Allegretto shawl pattern

This is a knitting pattern for a light and cheerful lace shawl with plenty of air and texture: long zigzag rows blending into a narrow trellis lace edging all around.
It is a relatively quick and easy lace knitting project, since the shawl is worked in one piece without any grafting, picking up stitches or difficult techniques.

The shawl requires one 100 g skein of lace weight yarn - approximately 800 m or 850 yds. Naturally, it can be worked in lighter and heavier yarn weights as well.

The pattern is available on Ravelry and YarnCanada shop.

Some help with lace cast-on and bind-off methods can be found in this post.








The sample shawl is knitted in Madelinetosh Tosh Lace hand-dyed yarn, shade Corsage:

Summer verdure

Hot weather - short text post: had to try some popular style jewellery parts and so these three études in green were born:

Needle patches

It is my strong belief, that workspace and all the tools must be something personalised and inspiring. After all, they will accompany you through all the good and bad working days and they will stay, even if the things you make are bound to go to new homes.
The one thing that I cannot live without, whether working with yarn, fabric or beads, is a pincushion. And it was time to try something new: a little bit of patchwork, more applique, a lot of stitching and a crochet flower... The fabulous fabrics are all vintage home textiles collected from second-hand shops.




All the needles and pins fit together in one place now and can be organised conveniently to different patches.

Make a knitting chart marker

To make it easier to follow knitting charts or text lines in a pattern, you can make a simple marker out of cardboard. It is best to have the marker in a modest solid colour, but who says the other side cannot be as colourful as you like!




You will need:

• piece of cardboard
• decorative paper (optional)
• pencil
• eraser
• ruler
• craft knife or scissors
• glue (optional)

Cut out a piece of cardboard measuring approximately 6 x 21 cm. If you would like to style it up, cut a piece of decorative paper in the same size. Glue these together and leave to dry under weight (e.g. a pile of knitting magazines).




Mark a distance of 2 cm from one end of the cardboard piece. Then mark four horizontal lines at 2 cm and 2.5 cm from each long side. Cut along these four lines until the vertical end line and the ends of the narrow straps. Place some cardboard leftovers under the chart marker, if you are using a knife. Erase marked lines if necessary. And done!

This chart marker is about the width of a standard magazine.
Of course, you can make it any size that seems convenient to use.

What women crafted 107 years ago

Came across an antique German craft magazin called Frauen-Fleiss (Women's Diligence) from 1904 and I just have to share some of those fabulous art nouveau style designs and patterns.
It appears to be a tabloid size magazine on four pages, published quarterly since 1893, possibly a supplement of some newspaper.



Bin seit kurzem in den Besitz einer alten Handarbeitszeitung "Frauen-Fleiß" von 1904 bekommen und einfach muß einige von diesen wunderbaren Handarbeiten im Jugendstil vorstellen.
Diese Zeitung auf vier Seiten wurde offensichtlich seit 1893 von Verlag John Henry Schwerin veröffentlicht, möglicherweise als eine Beilage zu irgendeiner größeren Zeitung.

Die Zeitung hat insgesamt 53 Anleitungen, meistens für Stickereien, Näh- und Häkelarbeiten, aber ebenso für einen Behälter für Postkarten in "modernem Kerbschnitt" und für einen Palmenkübel als Tiefbrand-Modellierarbeit.
Es gab noch einen Extra-Bogen mit Musterzeichnungen für größeren Arbeiten, den mußte man von der Redaktion zusätzlich kaufen.


There are 53 instructions for sewing, embroidery, crochet and other needlework, but also for a wooden postcard storage box and a decorated flower pot to be made of clay.













This last crochet lace edging seemed the easiest piece in the collection and the pattern quite understandable to my surprise, so this is my small sample with one motif:



Not sure, if everything turned out the way it was supposed to, but it looks art nouveau enough to me. The only thing missing now is a dress on where to sew it.

