French Terry rainbow leggings

When I made my Geodesic patchwork top I also made two pairs of cotton french terry leggings. This fabric has lycra in it. When I first used it to make several sweatshirts and dresses I did not trust this though so I never made leggings. However as time went by I also made some baby clothes and clothes for small kids as well as joggers and I realised they none of them seem to get "knees" in them so the lycra must work.

So, I have decided this winter to see how making leggings from this fabric really works. They are obviously much warmer than normal cotton lycra or performance fabric but these fabrics are all pretty "cold" to wear in winter at least here in the UK where its usually wet and often also freezing. Or at least you feel chilly when you wear these and I am sick to death of tracksuits after being in recovery for the last couple of months so I need a change. I can't wait to be able to comfortably wear something else but that's not just yet. A friend of mine who is Polish told me she hates the rain here. In Poland apparently its cold and damp in winter but rains much less. It did rain when I visited Poland, but since I never lived there and was only there a couple of weeks in the middle of winter, I cannot honestly comment if this is true but it would not surprise me, because we do get loads of rain and I know where my brother lives in Provence he gets much more snow in winter but much less rain and he has very hot summers which we only get occasionally. Actually I would like more snow and less rain!

Anyway these leggings are an experiment. I made two pairs. One in this red colour ( well its red next to the blue fabric!). And one in the same blue I used for the top I made. 

his then gives me a nice new look for winter. The leggings so far are warm. I assume if it snows I will still feel cold but they are warmer than I usually wear. They will be a good base layer under snow trousers too. I tend to store my leggings over winter or wear just under skirts instead of tights so this is a new winter look for me. If these work well next spring I intend to make lots of french terry leggings for the following winter. 

I am not sure if I mentioned I have tried to take a new stance when I sew. I am hoping to make next summer's clothing this winter and then the winter clothes next summer. It really does not work well making things for "now" because by the time I finish them the weather often changes. I am sure it will not stop the odd seasonal make but this is my new way to sew. I will see how it works once I can actually sew again. 

Mind you today for the first time I managed to get a pair of leggings on so that's good news and means I am getting back to normal. I still cannot reach to wash my foot at the end of the operated hip/leg! Its so frustrating! I tried in the shower and in the bath. Just cannot do it!

A friend said recently "its just downhill from here on in". I do hope she is wrong! Mind you some people only see the bad things in life. I am hoping to fully recover. I managed it last time so this should be similar.

Back to this outfit. I have yet to try on my new blue leggings. I made both just before the operation, so never got photos, but hopefully over the next few days I will get some. 

These are just my usual TNT patterns McCall's 6173. 

I have several other leggings patterns but decided to stick with basic for these because I need to know this fabric works before its worth fiddling matching up pieces of more colour-block types of patterns. If they do work then I have a bin liner full of bits to play with later for some real multi-coloured versions. Basic first though. Also this is an outfit and I really like that because I am not going straight back to work like usual, but taking a short break and that means just for a little while I am truly the authentic me. That's nice and not something I am honestly able to say when I am working. 

And these items will work great for Autumn layering:

You will have to ignore the slippers. I am having some problems getting shoes on right now so do not unless strictly necessary.

What I have been up to in place of my sewing is buying lots of fabric online. 

Well what else do you do when you have to sit still for days and days? 

I will try to catalogue it for you soon and show what I have bought and what I intend to do with it. A bit like at New Year I usually have some kind of aims and plans. Well right now my head is buzzing with ideas. 

Though I probably have more fabric than I should have bought but its very nice and I actually bought fabric with a definite intentions this time. Usually I random buy, stash, then try to work out what to make later. This time I sat down with my Burdas and some Knipmodes and I planned. 

I even recorded in a notebook where to find what I want and how much fabric I need! 

Organised or what!

I then made a list and bought specific fabric for what I want to make. Some of this has been on my to-make list for years and I now have the correct fabric types to get this done. 

I will have to do this as a separate post because its going to take me a while, but I do want to share this. There are some lovely fabrics around right now at good prices too. I have waited since 2015 to find some at decent prices so I will get on with this over the next few days.

In the meantime have a great week and thanks for visiting,

Bracken

Geodesic sweatshirt with pointed pixie hood

 

I bought this pattern many years ago when The Monthly Stitch was still running. It was part of a pattern bundle I bought during the Indie Pattern Month. I always intended to make it but until now never had the correct fabric. 

