A whole lot of wool

When I was 13 I got my first knitting machine. It was a second hand Knitmaster 321 and it was my main Christmas present that year.

I had wanted a new one but my mam refused saying she thought my wanting a knitting machine was a whim and it would just end up in a cupboard a few months after Christmas.

The following Christmas Santa brought me a ribber attachment for my machine. So much for it being a whim !!!! 

I bought my second knitting machine when I started my first job. It was a Brother electronic K950 (later upgraded to a K950i). My niece, who has just been born, ended up with a superb wardrobe of lace knitted baby clothes as a result.

Not content with two machines I also bought a Bond so I could knit with double knit and chunky wool.

I spent many happy years making lots of jumpers for myself, family and friends. I used to beg my sister and brother-in-law not to wear any of my jumpers to work as their colleagues would always want me to make them one.

I had seriously thought about setting up my own knitting business but back then (late 80's), it wasn't as easy as it is now.

I continued to knit for a few years after I got married but as I began to spend more time improving my dressmaking skills, the knitting took a back seat. My workroom isn’t very big and I needed more space for my sewing things, plus I wanted a desktop computer, so I had to make the tough decision to pack away my three knitting machines and put them into the loft.

Although I wasn’t going to use them anymore there was no way I could get rid of them. I think I was hoping that one day we’d move into a bigger house and I’d have room to put them back up again – well we can always dream !!!!

I’d used up a lot of the wool by making knitted toys and dolls for various charity raffle prizes but still had a large box of odds and ends which I wanted rid of.

My mam suggested I crochet a blanket. Who’s she kidding…? Hand knitting, no problem. The harder and complicated, the better. Crocheting, on the other hand, is a completely different matter. Although the principle of crocheting is basically making a chain, I may as well be trying to master Quantum Physics !!!!!! 

I do, however, like a challenge so armed with the ‘how to crochet’ pages from one of my needlework book, some wool and a crochet hook borrowed from my mam, I started practicing doing some granny squares.

Although the squares weren’t perfect I felt ready enough to tackle the blanket. I worked out that I would need 64 granny squares to complete it. No pressure there then.

Several months later the blanket was finished.

There was still enough wool left to make another blanket so this time instead of making 64 granny squares, I’d made one big one. Rather than have several rows of one particular colour throughout the blanket, I made my own multicoloured balls by winding random bits of wool onto them. 

I started making it in the summer so by the time the cold weather came (well, colder than our summer weather anyway…..) the blanket was big enough to keep my legs warm. 

I did hit one snag when I was making it. I dropped my mam’s crochet hook down the side of the sofa -  never to be seen again. A quick phone call to my mam to see if she could remember what number the crochet hook was (number eight apparently), then straight onto eBay to buy a replacement.

I do miss knitting, especially when I'm in need of a new jumper as I could have one completed in a couple of hours. Should I be in a position to have a large work room then they will most definitely make a reappearance.

Gertie xx

Found it !!!!

Back in September I blogged about a wedding ring shawl I’d made. Unfortunately I couldn’t provide any photos as the shawl had been misplaced somewhere in the loft.

I’m very pleased (and mightily relieved....) to say that it’s been found safe and well. It was, for some strange reason, in a suitcase with our summer clothes.

We only stumbled upon it by accident. Mr Gertie had gone into the loft to bring down the case (so we could see if we needed any new clothes for our cruise), and what did we find among the vest tops and shorts, the shawl.

So, a little later than planned, here's my wedding ring shawl.

And to prove that it 'does what it says on the tin'....

Thank you Mr Gertie for the use of your wedding ring (mine being a size I was just a bit too small to use).

Hope it was worth the wait.....

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Deck the halls

Last week I showed you 'Rudolph'. This week I thought I'd show you a couple of other Christmas decorations in the Gertie household.

This is the fireplace in the living room. There used to be a gas fire in the centre. We inherited it when we bought the house but it got condemned several years ago !!!! Normally the large vase, which you can just make out on the right of the picture, sits in the centre, but during the festive season it gets replaces with a cross stitch wall hanger.

I bought the kit from a sewing shop in a beautiful place called Solvang in California. At the time (1991) it was the largest cross stitch project I'd ever done.

  

We go from the largest to the smallest project I've ever made. These are 'the 12 days of Christmas' cross stitched on 27 count fabric - that's 27 holes to the inch. Ouch !!!! I seem to remember setting myself a challenge to make one 'day' per month. I think I did it with one month to spare.

These cute little fella's are Waverly the snowman and Iggy and Mo the snowballs. They're all hand knitted and Waverly's sack contains twelve little knitted bags, each with a knitted present inside.... 

