WATG Sock kits- a review

Unfortunately the lighting on these photos is not great. This is my current project since I am unable to sew for the next few weeks. They are really just begun but starting to look like socks. Or rather a sock.

A couple of years ago I was given a WATG sock kit with yarn for 3 pairs if leopard print wool socks for a birthday. I was very happy but the pattern is different to the Winwick Mum sock construction so I did not feel ready to try it. I watched a video of how to change size of needles to get the pattern to work if you do not end up with spots. It all seemed straightforward. Also now I have about 10 pairs of Winiwck Mum socks successfully knitted so thought why not try this. Its supposed to give the leg ribbed striped bit without effort or need for a contrast ball of yarn annd then you do the sock till you get to the correct length and then do the toes. You do have to cut and rejoin the yarn for the toes and you are also meant to cut the heel yarn and roll into a ball for an "afterthought" heel. Ok thinks me I will have a go. 

Anyway it's a hard pattern. I had the right tension at the start because my top stripes all line up correctly. The pattern says that's how to check the tension. That was a normal (for me) 2.5mm needle,  but the leopard print did not work. So I unravelled it.

Next attempt I did my normal aran cast on and dumped the edge ribbed colour ( part of their pattern but to be honest looks rubbish in my opinion)  because there is not enough for a full contrast edge if you don't use long tail cast on which I didn't like. So second attempt I have started to alter the pattern!

The pattern does state you must follow their pattern for yarn to work etc.

Right so ribbed edge done and we get to the spots. They don't work. Change needle size twice. I really do not want to knit on smaller than a 2.25mm. I tried bigger but that gave me a random pattern. 

But small this time is 2.25mm and really I think perhaps this pattern needs 2mm needles. I think perhaps that's what I should do to get the pattern right. That's just too much for me. It physically hurts to use a 2mm so I have decided to stick with the 2.25mm and have what is more like camo pattern than leopard spots. Still nice though.

Then the yarn changes for the heel. We'll by now I am losing patience with the WATG pattern. They want me to leave the heel yarn in a ball, knit the heel later and sew it in. No.

I have tried their cast on and that looked so rubbish and really I like the heel flaps on my other socks. So anyway I took the decision to do the heel flap ( Winwick Mum style) and not listen to their pattern for this bit. You actually have a small amount left over after doing a heel flap.

Then I went onto the gusset. I do a Winwick Mum style heel flap. There is a small amount of blue left over after this. I cut and rejoin after trying several other methods so I did all this twice. Back to leopard print/ camo. As you can see the pattern goes out on the gusset decreases. That's not the end of the world. I think these will still be a nice pair of socks. At this point the spots pattern goes out. It changes to a random pattern like space dyed yarn. Here next to the gusset decreases the pattern breaks up until I get onto the foot part when it goes back to how it should be. Its hard to take photos of this but I think you can see the more random part next to the foot. 

Here also because I had tried using several balls of yarn round the gusset only to unpick twice and then went with rejoining but I had by then 3 strands of yarn to incorporate and  you can just see where I rejoined the yarn having cut off the rest of the heel contrast and rejoined the leopard. It was my 3rd attempt that I eventually stopped and just went back to doing a Winwick Mum basic sock pattern with zero adjustments. You can just see the line of thicker stitches accross the foot where the spots change to the random pattern

The pattern will work. I reckon I will get acceptable spots and stuff the slight randomness round the heel area. There is also now a small line where the end of the yarn is knitted in. I had had enough and decided it will wear in and I think it will. Either way its done now, they will be wearable and I am just experimenting to get these to work somehow!

 Now I will finish in the next few days and join in the blue for the toes. Then knit sock 2.

Once I finish these will will show you how they turn out.

A few things here about this WATG sock yarn/ kit:

I have 2 more balls of this yarn. I will not be using it as is again. I think there is too little ankle ribbing. I don't like the WATG heel. The whole ankle part of the sock is not adjustable unless:

1) add a second ribbing colour and some stripes at ankle

2) just do normal heel flap

3) I have yet to reach the toes but I reckon match them to the ankle stripes next time.

4) I am tempted to do a contrast underneath the foot to give me more potential spots. I will decide once I see what's left when I finish the first sock.

5) WATG say knit from centre of ball. That's fine if you don't keep unpicking. If you do it all gets tangled. I have already separated my next two balls of this yarn into two smaller balls to stop this. Thats what I do with Lang Yarns ( their directions) and I have done with one pair of WYS socks though it seems less necessary with WYS.