No colours today

Sometimes eyes get tired of sunshine that lasts for weeks and a grey cloudy day feels very refreshing. In the same manner, all the colours around can seem too much to take every once in a while and it is time to look at things in black and white for a change.

And the pincushion goes to...

Thank you all so much for taking part in the giveaway and leaving such complimenting comments! Besides blushing, I have a long list of blogs to visit and read now, this is so exciting.

The most popular post according to your votes was the Mystic Forest shawl pattern, followed by Wire Mailbox. Good to know! For example, the blocking frame post was not mentioned at all...
I knew it! The nails were not straight enough. Must remind myself to concentrate on softer materials.

But to the most important part: the drawing. Used the help of an impartial organisation and here are the results:



Congratulations! Comment no. 4 was written by Ashley, hope to get in touch with you soon.

For all who did not win today: thank you again and better luck next time! This will certainly not be the last giveaway on this blog, I really enjoyed the entire event.

First blog anniversary. With giveaway!

This blog has been in the web wide world for a year now and it has been an interesting journey to see it grow. But what would a celebration be without a cake. I made a very sweet and creamy one for the occasion, with white chocolate, marzipan and sugar decorations, still containing absolutely no calories:




For a chance to win this bead and sequin embellished pincushion, please leave a comment here with the title or date of the blog post you like most (excluding this one!). Feel free to share your blog address, I would like to come for a visit.
The winner will be drawn from all entries posted until midnight GMT (before) May 9th. Good luck!

Inevitable construction work

Since blocking frames for lace shawls are not sold anywhere, I had to make one myself. It might need some improvements, but the blocking process is much more convenient now compared to using pins and trying to locate them in straight rows.




A visit to hardware store resulted in four 15 x 40 mm pine wood strips, one and two meters long



and too many and too expensive but very pretty brass nails (the original plan was to put a nail for each cm).



Hammering nearly 600 nails into these six meters of wood suddenly seemed like way too much work, so the nails are now 5 cm apart. This distance seems to work for lace edgings, where the pattern repeat is 10-12 stitches. For different patterns it might be necessary to add all these nails after all. Well, someday.



Considering all these upward nails, the frame is by no means a safe tool and should be used in a place where nobody can get hurt. Storaging is quite all right though, the four strips can be tied together with nails facing inwards and stored under the bed or in a closet. That's what knitters keep there instead of skeletons.

Mystic Forest shawl pattern

Inspired by nature itself, with its mysterious tree leaves and unknown undergrowth plants of a dark green forest, this lace shawl is just waiting to be knitted and become the best companion for chilly summer nights.
The shawl consists of the main section and the lace edging that is knitted onto the centre part using circular needles. The pattern has both lace charts and text instructions. Have fun!

Download the knitting pattern as a pdf file on Google Docs or Ravelry.

Oops! (Errata)
Rd1 of the written edging pattern should read:
[k5to3, k3, sk2p, k3] until last 4 sts of the side, k5to3, k1 to corner st

Not a tremendous issue, but one good tip slipped away from the pattern: for casting on the centre section, use needles one size larger than those for knitting, this will ensure the edge to stretch enough during blocking.



Below are some techniques explained. There are also more photos of the shawl at the bottom of this post.

Stretchy knitted cast-on
This technique looks more like making a crochet chain, but the edge will remain stretchy enough for blocking your knitwork.
Start with making a slipknot onto the left needle, knit a stitch out of it, but do not slip it off the needle yet. Place the newly made stitch onto the left needle next to the slipknot (first stitch), still not removing the right needle. Instead knit a next stitch by pulling the yarn through the same loop. Continue making the stitches onto the left needle.

Lace bobble (nupp)
Bobble in this pattern refers to ’nupp’ of Estonian lace knitting.
Knit 5 (or 7 or 9) stitches out of the same stitch while holding the stitch on the left needle and alternating knit stitches with yarnovers. Pull those new stitches at least 1 cm long, otherwise you will run into a lot of trouble on the WS row. Sharp pointed needles are also recommended for nupp making. Purl all strands together on WS row and pull the stitch tight around needle.