On either side of the mantelpiece are two cross stitch Christmas cards and above that is the 'jingle bells' bunting I made a couple of weeks ago. We had some baubles spare from the Christmas tree so I just put them in a glass vase, which is at the bottom of the main picture.

I decorated the dresser in the kitchen with paper snowflakes (so easy to make and surprisingly very therapeutic too). The 'falling' snowflakes are simply made by attaching them to a length of white sewing cotton.

Have a great week.

Love

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Finished !!

I've done it !! I've finally completed all of my late mam's unfinished projects.

Out of all of her projects this one was the easiest to finish as she'd done most of the work already. All I had to do was finish outlying a couple of squares and do the binding.

I'd like to think that she would be pleased with how they've all turned out. If you want to have a look at them just click on the various links: comfort teddies,  little girls quilt, little boys and baby quilt.

I certainly really enjoyed finishing them. They kept me busy during the summer whilst I was immobile from my hip op, though hand stitching a quilt on one of the hottest days of the year probably wasn't one of my brightest ideas !!

Once I've washed the quilts I'll then find a good home for them and the teddies.Whilst they may not go to the original destination that my mam had intended them to go (I don't have any contact details for the lady who was organising them) I'm sure whoever gets them will be most grateful.

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

How many work in progress do you have?

That was one of the questions set by Natalie in my recent post 11 questions.

I replied: 'I can't count that high !!! Off the top of my head I have: a knitted cable jumper; a knitted cable blanket, a crotchet blanket; two needlepoint cushions; two needlepoint glasses/scissors cases; four quilts; three cross stitch Christmas cards; two large cross stitch patterns – a tiger cub and a tigers eye; a four foot model of the QM2 cruise ship and a large needlepoint of the Battle of Trafalgar (started in 1985 !!!)'.

My list has got a littler smaller as I've just finished one of the Christmas cross stitches.

Whilst I had my camera out I thought you might like to see some of my WIP.

Knitted cable jumper: I'm still getting the hang of the cable patterns so haven't done as much as I would have liked.

Knitted cable blanket: This is going to be a long term project as there's 302 stitches and 33 inches of blanket to knit.... As you may have gathered I like a challenge!!!!

Two needlepoint cushions: This will be the fourth cushion I've done using this pattern.

I made this pattern up myself using a mixture of various needlepoint stitches.

Tigers eye: This is mainly a summer project as I need quite a bit of light to stitch the black fabric.

I'm off to see the Professor on Thursday so it's fingers crossed that he says everything is fine and I can finally get back into my work room.....

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Wedding ring shawl

In Wednesday's post I mentioned the item I was most proud to have made was a wedding ring shawl.

Back in the middle 80's Woman's Weekly magazine did an article about the Shetland Islands and how the elderly ladies were teaching the young to carry on their knitting traditions.

The magazine offered readers a free wedding ring shawl knitting pattern, so I sent off my required stamped address envelope and a week later the pattern arrived. It was eight pages of solid text !!!!!

It looked way beyond my knitting ability so I just forgot about it. A couple of years later my parents and I were in a craft shop in Whitby and I noticed they sold one ply Shetland wool (the wool needed for the shawl). I was bored doing cross stitch so decided to have a go at making it. I had no idea how many skeins I'd need so just guessed the amount. As we didn't live locally the shop owner kindly suggested if I needed any more or had bought too much I could give her a ring and she's either send me more or buy back the spare skeins.

The scalloped edging was knitted first. There was only 10 stitches and 12 rows to the pattern, however I had to knit over 500 of them !!!!!!  

Using a very long circular needle I had to pick up about 1000 stitches from the first row of the scallops to form the body of the shawl. 

It seemed like every waking moment was spent working on the shawl. I remember it once took me all evening just to knit one row of the shawl..... Eventually after eight long weeks it was finished.

Now came the true test. Could it, as the name suggested, fit through a wedding ring? I borrowed my mams ring, and very carefully so not to break the yarn, fed the shawl through the ring. It worked !!!!

I'm proud of the shawl as it was the first time I'd ever used a circular knitting needle. I'd never knitted with anything as fine as one ply before and it's the most complex pattern I've ever come across.

Note: Apologies for the lack of shawl photos only it was put in the loft a few years ago and we now can't find it !!!!!!!

Update: We've finally found it so here are a couple of photos.

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Lifting the ban

Thank you for all your lovely comments on last weeks blog, and Natalie, thank you for my award. I'll be posting my answers later in the week.