6) the amount supplied makes a very short sock with minimal ankle ribbing.

7) You know I am almost tempted to knit a hat or something else with the leopard spot part on the other balls.

 So my honest opinion on these kits: the yarn is lovely. Good quality sock yarn. Having the contrast ribbing as part of the ball sounds a great idea but stops the flexibility of a separate ball of yarn - ribbing length, more stripes etc. It has a bright yellow section where the two socks start and end which makes things very easy but there is loads of yarn in this section so I have kept to use as an edge or similar on another pair. So lots of wastage!

 I love the spots but need a much smaller needle than stated to get anything like the pattern it's supposed to. Yet with WYS yarns no I don't so it's unlikely it's my tension. Also my tension is dead on with the 2.5mm needle on the top ribbed section so this does not make sense.

It seems to my relative inexperience despite having knitted about 10 pairs of socks before this that the tension needed to get the ankle stripes is different to that needed for the spots.

Do I like this kit? 

We'll I will enjoy these socks but NO! I would not recommend because the leg length is set, ribbing is set, if you change the heel type it will work but will put the pattern out for a few rows.

I will knit 2 more pairs but I will not be buying more if this yarn. I will knit then incorporating a second contrast and trying out the above to get a decent pair of socks for winter. Its really not worth the bother of this kit (which is very expensive as well) just for leopard spot socks. I actually think it may be easier to just do intarsia for the leopard spots if you really want leopard spot socks rather than try using this kit.

So anyway if you do try out a WATG sock kit you are now informed and can make a sensible decision either way. This is obviously just my opinion and it may be most people love this kit but I prefer straight forward sock yarn. At least now I know that.

Have a lovely week, 

Take care

Bracken

Burda style magazine combat trousers model 118 04/2010 a journey

These have taken a while to make, well about 7 months so far, and they have evolved. They are not only still not finished, I totally unpicked all but the side seams.

What started out as combats has changed slightly. I decided against the side cargo pockets because I never really liked denim combats but then I do like back pockets. 

The pattern didn't have any so I found a pattern that does and used them and I went with expanding combat style pockets for the back pockets. 

Then it took me several weekends when I ploughed through relatives mending and repairs before I began to sew again for me. I really should say no to people but I seem to end up offering to sew their clothing and repair it etc so it is my own fault. I don't mind its just I seem to run out of time for me then. On top of this two of my best machines went down. Its just servicing needed I think or minor adjusting but I have not found time to play with them so I have moved to an old overlocker which does currently work well but is only good for light weight fabrics really and I have no machine for twin needle sewing. I just have my Janome sewing machine which is ok for straight and zig zag. It does do lots of embroidery stitches but I rarely use any of them. I do use a stretch zigzag sometimes when sewing elastic waistbands and sometimes I prefer that to twin needle sewing. It depends on the garment and the fabric.

Anyway, time has gotten in the way of making these. The indecision regards back pockets also held them up at least 6 weeks while I sorted through my Burda magazines for a likely pocket. This is the back pocket from model 131, 07/2003 of which I seem to have both an English and a German copy. Not a problem since there is a lot I would like to make from this magazine and you can find the pattern sheets start to wear out with lots of tracing. I have one already thats wearing out.  Having said that I had to make a list of items and where to find them for the next few months sewing because I have the perfect fabrics for many and never got round to making them. Anyway back to these rather epic trousers.

I must have been making these on and off since February and they are still not at all finished. I expected to finish them weeks ago and thought I had only to try them on and they are huge. Though I could tell just by looking at hem. They are meant to be a 36. Even had I made the 34 which is not available but I could downsize a little I think,  they would still be huge. I am not a large person but really I am not that small either so now do not have a clue what to do. I have not yet sewn the outside flat felled seems. I had though i won't bother with flat fells and just do ordinary seems but i did allow for them. I could just cut down the extra fabric. I suppose an elastic waist could be the answer. Right this minute I really do not know what to do. These have certainly not turned out as I had imagined!

So again I am pausing on making these. Also just for the record, I cut loads off the bottom of the original length thinking to make long shorts/cullotte type trousers intended for last spring, only to find they are actually about the right length for full length trousers. I am 168cm tall. Thats about 5 feet 6 to 5 feet 7 inches. These should be around knee length so I think the pattern must fit a bigger than 6 footer!

Ah problems.......

