Basketweave Blanket

I've wanted to knit a blanket for a while; however, the amount of yarn I would need to purchase always put me off. Recently, there was a huge yarn sale near me at the Pittsburgh Center for Creative Reuse (a fabulous nonprofit), so of course I went. I bought six skeins of Red Heart Super Saver for nine dollars, but because of the number of skeins of each color I had, I agonized over patterns for a while. I knew I wanted something fairly simple that I could work on while reading. I remembered the basketweave stitch patterns I'd come across while looking for scarf ideas. I love the texture of basketweave in the pictures, so I decided to go with that. To solve the problem of different numbers of skeins of different colors, I decided to arrange blocks in a pattern. After trial knits and measuring yarn and lots of knots, I finalized my pattern and got started. Here's what I eventually came up with.

This is a pretty heavy blanket, and it's on the stiffer side. I love curling up underneath it on the sofa!


BASKETWEAVE BLANKET

Needles: US Size 9 Circular needles are ideal because they can hold more stitches and more weight, but this works on straight needles as well. You don't want to know how I know.

Yarn: Red Heart Super Saver White, 4 skeins; Red Heart Super Saver Aran, 2 skeins; Red Heart Super Saver Navy Blue, 2 skeins*
Finished Dimensions: 40.5" x 69.25"
Gauge: 16 stitches x 26 rows = 4" x 4" in Basketweave Pattern

*Note: Because there are times you will need three separate balls of navy, I pre-cut three pieces of navy, each about 47 yards long, for the squares in the middle (see chart below). I actually made the blanket one skein (but I was pretty desperate for yarn by the end), so after I cut yarn for the three sections in the middle, I worked each side of the border with one end of the yarn.

In love with this texture!

Basketweave Pattern:

Rows 1 (RS)-3: k32

Row 4, 6: k3, (p2, k6), p2, k3

Row 5: k2, p1, (k2, p6), k2, p1, k2

Row 7: k32                                                

Row 8, 10: k7, (p2, k6), p2, k7

Row 9: k2, p5, (k2, p6), k2, p5, k2
Row 10: k32

Repeat rows 4 to 10 ten times.

Repeat rows 4 to 7.

Row 48: k32

Blanket:

Cast on 170 stitches in navy blue.

Knit 7 rows in garter stitch.

Maintain a 5-stitch navy blue border on both sides throughout.

Follow the colors shown below and use the basketweave pattern for each square. When working across, pick up the new colored yarn under the old color to minimize sewing later. It also creates a neat stitch-like pattern on the wrong side.**

Knit 7 rows in navy blue in garter stitch.

Bind off and weave in ends.

32 sts 48 rows

*Image note: For some reason, the navy blue perimeter is missing a chunk in the upper left. I'm not sure why this is happening, but it's there!

**Here's the wrong side of my blanket. In addition to the woven ends which I didn't cut (since it's for me and I don't really care :D ), you can see the two types of edges between the navy blue and white. The right edge is a result of the wrong side bumps, but the left edge is the result of picking up the new color from underneath the old color!

This pattern is for personal use only. The finished item may not be sold for profit. Please acknowledge the author. Thank you!

Dried Graduation Bouquet

After three weeks, the flowers have dried! (See Preserving Flowers.) As I have not yet found ornament balls on sale (well, it is July), I am leaving the rose aside to work with later.

My bouquet from graduation dried nicely. Some of the sunflower petals fell off, so I glued them back. Also, gravity caused the petals on the bottom to dry upwards, which doesn't look terrible, I guess. The craspedia (the other yellow one) is a little brown on top. The originally pink carnations have darkened to a beautiful dark red. The volderfrieden delphinium (blue trumpet-shaped ones) and
statice (purple) look as if they are alive, but they feel papery. The rose, originally orange, has become light orange with a bit of red (it was already past its prime when I decided to dry it).

I transferred the bouquet from the laundry room into the garage, where I lightly coated it with aerosol hairspray. For the vase, I cut the top off an old deodorant bottle made of a milky plastic, then painted the inside with a layer of blue acrylic paint. Because the bottle wasn't tall enough, I glued a ring of paper around the top. To make it thicker, I folded it in half lengthwise. I also painted a layer of diluted glue on it, but I don't think it made much of a difference. Then I just stuck the flowers in (I left the stems rubber-banded) and retied the ribbon from the bouquet. I am very pleased with the way it turned out!

