Knitting Randomly

Random Lessons, Part 2

My first lesson randomness occurred at the Great Sand Dunes.

My second lesson occurred a few years later when I found "Glorious Knits" by Kaffe Fassett. This was in the late 1980's.

I fell in love with the Toothed Stripe Waistcoat and decided that I had to make one, even though I could barely knit.

Both the colors and the teeth are stitched randomly. A small section of the pattern is charted with some advice on how to keep stitching the design without using the chart.

Unike walking randomly, which I found impossible, I found knitting randomly to be easy. After I had decided the colors for one section, I could think about the next section. I would have time to change my mind a few times before I had to make another decision. It turned out that I didn't need a chart.

It was great fun to knit the sweater. I enjoyed using many bright yarns and watching them come together to form a pattern. In fact, this project spoiled knitting for me for a long time. Anything else I started quickly became boring. I finished one other sweater and started several others. I'm just now re-discovering the abandoned bags of yarn and needles with a few inches of knitting.

However, the lessons learned on how to be random were remembered and used again and again.

To try this yourself all you need is a copy of the book, graph paper and colored pencils (or yarn and knitting needles if you are adventurous).

Comments

It's about time - the big reveal

My bright quilt was finished in June but I wanted to wait until both were done before sharing the pictures. Quilting the blue quilt didn't take long but finishing the binding sure did. I did procrastinate a bit as it was too warm to have a huge quilt on my lap for most of the summer. After this, I'll probably do all the binding on my sewing machine (and stick to smaller quilts). Notice the cut-out corners? That was a challenge. I found instructions here and it looked easy enough but I wished I had practiced some. After a lot of finessing I finally got good miters but I could have done much better. The cut-out corners allow the quilt to hang nicely over the edges of the mattress and it's a perfect match for a full sized mattress. But, the top edge isn't even close to the pillows. I wonder how the quilt fit on the bed it was made for. Here, at last, is the original quilt that I was copying. I just noticed - all of the baskets are

Basted

A few weeks ago I was at the Local Quilt store basting my bright sampler. It's been ready to go for a while. I've been working on a baby quilt and it's now done. It's been a while since I've quilted so I'm glad I had a quilt to warm up on. Next I need to pull a folding table out of the garage and re-arrange my quilting space. This quilt will have a lot more drag than the baby quilt. I've also been looking at pictures of similar quilts looking for quilting pattern inspiration. I'm thinking of taking the easy way out and u se wavy lines like this quilt . I should start quilting next weekend!

The last 2 blocks and the tops are done!

I needed 2 more blocks to finish the gray version of the quilt. I ended up making simple 9 patch/half square triangle blocks. One is the yellow block in the lower left. Here it is closer up. When I made the half square triangles I had the red fabric going the wrong way so you are seeing the backside of the fabric. So the red in the triangles is a little lighter than the red in the center. It wasn't worth redoing. The other corner has a blue block and I managed to get the front of all the fabrics showing. So, here's what it looks like almost complete. And here's the blue version of the quilt. I've got the backing and the batting for the gray quilt (the backing is in the washer now) and I'm working on the thread to use for quilting and how to quilt it. They are too big for me to free-motion quilt. I don't have the space. As it is, quilting with the walking foot will be a challenge. These tops deserve so

Erica's Stitches

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