The Geodesic pattern does not have a hood but I wanted one so decided to use an existing top to copy. The problem though is the RTW hood is far too small. Its for aesthetics rather than use ( hippy stuff from a festival!). So I needed to make it quite a lot bigger so its actually a real hood to keep me warm not just something pretty to hang down my back.

So I traced round the RTW hippy hood then transposed the hood from a Burda sweatshirt that I know fits me on top and drew round the new design.

After cutting it out this is what I got:

The hood pattern is a very strange shape. I nearly sewed it on upside down but luckily I realised when pinning what I had done. 

This fabric is actually two french terrys ( cotton and lycra) from Pound Fabrics and both were my birthday gift to myself back in July. I did not have a clue what I would do with them just I liked them and so I bought 2m of each. So not the cheapest top since both fabrics were £9.50 /m. 

But the blue in particular is beautiful with gold flecks and I don't mean dark yellow I do mean metallic gold. The "red" is a multi coloured space scape type of print.  Though I also got a pair of leggings from each colour and have enough for a top made from the "red" colour too. I have not yet cut that and it will be a more basic top than this one.

It hit me to make the Geodesic when I was getting ready to have the operation. This then, was one of the last things I sewed. I have been planning to make one for years just never getting round to actually doing it. That never shortening to-sew list! 

I also made two pairs of leggings in these fabrics, which will be a nice change from my usual boring black french terry ones ( H&M) that I wear for most winters. Since I am not right now working they should brighten up my winter as well as keep me warm. Anyway right now I still have a swollen ankle and foot so cannot wear the leggings but decided to wear the top today. It was my first outing in fact  ( other than physio anyway) after the op to see my Mum. I was so happy to actually go somewhere and not be stuck inside. I have missed all but the first few days of September and half of October. 

So we stopped en-route and took these photos.

The pattern itself is an easy make.

 Its tedius cutting all those triangles and the pockets are tricky though not difficult. 

My calculations here were incorrect. I needed two more triangles to make this but it worked in the end. 

If you enjoy patchwork you would enjoy making this top. I made the longer version. 

I lengthened the sleeves with the intention not to have sleeve bands but just hems but I found they were still short so added the bands anyway. So if you do make this pattern check your sleeve length. I didn't I just assumed I would want them longer. I was lucky!

Surprisingly my pixie hood worked a treat. I am pleased with that and will be using that pattern again on a different top or dress. Not so sure as yet what I will make but I do like the hood very much. 

Now when I bought this, I had thought it would be a great pattern for remnants. In the end I properly designed this down to deciding not to have the triangles on the back etc. I just have a plain back piece ( a pattern option)  because I reckon this top looks better with that. I went for an all over blue look too rather than contrasting hood. I do have lots of French terry offcuts though so might have to have a go at another of these in a more multi-coloured remnanty mix in the future because it will be a good way to not waste those bits of fabric you get left with that are just too good to throw. And really how many offcuts do I need for possible pocket linings?

Ah in case you wanted to know the trousers are camo sweatshirting made here.

I have to say though I do love my tracksuits and luckily have loads of different choices of tracksuits, but having lived in them for the last 6 weeks I really do not intend to wear them again (once I can get into normal clothes) for at least a month. I can't wait to wear something else!

Have a lovely week and thanks for visiting,

Bracken

WATG socks finished and a new pair started!

 

Updated photos, since the original ones are not very good. These show both my socks and the pattern. As you can see they are quite tight, The result of using a smaller needle to get the pattern to work! Possibly I should have made a larger size. Though they have turned out comfortable to wear and snug. I am just hoping my toe nails do not poke through because right now I still cannot bend and my nails have grown very long over the last few weeks. I think it should be ok though since I am still stuck at home and not wearing shoes.

Not the best photo I am afraid and apparently I never even put my socks on straight,  but the best when I am still recovering. Not long to go now. I have a meeting with my consultant on 23rd and hopefully after that I have no precautions ( keeping my hip at an angle less than 90 degrees, bending forward etc etc) and with luck I should also be allowed to drive again. 

These WATG socks:

I think despite all the issues I mentioned in my previous post they have come out OK.

I like the leopard-skin pattern very much though I still think the kit is overpriced and not in the least flexible.

Further to my previous issues - there is only enough patterned yarn for this size of sock which is a skimpy sized 39 or UK size 6. I am actually a UK 5.5 in shoes!

I would have had to have very large blue toes to get a larger size so yes very lucky there I think to be the correct size for this kit!

Doing the WATG recommended after thought heel would not, I think, alter this very much if at all.