So now I have to come to ask myself: is it me? First the Kai pattern,  now these trousers. Both cases the sizing is madly out. Its not a tracing issue. I have a download if this trouser pattern eliminating potentially tracing the wrong size etc. 

Here I measured against an ancient Miss Selfridge pair of shorts that still fit that I use for decorating. You can see the size difference. 

I removed the back pockets. I will put them back on though but I think a bit lower down the bum area than last time. I reckon I added them too high.

The MS shorts are a 38 / UK 8. I am usually a 36 with Burda because I think their sizing is slightly different. Hence I cut the 36. I think the EU sizes have changed a bit here since the shorts were new but the Burda pattern is an older one and states what size its supposed to fit!

My next make I intend to self draft some combats from an old well fitting 90s pair and see how they turn out. I could ask did I just cut the wrong size? Maybe but the size 36 is the smallest offered. Size 34 is smaller than me (usually) and would also have worked out large according to when I put the pattern pieces on top if my finished garment( finished minus waistband that is). This assumes the same differences between the 34 and 36 as the rest if the sizes. 

So that suggests I am far smaller than the sizes available. But I normally wear a size 36 Burda. And they usually fit. Maybe I tend to go a little looser in fit than some people but even then to get a tight fit would only be a 34 not a smaller size so is it just a bad pattern?

I made these cord trousers last spring. 

I would say they are too big but I will go down a size next time. They are my muslin. I think the next size down will fit well. They work with a belt. These denim trousers will be huge even with a belt. 

I have spent some time since writing the above and decided to go with an elastic waist on these. It's a look that's been around all summer so not such a cop out as I might otherwise think and I will then not just waste the fabric. Besides which  I think these would make great warm Winter trousers although the denim is a heavier weight so quite stiff, and will accommodate thermals underneath with comfort so that's how I will sort this out. It's now just a choice if do I opt for a denim waist band and two rows of thick elastic? Or a jersey waistband which would be softer and comfortable? I bought some jersey ribbing  a short while ago so have both black and navy. 

I now have to update the last part I wrote but have decided to leave it here on the blog to show my total dilemma!!!!!

I took these to bits and decided to resew them. I will not be beaten!

This TNT pattern will mean they should fit if I base my new sizing on this.

So, I have, since writing about cop out ( in this particular case) elastic waistbands, taken these totally appart.

 Or almost. I left the front darts because placement wise they are perfect with the trouser pattern I am intending to use and the side seams. So they are half constructed and not at all in my usual trouser construction order.

 Despite my reinforced very strong denim stitching I took them to bits. I left the nice front pockets and side seams intact. Then placed a well used pattern for wide leg city trousers on the pattern pieces. Had to pin front and back patterns together and carefully position to allow for my already sewn sides and I recut.

I folded and pinned the pattern to get the darts right.

I felt brave and scared but I did it. Once I am healed from the operation I will show you how they sew up. If nothing else and even if they are a complete disaster at least I shall be able to say I persevered and tried to make these annoying trousers. Though now I wish I had not cropped them. Winter is coming. I won't get these finished until at least November now. I am considering a tatty edging of strips of denim at the moment but we will see. It might be a terrible idea! 

I obviously cannot show you a finished item here and I am sorry for that, but these trousers deserve to be written about because they have been much much more difficult to make than originally expected and really just showing the finished item does not always do the journey to that finished item justice. 

I will post what happens to these though whether they work out of not.

So you can probably see here I am on a journey and just now I have no idea how long its going to take or  if I will ever get there.

Take care and have a lovely week 

Bracken

Sleep masks for the operation

First of all if you read my blog regularly and i know several thousand people from around the planet are regular visitors, I am truly sorry to have let you down with my recent very slack blogging. 

I have been sewing and knitting and playing with a flower loom but because I have tomorrow got my hip replacement I have concentrated on the sewing rather than my blog. 

After the op I will not be allowed to sew for at least 6 weeks so in that time my plan is to get to it and update my blog because I have been collecting photos of my makes so there is loads to show you.

Because my last op I was harassed by other patients who just had to talk to me even when I was obviously listening to music with my head phones on and really did not feel up to socialising I have this time made a sleep mask. Then hopefully they will leave me alone. Yes that is antisocial but seriously some people just want to chatter incessantly and I really felt ill after the last op.

Hopefully a sleep mask and headphones will put them off. I might of course get nicer people in with me this time. 

Anyway just in case I decided to make a sleep mask. Or a friend suggested it. It's a free pattern from the UK burdastyle website. 

