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Sunday, April 23, 2017

Finished My Afghan

For my last Knit Natters demo, I came up with a tuck lace afghan on my bulky machine.  I saw an idea in a magazine, then swatched, fiddled, and came up with my version.

With my swatches, I played around with fringe, tassels, and edgings, and I decided that a simple hem made the most professional finish for the latched panels.  The stitch has 3 needles in work and one out, and I used the same needle arrangement for the hems.  The mattress-stitched hems ensure every panel meets perfectly at the ends and lies nicely.

When I went to knit club, all I had done were the panels.  The panels still needed to be latched together, the sides had to be latched to make a pretty edge, and the hems, top and bottom, needed mattress stitched.  

For grown-ups, I like a big afghan.  This is about 5 feet by 6 six feet. I used two cones of dark and two cones of light, but I still have about 10 ounces of each color (4 cones of 5 ounces each).   


To my surprise, that all went very fast, and I enjoyed the finishing process.  I had used two strands of Tamm Star in a wine color and a soft rose color.  I thought perhaps having those two strands separate as I unraveled and latched might make the process tedious, but once I found an old latch hook for making rugs (it's big, and I needed the space to hold all the loops) it was terrific.

Using a tried-and-true cone yarn, stranded like this, is my new favorite afghan yarn supply.  This blanket had two cones of the same yarn for each panel, but for some afghans I made a while back, I actually used three thinner yarns to make a "tweed," a mixture of different colors. You don't need so very much of each color, and the finished result is quite interesting.

The color is truer in the close-up; that is, the wine is a little darker, but the rose is about right on my monitor.


Sunday, April 2, 2017

Upcoming Seminar

I'm teaching at Knit Knack Shop's Spring Fling next weekend!

Have you been to Spring Fling?  Put on by Charlene Shafer's Knit Knack Shop, this is one of the relatively few larger seminars.  It's held at a fairgrounds in Peru, Indiana, has multiple teachers, incredible shopping (Knit Knack has just about anything you need for your machine knitting), and incredible fellowship with over a hundred knitters.

You can pick and choose from a great lineup of classes for Friday and then more for Saturday.  The teachers this year are Sandee Cherry, Susan Guagliumi, Carol Scott, Carol Wurst, and me.

I'm certainly looking forward to this.  My friend Barbara Deike is going with me to help out, and we always have a great time, visiting with fellow knitters and shopping a bit, ourselves!

Click here for more information.




New! Video for April - Chunky Woven Cable

Here's my April video:



This is one you can do on any main bed - no ribber required.