Yesterday Mr Gertie temporary lifted the ban on my workroom being a no-go area so it was good to be back even if it was just for an hour or two. I know it's just a room but I have missed it so much - ridiculous I know !!!!!

I've been busy this week reading up on how to set up a craft business and also coming up with various bag and accessories designs. That was why Mr Gertie let me into my workroom as I needed the space to convert my rough sketches into something more workable.

For the moment though that's as far as I can get as the next stage is making mock-ups and that's definitely banned !!!!!

I'm making good progress with my mam's quilts. Both the boy and baby ones have been hand quilted. There's just the girls to finish stitching.

To give my fingers a rest from quilting I'm making a start on another cable jumper. I had thought about knitting a simple lace jumper but I wanted something bit more challenging. Here's a photo of what I'm doing.

 

Whether it'll turn out like this is another matter!!!

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Comfort teddies

My mam used to love making things for charity: Quilts for families made homeless and heart shaped pillows for ladies diagnosed with breast cancer (the pillows tuck underneath the arm to give pain relief) were two of her favourites.

One of her quilting friends mentioned that she had started knitting little comfort teddies for children suffering from trauma. As the charity was in need of more teddies my mam dusted off her knitting needles and set to work.

When my mam died in March she left some quilts and teddies that needed completing. So instead of melting from hand sewing one of her quilts I decided this week to do something a little cooler. I finished knitting the teddies.

There's enough wool left to make a couple more so they may be getting some new friends soon.

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS why not pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Knit one, cable one

In knit one, purl one I mentioned I’d pop up a photo of the first jumper that I’d knitted in a long while. Well, here it is....

I would image that when you haven’t hand knitted a jumper for a long time (in my case over 20 years), you would choose something simple to get you back into the swing of things. Not me!!!!

As you will have probably noticed in some of my makes I like a challenge. So when I spotted a jumper which was for ‘experienced knitters only’ I was immediately drawn to it.

My mam did suggest I start first with the yoke jumper in ‘Knit one, Purl one’, as most of it was stocking stitch and should ease me gently into knitting again. Sound advice but my mind was made up. It was the cable jumper or nothing.....

The design had four different cable patterns and I did get in a knot a couple of times at the beginning trying to remember the pattern sequence – D,D,C,B,C,A,C,B,C,D,D – but yarn markers made things so much easier.

Once I got into the swing of it, the cable patterns were pretty easy to do. However if I put it down for a while then came back to it, I did have to unravel a few rows as I’d forgotten the cable pattern.

I’m about to undertake another cable jumper (just as complex – there’s a surprise!!!) and it’ll have quite a bit of my undivided attention as I’m going to be out of action soon for several weeks so my work room will be out-of-bounds. More about that next Sunday.

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Knit one, purl one

In last Sunday’s blog I mentioned the jumper I had hoped to show you but unfortunately it wasn’t finished. Well it is now.....

The pattern I used comes from a book that’s ancient – the models are wearing legwarmers!!

However if you look past the early 80’s fashion disaster some of the patterns are really good. 

I remember my mam knitting this jumper back in the day and when she found out I was going to knit it again she hinted madly that she would love to have it when it was finished. Sadly that wasn’t to be as she died in March. However I’m sure she would have loved it.

The main part of the jumper was easy to knit as it was just stocking stitch. The fun though began with the yoke. It was supposed to be knitted over four needles but I used a circular needle instead.

I’ve only used a circular needle once before, and that was many moons ago, so getting back into the swing of knitting with it took a while.  

The yoke itself was only 42 rows but it probably took longer to do than knitting the stocking stitch pieces.

When it came to knitting the neckband I did eventually have to use four needles as I didn’t have a circular needle small enough.

This is only the second jumper I’ve knitted in a long time (I’ll pop the first one up on the blog shortly) so I was really pleased with how it turned out.

Have a great week.

Gertie xx

PS pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other fellow craft bloggers have been up to.

Unfinished business

I wasn’t sure whether to blog this week (the reason will become apparent shortly) but as it’s Mother’s Day, I thought I should.

My Mam died on Thursday. She’d just recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer and although the end came quicker than expected, she went peacefully and was in no pain.

She had a passion for sewing and needlework and made some beautiful things. Very few though were for her, they went to charity instead.   

On looking through her sewing room my sister and I came across several unfinished things for charity that she’d either been in the middle of making, or was about to start:

Little teddy bears to bring comfort to traumatised and distressed children. 

Adult, boys and girls quilts for families made homeless due to domestic violence or fire.

I gathered together all her work and brought them home. My Mam may not be able to finish them but I could.

Although I’m not as good as she was, I hope she would have been pleased with them when they’re finished.

Gertie
xx