Fabric of the best version is woven cotton camo one side then French terry the other.

I did attempt one in just French terry but it's s bit dodgy and wavy round the edges. Probably needs interfacing but I only need this for one day and its tomorrow so  Ijust sewed this as is. Never mind. I only need one and the woven one will work well.

Here you can see the French terry version,  woven and French terry lined and the pattern piece.

These are so simple to make. 

Have a lovely week and I promise to be back soon with lots of sewn makes. And it should be much easier to sew again in a few weeks because in all honesty it's been difficult for at least 6 months now.  Tomorrow the surgeons will fix me. If it's as good as my right leg it will be amazing.

Thanks for visiting and take care

Back soon

Bracken 

Lang yarn men's socks using Winwick Mum techniques

These are not photographed in the best surroundings due to the rain when they were photographed so they are taken in my very eclectic and colourful conservatory. The light is OK its just the miss-matched furnishings!

Well I have knitted several pairs of socks for myself as well as a few pairs of child sized socks. Now my partner wants some and I wanted to get these done well before winter so I really went for it in knitting these. I even did a swatch to work out how many stitches to fit his feet - using the Winwick Mum stitch count method.

The yarn is Lang. I bought it in Krakow several years ago so have no idea of the current price and I also lost the ball band so I do not know the colourway. I am quite sure it, or a very similar colour will still be available if you wanted some. Lang do some amazing sock yarns and they wear really well. The pair I made for myself back in 2022 are still in really good condition despite being worn regularly. In fact I have made a couple of Lang sock yarn pairs and they all wear well but the 2022 ones are my first in actual sock yarn. I have since reduced my stitches to make them a bit smaller but even with the first pair being slightly loose they are still going strong.  My rainbow socks were also Lang and I bought all these sock yarns together in Krakow. That was my souvenir present to myself when we had a holiday there. I still have a couple of balls in my stash in fact that have yet to be knitted. 

Anyway after doing a swatch, in the end I needed 64 stitches to get socks to fit my UK sized 10 shoe partner. And you can see they do fit which made me very happy. You can never be sure until you finish this kind of project after all though we did do several tryings on as this project progressed.

I followed the basic sock free pattern from Winwick Mum so not too difficult and the only real thing is getting your head round using 2.5mm needles. That said its now my 9th or 10th pair of socks. I have actually lost count! Wow! Nit something I would have considered possible a few years ago.

Anyway here se my latest socks. 

Depending on how useful he finds them I may be knitting my partner a second pair. But I am waiting to see if these get worn first. My partner cycles in all weather's so they may get well worn this winter. We will see.

When I made these I wound each part of the sock yarn ball into two separate balls. With Lang thats easy because the centre of the 100g ball has a plain white bit and then sock 2 starts. So its pretty easy to pattern match these Lang yarns. You start at the centre of the balls though each sock on the ball band must be a toe up because I have all the patterns in reverse. Mine are top down socks. That really does not matter about the reversal of the stripe pattern though. 

My only annoyance? 

Well I did exactly the same number of rows and exactly began the yarn at the same point on the ball for both socks but the yarn is not exact in printing because one toe has an extra purple row to the other and I am positive its the yarn not my knitting. Still its not really such a problem and except for me no one will ever know. My partner cannot see it even when I pointed this out.

Thanks for visiting and see you again soon.

Take care

Bracken 

Leggings 3

These are my 3rd pair of basic leggings made in activwear fabric - and made the correct size to fit me!

They are an almost tie dye effect and very summery. Perhaps more than either of the other pairs.

These are my first two pairs:

I have actually made a 4th pair but have yet to get good photos of one of these but they are swimwear fabric so similar, but different. These are a wicking activewear fabric.

I just ordered another 1m piece of activewear fabric in a different print but I suspect the last pair will get made next spring because its already August and I tend to wear fleece lined lined leggings all winter.
I am intending to see how french terry with lycra works this winter. I bought some to try but I really do not know yet if leggings made from French terry will just become baggy and out of shape.
Anyway this last pair are thin active wear fabric ( though not thin fabric it's 210gsm and feels safe for doing "active stuff in and lovely for cooler days in summer. Especially so in this print in fact.

I am hoping to get some photos this weekend of other items I have made because my photographing has fallen behind somewhat meaning its impossible to stay up-to-date with my blogging and that is something I find very frustrating!

