Green – Page 2 – Hopefully Creative

Newsboy Cap & Beret

Two green wooly hats, with brim and without.

I have so much dyed yarn and not enough projects, so I cast on for a quick and easy hat to reduce the stash by one ball of yarn. The yarn was Donegal DK yarn, dyed with dark greens in December of 2023. I chose the Knitted Newsboy Cap by Nicola Robinsonova as the pattern.

I first cast on for a hat on 4.5 mm needles, and was on gauge following the instructions. The pattern is very easy and I managed to finish it fairly quickly, however, when I put it on my head it was more a beret than a newsboy cap. A bit too tight for my liking. I did continue to knit the brim to see how it would work together. I own some plastic brim inserts so I modified the brim pattern a little bit by knitting short rows to mimic the insert’s shape better. I pinned it together and it was just too tight.

Two differently sized newsboy caps on a ruler background

Newsboy Cap in dark green with blue buttons

Luckily, the pattern also listed a more slouchy version using 5.5 mm needles and after weighing my leftover yarn, I hoped I would have enough. So I crossed my fingers and cast on. Who knew that 1 extra mm of diameter would make such a difference! This new version is a perfect amount of slouch and makes a lovely hat. To add a safety/fun touch, I also knit a band with reflective yarn that’s attached with two very cute blue buttons. When I cycle in the dark, I should light up!

Leftover yarn from the knitted newsboy cap

Newsboy cap in dark green with detail of blue button

There is less than a meter of this yarn left, and my bucket of dyed yarn has reduced in size a little bit. My stash of hats has increased by two: one green beret and one green slouchy brimmed hat. Best way to ‘mess up’ a project is to end up with two great end products!

Anna Crop Top

All the greens in a little crop sweater

I was looking through Ravelry again, as I sometimes do, and found a crop top sweater that looked really cool. It was the Anna Crop Top from Wiam’s Crafts and I decided that I needed one. So I grabbed some of my Ultra Aran and put it in the chafing dish. The sprinkle effect was created by putting 5 dye colours and citric acid in a little salt shaker and just shaking it all over the yarn. The colours were Jacquard Acid Dyes Spruce, Kelly Green, Chartreuse, Teal, and Emerald. In total, I dyed 4 skeins for the project.

When I started knitting this thing, I was extremely afraid that I’d run out of yarn. So I cast on two sleeves at the same time and hoped that it would work out. I did make a fair amount of changes to the pattern that led to both extra yarn used and less yarn used. In the sleeves, I started them with fewer stitches and decided to do gradual increases. But in the body, I added extra stitches to the bottom because it was very short.

When I knit the right amount of sleeve on both sides, I cast on the total number of stitches that I wanted to end with (a few more than per the pattern). Then some short rows to get the shaping effect. I tried doing the pattern instructions first, but it just turned into a lumpy mess so I gave up. One skein was enough for the full sleeve plus the start of the body. Then I attached another skein to one of the sleeve-body things and continued knitting the rest of the body, front and back. I didn’t want to join it in the middle but on one side, and used Russian Grafting to put it all together.

The join is nearly invisible on the knit side, but there is a little interest on the purl side, which is the side that is showing. Still, you don’t see if from any distance. I’ve not really worn it out yet. I tried it with a pair of dungarees that I recently made and am in the process of writing up, but it was still a little too short and I was worried about the cold. It might be more of a spring/summer thing than a winter thing.

Greener Frog

A bright green frog for all your dressing needs.

The first frog was great, but he was more toad coloured than I wanted. So I decided to get on a new frog. This started by dying some yarn bright green and slightly lighter green. I think I measured ten grams from a skein of Titanium Sock yarn and then dropped it into a green bath. It didn’t exhaust entirely, so I dropped 10 more grams in to make some light green yarn.

As usual, the actual knitting time for a frog is very short, however, convincing myself to finish adding the arms and legs took several weeks yet again. I started him on October 22 and finished on November 26. The back, arms, and legs were done with a combination of the bright green sock yarn and DROPS Kid-Silk in 18 Apple Green and the tummy was the light green sock yarn and Søstrene Grene Mohair Blend in 1650 Blanc. He’s got wires in his arms and legs and is posable. I’ve not tried to pose him yet because I still want to make some clothes.