Birds and Trees Hat

After seeing the panda hat I knit for my friend, my sister asked for a ski hat for Christmas. However, she was worried that it wouldn't be warm enough. I assured her I could knit with two strands held together as one, doubling thickness and warmth.

Then I found double knitting.

Basically, you work two pieces at once, and the stitches alternate between the front piece and the back piece. You cast on and bind off with both colors held together. If you're working flat, one stitch on each edge is also worked with both strands together. You carry both strands together to the front or back of the work, but only choose one to loop around the needle. The result is double-sided--the same pattern on each side with the colors inverted.

I knit looser with this technique than usual--just something to watch out for.

I searched for some designs, and came across this one from The Purl Bee. With a table in Microsoft Word, I changed the pattern a bit to incorporate some birds (my sister's favorite animal). Add some ear flaps and a pompom and it's done! I am very pleased with how the hat turned out. My sister thinks it's warm enough, too!

(Sadly, the addition of the pompom means my sister can't wear this the other way.)

Preserving Flowers

With high school graduation just past (yippee!), I have a beautiful bouquet from my mom in the kitchen. And the rose from school (confession: I broke its stem in a moment of happy hugging). It's not the first time I've received meaningful flowers, but it is the first time I decided to think about preserving them. Originally, I just wanted to press the rose. But roses are round, and I wasn't sure how that would go.

So to the Internet I turned... I found that a.) if I wanted to press the rose I should slice it in half, and b.) other expensive methods aside, I could hang it upside-down and wait for it to dry.

Well that's not difficult. Except the waiting part. Two to three weeks! Sigh...

After further research, I found that many types of flowers can be dried that way. Including the ones in my bouquet (sunflower, rose, volderfrieden delphinium, craspedia, statice, carnation--I looked most of these names up).

So now I have lots of flowers hanging upside-down in the laundry room. For the rose whose stem broke, I threaded a piece of craft wire through the remaining bit of the stem and hung it from that. For the rest, I rubber-banded the stems and threaded some ribbon through it.

So now as I wait for the lack of water to do its job, I'm thinking of ways to display these dried flowers. I plan to apply a light coat of hairspray to the dried flowers to keep them stronger. After that... For the single rose, I'm thinking about placing it in a clear plastic ball, like an ornament (except that the openings of those are way too small. Perhaps a snow globe?). For the bouquet, I'd like to display it as a bouquet. I'm thinking about making a vase for it, then retying the original ribbon around it. However, that just seems like a dust collector, and it'd be a pain to dust... this still requires some brainstorming.

I can't wait for everything to dry!

Junk Mail Journal

For the past couple years, our mailbox has been stuffed with mail from colleges. I used to love getting stuff in the mail--I still do--but the sheer amount of mail I have received from colleges put me off a little. As is my habit, I didn't trash any of it (I didn't read any of it, either). However, as the college application process started to wrap up, I realized I needed to do something with my three brown paper shopping bags stuffed full of mail. So, after much research, I decided to make journals. Here are my first few:

  

I basically followed Sea Lemon's YouTube videos, following the links from this one.

 

To start, I opened all the envelopes and removed all their contents. Then I sorted envelopes and papers by size. I set aside magazines, postcards, and double-sided pages.

 

To work with envelopes, I unglued and cut off the flaps before cutting the envelopes to size and folding them to make text blocks. Although I tried to make each book with only one size of paper, it wasn't always possible. To accommodate, you could cut the papers to the same size. I just ignored the different sizes. These journals will be for me to write in, anyway. The number of signatures varied from book to book (anywhere from six to fourteen so far). For the endpapers, I ripped sheets from magazines or other double-sided pages and cut them to size. I only used book headbands for my first one because the spine wasn't even and I wanted to hide that. I did not add a bookmark.

 

For the cover, I used postcards or the covers of booklets for the inside. For the bookcloth portion, I cut a piece of colored paper to size. Then I glued on logos, stamps, and addresses from the cut-off envelope flaps. Finally, I used a glue stick to glue a piece of white tissue paper over the whole thing. I treated the entire thing as the bookcloth. I like the effect of the tissue paper because it "washes out" the colors. Note that the tissue paper is very fragile and will likely tear unless every inch of it is glued down. I also ran out of tissue paper; I have been using a thick, clear, flexible plastic that some of the mail came in. It is harder to glue, but it gives the books a nice sheen. I also used a Chipotle bag for the covers of some books. I like papers that have text on them. You could also decorate with stickers or drawings.

 

I really enjoy making these books (twenty and still going). It's a great way to recycle paper, and because I'm a daily journal-writer, it's also very practical. (I just find white spaces to write.)

 

Now I just need to figure something out for the magazines, postcards, and double-sided sheets!

 

Violin Pig

A few months ago, my violin teacher asked if I could knit her something. Because I love pigs, she requested a palm-sized stuffed pig that she could use to teach students not to squeeze the neck of the instrument. I based this design largely off Apocalypse Knits' Chichester Pig but basically enlarged it. A lot.

Finished dimensions: 3 1/4 in. long by 2 1/8 in. high
Lion Brand Baby Soft pink
US size 1 dpns (set of 5)

Special instructions:
make ear:
k1, yo, k1, yo, k1 in one stitch
Knit 10 rows in stockinette.
Slip the 2nd stitch over the first, then the 3rd stitch over the first, etc. until only 1 stitch is left.
make leg 1:
(k1, p1, k1, p1) in one stitch two times (8)
Knit 12 rows in stockinette.
Slip stitches as in ear, leaving 2 sts.
make leg 2:
(k1, p1, k1, p1) in one stitch two times (8)
Knit 11 rows in stockinette.
Slip stitches as in ear, leaving 2 sts.
Turn, k2

Note: Stagger the increases to avoid a polygonal result.

Cast on four stitches using the easy circular cast-on; join in round.
kfb around (8)
kfb around (16)
k around
p around
k 3 more rounds
(kfb, k1) around (24)
k around
(kfb, k2) around (32)
k around
(kfb, k3, kfb, k4) around (39)
k around
(kfb, k4, kfb, k5) around (46)
k around
(kfb, k6, kfb, k7) around (52)
k1, make ear, k9, make ear, k to end of round
(kfb, k12) around (56)
k around
(kfb, k27) around (58)
k29, make leg 1, k10, make leg 2, k to end of round
kfb, k57 (59)
kfb, k58 (60)
k 9 rounds
From (kfb, k58), read up the pattern replacing kfb with ssk until you finish (ssk, k12) around (52 sts). Knit one round and start stuffing.
(ssk, k5 or 6) around (45)
k around
(ssk, k4 or 5) around (38)
k around
(ssk, k2 or 3) around (30)
k around
(ssk, k1 or 2) around (22)
k around
(ssk, k0 or 1) around (14)
k around and finish stuffing.
(ssk) around (7)
k3tog, k1, k3tog (3)
Insert wire if desired.
Knit I-cord (around wire, if applicable) until desired length.
Curl into tail shape (sew if necessary)
Break yarn; pull tail through remaining loops.
Weave in ends.
Embroider eyes and nostrils.

The pattern is for personal use only. The finished item may not be sold for profit. Please acknowledge the author. Thank you!

Mobius Knitting

A Mobius strip is a ring of paper that has only one side and one edge. Don't believe me? Try it out:
1. Cut a strip of paper.
2. Twist one end 180 degrees.
3. Tape the two ends together.
4. Grab a pen and draw a line down the middle of your Mobius strip without picking up your pen.
Cool, isn't it?

I got a ball of fern Bernat Softee Chunky yarn for Christmas a couple of years ago, and I had no idea what to do with it. I decided to go for a one-skein project--a Mobius cowl. All you need for Mobius knitting is Cat Bordhi's Mobius cast-on and a little imagination. Mobius knitting is nice to wear because of that one built-in twist. The Internet has so many other Mobius possibilities.

Basically, you start from the middle of the Mobius strip and knit outwards with each round. Mobius knitting is possible because a Mobius strip has only one edge, and you go around and around it. While it's on your needles, the Mobius strip is folded in half, so your marker passes by underneath your needles once every round.

The confusing thing about Mobius knitting is that halfway through, when you get onto the other side of your cast-on middle, the right side and wrong side seem to flip. To knit a Mobius strip in stockinette, you'd actually have to knit half the round, then purl the other half. As a first-time Mobius knitter, I decided to stick with a garter stitch design--I knit the first round and purled the second. I cast on about ninety stitches and knit with US size #11 needles.

 

Since I was determined to use up all the yarn (and use it all I did), the cowl turned out quite large--perfect for bundling up when the winter comes!