Of course it also means when you wear things you made their is also a chance they could be damaged before I get to catalogue them and I like to do this as much for myself as my bog because I find I forget the making details over time and when I want to replace something its very handy to have it available to me to look up so I can do the same again. Or of course make any differences that I decide would be advantageous in my next rendition of this or that item.

I do hope Blogger keeps going because I did start a WordPress account but never got round to moving everything over to it. Its probably something I really should get round to in fact. Ah for a few more hours in the day!

So thats it for this week until I get some photos taken. Have a great weekend and thanks for popping by,

Take care

Bracken

Knitted Clanger- 2 weeks to knit, 7 months to construct!

This toy was incredibly hard to photograph well. Normally I ensure my photos are the right way up and make sense when I write my posts. This time it seems to not matter and when I adjusted one photo I ended up returning it to how it started so please bear with the slightly off photos for this blog post. 

This is a Tiny Clanger from the BBC TV series which despite its aimed at very young kids I still love and have been a fan since the original 1970s series. The BBC released this knitting pattern for Tiny Clanger many years ago and its something I have had on my to-do list for absolutely years. So this toy is made using free pattern I downloaded years ago. It's still free though. The pattern uses 4 ply. I used DK hence my upscaling of the clothing is out of scale. I did ok with the feet I think but not the tabard ( if that's what you would call it?). Maybe Armour is better?

Feet are black felt (synthetic from amazon,) on top but brown underneath cos I didn't want to buy any more so used what I had. It's the same stuff I used for the Easter basket last year. It comes in 50 or so coloured squares per pack. I accidentally ended up with it on subscribe and save and didn't realise till the second pack arrived. Anyway according to the pattern both top and bottom of the feet should be black felt. I added a piece of tupperware for strengthening in side each foot to make them more rigid.

The pattern does not do this but many many years ago myself and several friends got into the Rave movement and I made, for lots of people, velvet baseball caps. To make the peaks I used tupperwares so if you fancied doing that its a cheat way to get a harder but washable strengthened area. It works for the Clanger feet anyway.

You can see here the armour is a bit small!!!

Has to be said though it useful to have two sheets of each colour of felt so if you did buy some with the idea of crafting rather than for children then you probably want two packs. Though the colours are slightly different per pack. Though I received them a month appart so maybe if bought together you get the same mix of colours. The tabard is actually 2 slightly different shades of red. The pattern uses pink but the child this was for chose red. It works. 

The clanger us 100% wool except for the hair. That's acrylic because I had some stashed. The wool was cheaper per 100g than acrylic so I went with the environmentally friendly option. It might turn out to be a mistake. It's meant to be washable but the child who now owns it is 2 so it's likely to need washing quite a bit. 

Small person who now owns this Clanger seems not to care a jot its all a bit small but it is not I beleive going to stand up to play well so I reckon I will ask small person if he would like me to alter it. It occurs to me while writing this I could glue these pieces to new felt pieces which would thicken the rather thin felt sheets and in turn make the armour more substantial. Then just use a sewing machine to sew them together nd cut around each piece to make them larger. 

If you look at the CF panel as well I did the embroidery the wrong way round it should lie the other way so the longer side across the Clanger body not down it.


Anyway the pattern is odd in the way it's constructed and the strange increases and decreases to get shaping buy its easy to knit. It's however in loads if bits. Like each ear has 2 knitted bits plus felt. So I spent just over 2 weeks knitting this then 7 months to finish it. 

Armour/ Tabard is far too small!!!

The tabard is embroidered in gold thread. I bought this when experimenting with using odd bits of yarn. The silver skein was used for my blue aran. Though I still gave enough of both gold and silver for several mire garments. I think its easier to sew with than knit with actually but I am not an embroidered. I am truly rubbish at embroidered so this took ages.

So yes the entire project took ages actually and I am so glad Tiny Clanger finally got finished. Its a project that started to really get to me because it was taking so very long to get her finished. When I began I had ideas to make all 5 of the current Clangers but I don't have the heart to repeat this right now so have just stopped with Tiny. This does mean I still have 4 balls of this pink DK and I am not a pink person so now need to find a way to use that. Hopefully something will come to me because its a good quality yarn. I really don't want to just give it away. 

If I really do want to knit more Clangers I can always buy more yarn.

Ah the yarn is the Drops Karisma that I used for a jumper previously and its a very good prive from Wool Warehouse if you wanted some. Its 100% wool. Red is also Karisma left over from the mushroom season jumper. Black is embroidery thread. Yellow is acrylic from Aldi.

Have a lovely week, thanks for visiting,

Bracken