Knit 5 stitches into 3 stitches
Knit 3 stitches together without slipping them off the left needle and knit 5 stitches out of this loop as in making the bobble, but without pulling the stitches longer than usual. Purl all strands individually on WS row to have 5 stitches. The k2to3 is made similarly.

K2tog cast-off
This technique will ensure the other edge of the knitwork to be stretchy as well. Working with medium tension will be best.
Slip the first stitch and knit the second one, then place them both back to the left needle without removing the right needle from the loops and knit together through the back loops. Knit the next stitch and knit two stitches together the same way.

These knitting stitches and techniques are best described in books The Haapsalu Shawl, The Haapsalu Scarf and Knitted Lace of Estonia.













If this shawl seems too difficult or time-consuming, you could start with the much easier Allegretto shawl that is worked in one piece and uses a simpler stitch pattern, or the easy little Crinklie scarf.

Diamond of the night

This is a small excerpt of a bead embroidered velvet choker necklace. This lovely vintage montana blue rhinestone is surrounded by scattered seed beads that sparkle like stars in the clear spring night skies.

Wire mailbox

This is a shabby style mailbox to hang by the door, where anything that arrived by post or anything that needs to be taken to the post office can be temporarily stored. Sort of a 2-in-1 incoming-outgoing box.
Made this out of wire in three different gauges using the design-as-you-go working style without a plan. The uneven paint cover makes it look really old and that is the key.

Spring leaves

Here is something to give the nature a small hint of what everybody is expecting to happen soon: a shawlette consisting entirely of green leaves.




This triangular shawl is knitted lengthwise, making increases and decreases at one edge - probably the most knitter-friendly approach. The yarn is a high quality lace weight merino wool by Angeljays.

White cables and bobbles

And here is the completed cushion cover mentioned in the previous post:




And a matching (favourite item lately, can't seem to throw away any tin cans!) pencil cup cozy:

Chunky aran wallpaper

Winter is definitely not over yet, we had -25°C tonight. In order to keep your computer warm, you can download this wallpaper of chunky knitted cables and bobbles. Behind the scenes information: it's a cushion cover in progress.

Normal 1600 x 1200
Wide 1680 x 1050

Needles kept warm

The needles and hooks got themselves a warm chunky cozy, this way they are always ready to work:

Old-fashioned white roses

Knitted, finished, washed, blocked and blogged: a shawl full of white roses, something to dream about in wintertime.
The edge pattern is from a stitch library, I designed the centre pattern and that took a lot of drawing and erasing. And imagine that heap of swatches! Fortunately they are woollen, so I have some ideas on the back of my mind how these could be used for a felting project.




The mission was to create a rose looking like those old filet crochet motives, of course it is not that simple with knitting stitches.




The yarn is Linate Smyrna Platinum with sheep and alpaca wool, which holds very well and I definitely like it more than lace weight merino.

Iceblue lace

Took a long time, but I finally finished a pale blue lace scarf of pure merino wool. This could have been a nice stole, but didn't have the patience, I wanted to try out knitting the lace edge directly to the center piece with circular needles. The edge came out quite nice, but of course, this way the scallops are formed by yarn-overs, not solid stitches, and may not hold so well. To give the edge more strength, I added some bobbles (nupps) on the last row.











The Allegretto shawl looks a little similar, though I have used a different stitch pattern, and can be made as a scarf with just reducing the pattern repeats.

Christmas knocking on the door

Last post of the year - the holidays and the end of the year will mostly be spent offline. Time to enjoy snow, candle light, presents, cooking, reading and being a bit lazy. And making plans for the new year. Hope you can do that all, too. Nothing else to say then but Merry Christmas!

Felted decorations

Something small and woollen will bring home that country style cosiness, when there is snow outside and a lighted fireplace inside. That is the mood I was looking for with these needle-felted hanging decorations: