I realize this is not normal

What do you do when you have a whole lunch hour to kill and you have your thread, but you’ve left your hook with your other project? I’m pretty sure I know what normal people DON’T do. They don’t obsessively fashion a hook out of a plastic kitchen knife using the keychain version of a Swiss Army Knife, a pair of office scissors and an emery board, leaving no time to actually crochet anything. Because that’s … not normal. Heh.

Irish summer

I never liked dolls. Not ever. Yet, as a kid, I created a dollhouse out of some modular shelving that covered one wall of my room because I was fascinated by miniatures. I’d spend hours in there crafting tiny pies and chairs and blankets.

I also became entranced by a National Geographic article about Ukranian Easter eggs (pysanky). The colors and detail just drew me in. I remembered that article until adulthood, when I was able to search for information about pysanky on the internet. I loved them so much I had to make them myself. I bought all the equipment and started learning. Those guys in the photo are mine.

Tiny, detailed stuff calls to me like a siren's song. So it has been and ever shall be. When I started knitting, I went straight for the intricate lace, then intricate colorwork, then intricate cabling. I suppose it's really no surprise that I’ve gravitated toward Irish crochet.

 I’m not good at it yet. These are, literally, my very first attempts at real, padded motifs. But I’m having a blast. I've started with some motifs from Priscilla Irish Crochet No 1 and Dillmont (DMC) Irish Crochet Lace, both of which can be found in the Antique Pattern Library. The largest motif is actually one of the recent CALs from the Irish Crochet group on Ravelry. I don't have it with me, but I'd estimate it to be around 3.5" long.

Getting the supplies hasn’t been as easy as I expected. You'd think, living in a big city, you'd have easy access to everything under the sun, right? Not so much when it comes to old school things like crochet/tatting thread. I haven't found anything smaller than #20 thread locally, so that's what I've started with. It seems small to someone who started out as a knitter, but I want to go smaller. I bought my first pair of reading glasses to magnify the tiny thread and hooks. It helps a lot, even with the #20. I’ve just received some nice #60 thread and I’m looking forward to torturing myself with it at lunch today.

Antique-Style Cordelière for Drawstring Bags

This is a style of drawstring/strap that was sometimes used in patterns for crochet bags in the early 1900s. Many of these old patterns are public domain and are free if you know where to look (start at the Antique Pattern Library). While I didn't design this thing originally, I feel like the instructions in those patterns are lacking in detail for modern crochet vixens who haven’t ever put one of these together. I've made some adjustments and given a more thorough explanation of the construction.

The following instructions are for a bag with two rows of drawstring holes around the top into which the cordelière would be inserted. However, it could easily be modified to work for a bag with one row of holes. I used #10 thread and a 1.65mm steel hook for a bag approximately 6.5" across. If your bag is a different width, you might want to add or subtract length from the 24" sc sections.

Construction of cordelière:

Make a chain 15 feet long (no, really). Turn, skip the chain next to the hook and make 1 sc in each ch. until the work measures 24 in. Without breaking thread, make another chain, long enough to reach within 24 in. of the beginning of first chain made. Make 1 sc in each ch. to the end. You should now have a piece consisting of two approx. 24 in. sc ends with approx. 11 feet of double chain between (around 15 feet total).

Using a large hook (I used an “I” hook) and leaving the first sc section as a “tail,” using both strands of the double chain as one thread, crochet that loooong section of double chain into a single crochet chain, fastening off when you reach the other sc section. You should now have two 24 in. sc sections with a thick chain in the middle.

Small balls (make 4):
Chain 4 and join in a ring. Make 8 sc in the ring. Do not join, as the balls are worked around and around, both threads of stitch being taken up.
Second round: put 2 sc in each stitch of preceding round. 16 st.
Make four more rounds of 16 sc.
Make two rounds, skipping every third stitch on each round.
Fill with cotton and make two more rounds, skipping every other stitch.
Draw up with one sc, chain 10* and fasten off.

(*for second ball of each pair, ch 3, catch 4th ch. of first ball, ch 6)

Slip balls (make 2):
Chain 6 and join in a ring, 12 sc in the ring.
Second round: 2 sc in each stitch. Make six more rounds of 24 sc.
Make 2 rounds, skipping every third stitch. Fasten off, but leave a long end of thread.

Assembly:
Slide one slip ball onto each sc section and move it up towards the thick chain so it’s out of the way. Now, starting on one side of the bag, thread one end (sc section) through the bottom loops. Alternating over and under, go all the way around the bag and come out where you started. Even out the two ends of the sc section you just threaded through so that they’re about equal length.

Now, starting on the opposite side of the bag and using the upper row of holes, do the same thing with the sc section at the other end of the thick chain. After that's done, one each side of the bag, you should have two lengths of sc emerging - one attached to the thick chain and one hanging loose.

Slip each remaining loose end through its respective slip ball and attach firmly to the thick chain. Slide the slip balls over the join, fill them with cotton.** If necessary, draw them closed using the long thread-end, Anchor the top in place. Fasten two small balls to the bottom of each slip ball (I actually fastened mine to the chain inside the ball, but it's up to you).

Now engage in your favorite celebratory activity because, after 30 feet of chain and all that other hoo-haw, you deserve it!

** I recommend cotton instead of fiberfill. Just get some real cotton balls. Cotton, being denser, is slightly easier to work with. Fiberfill is hard to get a grip on in such tiny amounts.

Rivendell's a Wrap!

Done. I love the finished sweater. It's exactly what I had envisioned. At first I really wanted the Waterslide color (turquoise), but I think I prefer this color now.

If I were willing to re-do the sleeves (which I'm not), I'd pick up a few more stitches under the arms when starting the sleeves. There's a bit of pull across the chest because I picked up so few (9, I think). Live and learn!

I'll tell you what, I didn’t enjoy weaving in the ends on the backside of a p2 x k1tbl ribbed item. I tried to keep the joins in places that wouldn’t be seen much.

The weather was really beautiful this morning so the photo session got a little hot, even though this is a fairly lightweight sweater. Not surprising, I suppose, because of the wool content. I’m actually glad because it’ll keep me warm at the office (aka Ice Station Zebra).

KnitPicks seems to have discontinued this yarn (Risata) and I haven't found a good substitute. There are a couple of other stretchy cotton/wool sock yarns (Paton's Stretch Socks and Mary Maxim's Bounce), but neither have a good selection of solid colors. I'd love to know if anyone is aware of any similar yarns. Fixation doesn't work because it's more of a sport-weight.

One Sleeve Down

The first sleeve is finished. I was prepared for the grafting to be imperfect because of the ribbing and sure enough, it was. To camouflage the imperfections I decided to add a set of cluster stitches over the graft line by “sewing” them on. I put the sleeve on my left arm while sewing to make sure I got the tension right. It was only mildly problematic doing it with one hand.

The fit of this thing is so “painted on” that I really have to adjust it after putting it on to make sure that the pattern is straight, that all of the ribs are lined up, that the sleeve isn’t pulling down the neckline, etc. The good news is that once it’s all adjusted, it looks great. One sleeve to go!

More Rivendell

I’ve finished the body. It’s sooooo stretchy that it really didn’t require any shaping, but I threw in some increases toward the bottom to accommodate my own extreme angle in that area.

I’ve started the sleeves. The plan is to do the lower part of the sleeves bottom-up on size 0 needles. I’ll be doing the sleeves from both bottom and top to meet in the middle. It’s a tortured way to make a sleeve, but that bottom part is critical because that’s how this whole thing started. When I get past the Rivendell pattern I’ll stop and switch to working shoulder-down on size 4 needles, changing needle sizes as I go until I’m back at 0. Eventually I’ll graft where the two pieces meet.

Rivendell Sweater

I recently started working on a pair of Rivendell socks. Just before I started the heel flap I slipped one of them onto my arm to stretch out the pattern so I could see it properly. It looked so nice there that I thought, “this would make a great sleeve.” My mind took off from there and before I knew it, I’d bought the yarn (Knit Picks’ Risata in Woodland Sage).

I was picturing a tight-fitting, long-sleeved pullover with a mock turtleneck. I couldn't really find any patterns like that in fingering weight so I started with some numbers from the closest thing I could find (a scoop neck) and did some calculations to get 36 stitches each for the front and back and 9 stitches for each sleeve for a total of 90 stitches.

Using the magic loop method, I cast on the day the yarn arrived. I made the neck about 2” before starting the increases for the body. The increases look a tinier bit messy than I’d prefer, but not so much that I’d rip it back and re-do it. If I ever do this again I’ll figure out a different increase method.

I decided on 3 repeats of the pattern across the front of the sweater as if it were an “opened up” sock. Since I’m doing it top-down and it’s a top town sock pattern, the pattern is right-way-up. I started the pattern at about row 34. I only made a couple of adjustments to the Rivendell chart. The first one was to “crop” the ends a bit for the first row of wrapped stitches since I didn’t have enough stitches across at that point for the whole pattern. The other was to switch a lot (but not all) of the YOs to paired lifted increases since I didn’t want all those holes across my chest.

Due to the ribbing, the negative ease and the stretchiness of the yarn, this thing looks like it’s made for a 3-year-old! Not to worry, it fits great so far.