The original frog has since found a new home and I’m more than happy to have this one hanging out on the dinner table!

Seas Shawl

Thick and thin yarn to make some waves.

In my last big undyed yarn purchase, I included 10 skeins of ‘Thick and Thin DK’-weight yarn. It’s single ply but it varies in thickness along the length and therefore has an interesting sort of effect. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with it, but I was intrigued by how it worked. So I set off to dye it with some soft yellow and green sprinkles on 3 June 2023.

Once it was dry, I had to figure out what to actually do with it. I tried several patterns until I ran across the Seas Shawl by Puff Updater. It seemed like a fun, slightly involved pattern that wouldn’t mind the uneven nature of the yarn. You can still lightly see the waves made by increases and decreases, hence the name, I guess. I started on July 23 and finished it on November 19. It traveled with me a lot, together with an ever more crumpled piece of paper with the instructions on it.

After blocking and pinning out some points, it turned out a bit smaller than I hoped. I knew I would never really wear it as it was. So I decided to ask one of my colleagues if she was interested and it has now found a nice new home. The end result is only a small part of what I enjoy about knitting. It’s mainly the relaxing nature of knits and purls that keep me coming back to the needles.

Toadalicious

Overstuffed little toad man wearing pajama pants.

While I was knitting the Frog, I also investigated the possibility of making Mr Toad by Claire Garland. The toad is meant to be a standing figure that you also make clothes for. After finishing the frog, there was still a lot of yarn left. So I thought I’d use the toad green yarn for an actual toad. The method for making him is very interesting and creates a very strange shape.

Getting those legs to work out wasn’t very easy. You need to wrap them around to the front and then sew them together. One of them ended up a bit higher than the other for some reason. I included wire so he can actually stand up. Still, he also doesn’t look like the original image. He’s way too fat. I didn’t feel like pulling stuffing out (I also would’t know how, he was already so sewn together). So when I wanted to make his clothes, the patterns included didn’t really work out.

For his pants, I chose to use the knitting machine because it would all be straight or near straight anyway. The yarn was leftover from a pair of socks. I completely modified the pants pattern and tried and frogged the pieces several times before they fit and looked decent. I should still make a top of some sort for him. However, I’m not nearly as much a fan of him as I am of the frog, so I’m having a hard time committing to making more for him. He’ll stay pajamaed for a while yet, I think.

Argyle Vest

It caught my eye, I had to try, it’s now done, wearing will be fun.

Have you ever had the feeling that you had to make something after seeing an image of it? Well, I’ve had that feeling recently and this time it was due to a combination of slipped stitches and eyelets. I spotted the free pattern Argyle Sweater Vest by Kaitlin Barthold on Ravelry and it was love at first sight. Am I secretly eighty? Maybe. Do I care? No, that Argyle vest had to come live in my closet too.

So I first looked for some yarn. The pattern indicates that it’s originally made with a cotton bamboo DK yarn but that a good substitute would be a wool bamboo DK weight. I happened to have some of that in my undyed yarn hoard. I wanted to make a dark green vest, almost like the picture and I swear the yarn looked like that in the dye pot. However, once it dried, it was more.. grey-green-sea foamy than dark winter forest green. I decided that that was fine too. So I cast on.

I used this as a travel project, it went with me to Amsterdam, to the zoo and stayed in my house. I’d printed the instructions for the argyle pattern and meticulously referenced them throughout my travels (and while in my lazy chair). The pattern isn’t difficult, but it does require some counting and being able to read what you did the round before. Once I cast off the armholes, it became more like a guessing game of where to start the written pattern (I probably should’ve used the chart), but I think it all worked out well, argyle pattern wise.

There have been some modifications to create a more optimal fit. After 2.5 (instead of 3) repeats of the pattern, I started the armholes. I’m short, I didn’t want a dress. Then I also reduced the length of the armholes by 8 rows on front and back. The amount of ribbing rows in the neckline is different and I completely chucked the instructions for the armhole ribbing out of the window. It looked like you could drive a truck through those armholes before I redid them. So the second time around, I also took those in like the center front with a triple decrease.

