mother-in-law in Kuala Lumpur during the school holidays. As usual,me and my family will shop at MPH Mid Valley Megamall. I love to spend my time browsing knitting books and magazines. Then suddenly, I saw this beautiful wrap cum top from Knit'N Style April 2009 issue. Without hesitating, I grab the magazine and bought it. That is me..sometimes I just buy the magazine because of one pattern that I really love. Do you do that too? :)

To knit a small size top, I will need 7 balls of 50 gms (125 yds) yarn. So there I was going through my drawers of yarn looking for the perfect yarn. Luckily for me I found out that I have just enough yarns for this top. I have 5 balls of 50 gms (178 yds) Katia Swing in green. Incidentally, the green yarn that I have is very close to the one worn by the model :) I didn't swatch it ...lazy me...so I ended up with a slightly shorter width for the strap. You can see that it is not perfect!

Guess that I have learnt my lesson...."ALWAYS SWATCH PAT!"

Fong's Tops

These are two projects that I knitted for Fong sometime ago. The first top is the Brown Ribbons which have cables and slip stitch. The pattern was chosen by Fong from a stitch library. At first I was quite reluctant to knit it because it doesn't look very appealing to me. Since it is her choice, I had no say. So I reluctantly finish it while keeping my fingers crossed. It took me more than a month to knit because it was very tedious. When she came to pick up her top that day, her face was beaming. Phew! What a relief. I am so glad that she like it. She just love cables, the more the better.

Started : 1-10-2008
Finished : 10-11-2008
Yarn : Elann Esprit Coffee Bean
Needles : 4.5 mm
Pattern : Stitch dictionary

The second top is the Olive Tunic. Fong specifically mentioned that she want crochetted edgings, so I crochetted the neckline and cap sleeves. It is an easy and fast to knit project knitted in the round on the body. The pattern for the cap sleeves was taken from a stitch dictionary but with slight modifications. It has less rows and stitches to suit the cap sleeves.

Started : 11-11-2008
Finished : 26-11-2008
Yarn : Elann Sonata Olive
Needles : 4.0 mm
Pattern : Stitch dictionary