There is tons of blue for the toes though so I assume that's what you have to do for the larger sizes. As previously mentioned I find the top of the sock so the ankle bit far too short. Shorter by 3-4cm than the usual Winwick Mum patterns and by around 12cm shorter than I like to make for myself. I like longer socks. See below for my choice of sock length!

 

There is also this waste bright yellow yarn you get at the start, middle ( where the second sock starts ) and end of the ball and there is just too much of that. Lang do a similar thing and have a bit of pure white yarn to differentiate between the two socks in the single ball but they waste far less yarn. Their separation part is a metre or less in length and works fine. You would have to be pretty stupid not to understand the white bit marks the second sock. I honestly think the WATG kits are wasting far too much yarn and I suspect most people who make these just throw it away. 

Considering WATG market themselves as a sustainable company with lots of very nice recycled yarns I think this is terrible. I really was drawn to this company because of their recycled yarns I have to admit though other than this kit, which was a birthday present, I have never bought any due to they are so very expensive. But I do like the idea. 

Instead I tend to buy "old" as in sold on Ebay or in Charity shops ( "Thrift" shops in some countries)  from peoples lofts and maybe 1970s, 1980s and even 1950s yarns. That gives a viable sustainable alternative, for now anyway, for people like me who have limited money. And most of what I have bought this way has been good quality and quite beautiful!

So these sock kits: well I have lots of this yellow yarn and also the rest of the blue toe yarn and I do not like wasting yarn so I decided to start another pair. After all I have some sock yarn available sitting next to me though only this one ball at the moment.  I cannot go in my loft which is where my stash is so cannot access the rest so this will have to do the job. Its a nice colour and will cheer up my winter. 

This is WYS Signature 4ply yarn in Summer Sunset:

The yellow cast on and top stripes are the waste yarn from one WATG sock and I have even more I did not use. Since I have 3 pairs of these WATG sock kits ( so 2 pairs left to knit) I am going to have lots of this bright yellow. 

The blue heel is the blue from the toes of my leopard skin socks. I considered a striped heel with yellow stripes but will save the rest for a different pair since its the same yellow they use for all 3 pairs so I will have lots of bright yellow edges or stripes in the coming months I think. I might do yellow toes? Not sure. Maybe they would be best in blue. I have yet to decide. You can see I still have lots of the blue left and this is just the one sock so I have double this.

Ah one other thing, to get the leopard print to work ( well almost!) I ended up using a 2.25mm needle. Really I suspect it might work better on a 2mm needle but I have bad arthritis in my hands and a swan neck  ( deformed)  finger so I really could not use a 2mm needle due to the pain so I made do with the almost ok leopard skin spots with the 2.25mm. 

I actually started knitting when I read on an arthritis forum that knitting works better than Physio if you have the issues I have with my hands. I never would have believed when I was younger I could knit something like socks on such tiny needles. Its actually easier than using larger needles and knitting a jumper though due to the weight of bigger items. Anyway it still hurts, especially when you first pick the knitting up, but an hour or so a day is better than most physio workouts - and my Rheumatology consultant agrees!

But a 2.25mm needles seems far different to using a 2.5mm needle. It does not sound so different but pain-wise its massive. There has been a very unexpected upside to this though. When I went back to knitting on a normal 2.5mm needle to do this pair of WYS socks ( using the Winwick Mum basic sockalong pattern) I have unexpectedly found I am knitting this so fast. I do not think I had sped up at all but the ease of using the 2.5mm needle has meant I have in 2 days knitted what normally takes me 2-6 months! Wow!

Its not like I am speeding a long but its just so easy and I have got so used to the pain of the 2.25mm that these bigger needles are a dream and I can knit for longer than usual so the sock is growing so fast. I also an stuck recovering of course! Its keeping me busy.

Well, assuming these get finished before next summer I will show you how they go ina  few weeks if I continue to knit at my current rate. 

As for my other 2 pairs of WATG socks. I think maybe I will join the two pairs together and do stripes of different coloured leopard-skin and see if that makes for an interesting sock. It will at the least make them longer. I have not decided really how to deal with them as yet. At least I now know what sized needle will give reasonable results.

Have a lovely week, see you again soon

Bracken

Upcycled Furry waistcoat

 

This is essentially a free project. It also is a very quick sewing project for when I am recovering and unable to sew with a machine. Its actually been on my sewing pile for years and because I needed to hand sew the hem has stayed there. Every winter it comes out again. Every spring I put it back away not having finished it. I even wore it with dangly threads and a chopped lining inside it when I went out shopping a few times because I really like it but never got round to this small bit of hand sewing. 