Unfortunately, the weather turned bad before I really got a chance to wear it. As I am a lizard and it’s turned cold recently, I can’t just wear a button down without freezing. I’m currently debating whether I can make a button down / sweater to wear under this thing, but I haven’t figured it out yet. So for now, it lives on my dress form in the window, mesmerizing me from a distance. I do love argyle patterns so.

Froggy Hat

Frogs perching on lily pads make the best head gear.

I’ve been subscribed to Dot Pebbles a.k.a. Claire Garland’s newsletter for a few years now, and every so often I get a free pattern for a knit animal. These knits are always very life-like and look insanely complicated. I made the polar bear before and while it all worked out, I wasn’t sure it would while knitting it. So I’ve been eyeing the Frog pattern that’s been making the rounds on the internet recently. I thought I had received it a while ago in my free patterns too. Turns out that I indeed had and I really wanted to have a frog…

Since I really wasn’t sure if it was going to work, I tried to get similar yarns to the ones Claire Garland suggests. I got some drops kid-silk in my mailbox and dyed some fingering weight yarn in ‘toad-green’. The body and legs of the frog were going to be toad-green with apple-green kid-silk. It’s belly was undyed yarn with moonshine kid-silk.

Knitting the body is really fast. I only deviated from the pattern once, by skipping the mouth stitches. I couldn’t get them to work and it just looked awful. Once the body was done, I knit the legs and arms on. At that point, I decided that I need him to be posable so I found some armature wire in my stash and added that. When I make the frog again, I’m going to try to use the wire while knitting, instead of when it’s all done. That way, I can probably hide the ends without having to use so many bits of yarn. With the wire in, froggy can do push ups or sit awkwardly instead of just flop down.

So I had a completed frog when my mother sent an invite for her birthday party. The assignment was to wear ‘your best head gear’. I knew I wanted to wear my green Rita-cousin dress, so I wanted to make some sort of hat that would work with that. I also had this frog. 1+1 = 2 and I decided to make a lily-pad fascinator with the frog pinned to the top. The lily pad pattern was based on the left leaf from an image on the internet. I cut it out from the same green fabric as the dress, stretched over some foam. I then added some hair clips to the bottom. The frog was maneuvered into a normal sitting frog and safety-pinned onto the lily pad.

I love this thing. It’s adorable, it doesn’t hurt while wearing it, it’s got a frog, what’s not to like!

Cousin of the Rita Dress

Useless buttons can definitely add some flair to an otherwise plain dress.

For the opening of this academic year, I started work on a new dress. So I scrolled to my ‘dresses’ Pinterest board and found a pin that I really liked (the Rita dress). Since I still can’t actually draw patterns from scratch, I got out all my pattern magazines and looked for one that could approximately match the style lines of the Rita. Eventually I found the vaguely related Simplicity Naaimode 38, model 13 (New Look 6574 C). In contrast to the Rita, 6574 has raglan sleeves, no waistband, no neckline cut out and less skirt. I didn’t really want the longer sleeves of the Rita and I could do without the high collar, so I figured that the New Look could work out well.

Rita, retrieved from https://www.esterinflow.se/store/p/0/dress-rita-petrol-801421 on 29-8-2023

I drew out all the pieces in my size and it just looked.. enormous. The underarms would end under my bra. So I did major surgery on the pattern. I removed around 3.5 cm from the tops of the bodice and sleeve pieces and redrew some armholes. This may have been a little too much, looking back, but it ended up working out decently well. I added the neckline cut out, which turned out a bit bigger than I expected. I used the tops of the skirt pieces to make a waistband. The New Look skirt was discarded in favour of a circle skirt.

On to the making! The bodice was sewn together and there was so much extra fabric in the back and sides. It would probably have been possible to wear a backpack underneath or something. So some additional major surgery occurred. Then I figured out that there was no way I was closing this thing with the center back zipper I had intended. So I performed more surgery on the sides and added the zip in the left side seam. This also allowed me to fit it a little better along those seams, so no harm no foul. Massive pockets were also needed and this skirt can hold a fair amount of stuff. The sleeves, skirt and cut out are hemmed with bias tape in an almost matching green. There is no lining and it’s slightly see through in the skirt, so I may need to wear a petticoat with it.