Anyway that does mean this project will not be a waste of time because it has been worn half-made for years!

Originally this waistcoat was a second hand fur coat which I bought to use a piece of the fur around the hood of a jacket. 

I do not actually remember what the coat cost, but not much, which is why I used it for my trim. It was also much better quality fur than I could at that time source so it ticked all the boxes. It did seem a shame to waste the rest of the coat though. 

And then of course I was left with the rest of the jacket. I took the sleeves off a while later - not too sure what happened to them but suspect somewhere in my fabric stash. If I find them I am considering making a muff. Anyway the jacket pretty soon became this waistcoat, just I never finished sewing it. I sewed around the armholes by zigzag ages ago. Probably after about a year of just wearing as it was around the house. But the hem just stayed this cut off frayed mess. 

Then about a week ago it occurred to me that I am sitting here vegetating because I am not allowed to sew. I had a total hip replacement. Though as you can see I can now stand without crutches! I do not actually walk really as yet but physio will hopefully make me stronger very soon. I want to be normal again and really need to be able to use a sewing machine. Anyway, time to do the bits of hand sewing I can manage and this is very basic easy sewing because you cannot really see if I do not do perfect stitches and to be honest I am rubbish at hand sewing. 

The waistcoat is worn here with a pair of my camo joggers and my green velvet top ( and my new hat!). Also because this was originally a coat it has more hooks at the front than most RTW waistcoats of this type making it much warmer to wear. 

I am starting to feel very wintery now. I really need to find out the other items of hand sewing I need to do. I do not have many because using a hand sewing needle is something I actively avoid but there is a couple of other things I could do now that will mean I get stuff sorted out that has been left in most cases for years. Otherwise I am stuck with reading and doing the odd bit of knitting and I am very slow at that as well. 

Have a great week and hope to see you again soon,

Take care

Bracken

The Isolation hat revisited

I made this hat pattern before when it was new ( and free because the designer gave it away for free when she was in Isolation due to covid. Hence the pattern name.)

The first version is not so well knitted. Its made in 100% lace weight mohair/ acrylic yarn. This version has different yarn and is more substantial in feel. 

I used a different lace weight mohair that is mohair/nylon in two shades of dark purple. I used these colours previously in a bat wing jumper I made a long time ago now. I look so young on those posts! Mind you its nearly 10 years ago. The pale pink yarn that runs through the hat is a vintage 100% wool sock yarn bought on a whim from Ebay. It's I believe 1950s yarn and it's 3ply. I bought 3 colours and this is the pink. I also have peach and yellow- all pastels. 

It also contains no nylon hence I have not used for socks because they would not last long. 

The darker purple is 2 strands of kid mohair in two colours on the main part of the hat and just one strand/ colour on the ribbing. The body also has a strand of gold glitter. I used this stuff before in an aran. Then I used it to tie together loads of oddments of similar coloured yarns to make it look like just the one yarn. This time its just for a bit of glam. Unfortunately the gold doesn't show in the photos so please just believe me it adds a bit of sparkle to the knitting which I hope will cheer me up come nasty cold winter ( usually wet) weather. If only we could have more snow and less rain! I do not mind the cold really just the constant wet we have here in the UK.

Ah also the original pattern has a seed stitch edge so the single stitch you increase for the main ( in original pattern)  I added to the ribbing to get the right stitch pattern. That's all I changed though. The shaping etc is as the original. I prefer a ribbed edge but that's just me. I did version 1 exactly as the pattern so this time its time for adjusting for me ( as you do!).

I actually knitted this hat in the summer. I am trying hard now to think ahead and plan more sensibly so make winter clothing in summer and summer clothing in winter rather than make when you need only to find its not yet finished and the weather has changed. 

Really I made another of these hats because I thought I had lost the original version when we had a family outing to a country park and was gutted to lose it so decided to make a new one. 

In the end I had not lost the hat but the warning was made I would miss it very much. The hat actually turned up at the end of the day out, stuck down the back of my jacket! 

I was so lucky I had not lost it and realised at that point I really need another if I like that design so much. Hence version 2.

The star stitch is easy though it's tricky knowing where to make it once you get past the first few rows. This is especially the case when you do not knit it for a few days and when you go back its a case of when to do the star. I needed to unpick a couple of times because of this but all in all this is a very straightforward hat to knit. The star pattern shows much better on this choice of yarn than on my first version. I think I am going to like this hat even better and I love the original.

Thanks again to the designer for this pattern.

Have a great week,

Bracken

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