The final details were self-fabric buttons. One on each side of the collar and 2 x 5 along the front. They really elevate the dress and I love them. Making the buttons is fun, but attaching them certainly is not. What a tedious process that turned out to be. I finished it the day before the event and it was very nice to wear the next day. I added the zebra top because the weather still thought it was October. While the finished product is only a cousin of the Rita dress and not a twin, and I do really like how it turned out.

Proof of Concept Dyeing

Trying out some more dyeing ideas.

“What happens if you separate out random partial sections of yarn and dye those a different colour?” Was the question that spurred the 28 March round of dyeing yarn. I wanted to try and see if it would 1) be possible to even separate out different parts without making it impossible to ball up later and 2) whether that would then create a more random pattern. I started with two skeins of Krypton 4ply yarn and started pulling out random strands and strand sections. The majority of the skein was dyed with a low percentage of black. It’s more grey in appearance because of that. The strand sections that were left out were dyed a nice dark green.

The second skein was Alpaca 4ply sock and got the same separation treatment. I wanted to dye this a bright light blue/turquoise colour with the contrast being navy. However, part of the skein that wasn’t supposed to be navy fell into the pot so there are some more blue spots than intended. I also had another skein of Alpaca 4ply sock that was dyed in some leftover yellow dye. Later, some orange and brown speckles were put over the top.

The first and second experiment also had some leftover dye in the pot, so I wanted to test out the Tweed Effect DK yarn that’s been hanging out in the cupboard too. I took a full skein and started it on the yarn winder until about half was into a ball. Cut the skein and had two tweed experiments. The ball was unwound gain and dropped dry into some blue dye. It did actually take on the barber pole effect that was indicated on the website. The green experiment was not as successful. The yarn came out very uneven and without much barber-poling.

After these experiments, I’ve been able to answer question 1. Yes, it is possible to separate out without making it impossible. It did take a bit longer than normal because certain bits didn’t want to let go of each other. I’ve not gotten around to question 2 though. I’ll report back once these yarns have reached either the knitting machine or the needles!

Nutmeg Leftover Sweater

Random stripes for random colours.

Some time ago (Ravelry tells me May 24, 2020), I started on a sweater meant to use up leftovers of Zeeman Tweed wool, the thick version. I had the body of a Marsala sweater basically finished and got stuck on the sleeves. It went into a box of doom for probably two years or so, never to be worked on again. In October of this year, I unraveled it all and started on a new leftover sweater. This time using the Nutmeg by Jenifer Stark.

It’s a fairly simple raglan sweater with the one design element being the roll over hems, made with 5 knit rows and one purl row. The original pattern was quite boxy, so I added some impromptu shaping in the sides and some sort rows to the back at the bottom. The original plan was to have all the hems in grey, and then alternate stripes of red, white, blue and green. About three stripes in I devised a new plan, to have main colour stripes (red, green, blue) that would all have white in between colour switches. It worked out quite well, but I had a literal mountain of ends to weave into the sweater. I dedicated long stretches of time to do this fairly regularly, knowing that if I didn’t do it immediately, the sweater was liable to go into another box of doom.

The body was finished first and then I completed the sleeves. At that point in time, I was wondering why the purl row at the bottom of the sleeves worked so well to stop further curling, but the one at the bottom of the sweater was doing nothing of the sort. Turns out, I’m still crap at counting and only did four rows before casting off. I undid all of that and knit an extra row. This seems to have helped a lot. Then it came time to do sweater surgery. Originally the neck was grey-blue-red, but the new white in the middle plan necessitated some adjustment. The neck was knit again, and then I matrass stitched it to the first row of the original red stripe. It took a while, but it worked out well. The last thing I did was to add a contrasting stitch in the back of the neck, so I can easily see how to put it on.

In the beginning I had 44 g of green, 136 g of blue, 101 g of white, 164 g of red, 79 g of grey and 27 g of black. At the end, there was no green anymore, 37 g of blue, 15 g of white and 15 g of red leftover and since I didn’t use any, still 79 g of grey and 27 g of black. All in all, a pretty good score. I think that leaving the grey out makes this a much brighter sweater. The grey really muted it. I think it’ll be easy to wear and we’ll see if I finally managed to make sleeves that are the right length. Something I’ve proven to be exceptionally bad at…

Next up, a hat as part of the leftover projects!

Tag: Green