Yet another hat, and almost a scarf

Happy New Year! I hope you are well! We went back into lockdown 3 on the 6th January. It's getting BORING now - but on the plus side, no having to de-ice the car of a morning. I'm actually looking forward to getting proper snow, because this winter we'll actually get to play in it like big kids and not have to navigate it in the car. Always got to look for the upside!

Yet another handknit hat - this is from two ends of leftover sock yarn, held together. I love the way the colours alternate, a happy accident! I really need to donate some of these hats but I love them all so much, it's hard to let them go.

Almost finished, bar completing the fringing, the garter stitch scarf I started last week. It's some sort of Shetland wool from Uppinghams which doesn't appear to felt, despite not being marked as superwash. For personal reference, the pictures below indicate the positions of the end stitch cams (green) and the RH turnaround cam (white). It didn't seem to matter where I put the LH turnaround cam, it seemed to affect the patterning, so consequently I left it out in the end. They work by reducing the "turnaround" time where the garter carriage isn't knitting, so speed up the overall knitting. According to the scant instructions that come with them, anywhere within 24 sts of the edge should work. Some experimentation is required, methinks.

Tripper for the KH950i

Current mood: weary but coping.

Twixtmas fun

Well, I hope you've had a nice week relaxing. The Cog and I have spent lots of time in front of the tv watching films and enjoying being lazy (rather too lazy but never mind!). Most of the UK suddenly went back into full lockdown as of today, so I got a last minute hair appointment yesterday. A good job too as my fringe was starting to behave like curtains again. I managed to order a new sponge bar for the Brother KH950i before xmas - it arrived in good time, but the Hermes bloke is apparently not keen on ringing the doorbell. It's a good job it was well-wrapped, as the day it arrived, it rained so much there was a lot of localised flooding in the area. It was leaning against the front door - luckily I was in and out emptying bins, so I don't think the tube was outside too long. 

As you can see, I've started knitting another MK cowl from this pattern. To start with, stitches were dropping all over the place - I swapped about 6 needles out in the end PLUS the gc needle. Seems my garter carriage doesn't appreciate lots of weight. Tuesday afternoon was very frustrating - I couldn't leave it unattended without having to reform knit stitches every 8 rows - it's a block stitch pattern already in the machine's memory, 6 stitches by 8 rows. Someone posted an odd question on one of the big Ravelry forums recently - something about machine knitting and cheating. As you can imagine, that rather got my dander up, especially as someone else recounted a tale of being denied access to a sales venue where someone else was selling clothing made with sewing machine and serger. If anything, I'd say machine knitting is harder to learn than handknitting. You can easily teach yourself a new stitch pattern, or retrain yourself to knit continental. When the machine plays up, who do you turn to? How do you figure out what's wrong, when there are many more variables?

Yes, I did manage to successfully another hat, and knit the front, back and one sleeve of a very plain jumper yesterday on the Passap - whilst keeping a watchful eye on the garter carriage, which behaved impeccably. I've still one sleeve to go, and then I've to figure out how to join the shoulders and knit the neck on the Passap - that will be a manual operation I've not tried before, but should be ok. The lack of holding position on the Passap is the main bugbear. This one's not cut and sew, so at least that step is skipped. I might write it up as a simple pattern - the yarn is Yeoman Cashmilon, which knits up beautifully at ss5.5 on the E6000 in stocking stitch. You can knit the whole lot on the E6000 with console off, including a round neck (once I figured out how to mimic holding position with LX and no pushers).

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - machine knitting just speeds up the boring bits for me so I get more time to concentrate on the fun bits (patterning, designing, cables etc). Truly creative people will understand that I think. It being a machine it's just as prone to error as the human mind -  in fact, ironing out the bugs - too much weight? Not enough? Did I forget to add the end stitch cams (I did!) - teaches the student patience and forbearance. 

With that in mind, if anyone wants to book me for a Zoom 1-2-1 lesson in machine knitting, I am more than happy to try and help. I'm in the GMT time zone and it'll either be weekends or weeknights, £10 for a forty minute zoom call. I can set up my DSLR as a webcam so you will be able to see what I am doing. 

Mum has agreed to "bubble" with us, which means she can come for lunch tomorrow - she's widowed and since Grandma passed away I think she's been quite lonely, especially on Sunday afternoon. It's her birthday today, so tomorrow will be a double celebration. I only delayed asking because I didn't want to ask her to choose between my sister and I (sister is more at risk because three of them are in school). The Cog's not very keen - I agree the whole "bubble" thing is rubbish, there is always still a risk, but as we both WFH and Mum is very sensible I think it's minimal. Plus I'm not in the same town as Mum and sister, so they can "doorstep" each other when required. 

We'll be having our regular NYE party later - just the Cog and I at home, good telly, beer, nibbles and giggles. Here's to 2021 being better - 2020 can get lost! 

Current mood: happy

MKKI day, May 5th, 2012

I promised to do a review of the MKKI day last weekend, so here it is. Apologies if I ramble somewhat, as mentioned before, work's been really busy, and the office move has meant extra chaos and stress - printers beeping all day because they keep jamming (because we couldn't locate the A4 paper to refill them), drilling, etc. I'm sure it'll all come together, but it's going to take a few weeks yet I think. Couple that with lots of quotes going on (which is GOOD news, of course!) and it makes for one frazzled steelbreeze with airhead brain. It will take me a week or two to top my sleep back up I think.

The original idea was formed as a result of two things - a meet up last year with various Ravellers, and also the idea of the workshop days that Manor House mk group organise. Bearing in mind that most knitting machine manufacturers are no longer in production, it's rather hard to see a live knitting machine in use (especially the Passap as it is not very portable). My favourite room at Metropolitan is the "museum" room, with all the vintage machines, and lots of the Ravellers have these machines. So, a vague idea formed that we would all meet up with our various machines and have a bit of a play on them. Of course, I would take all of my machines (which is almost in double figures - how did that happen?).

Getting a bit nearer to the event, I checked out the insurance aspects, and discovered that contents insurance  only covers personal possessions outside the home if you damage them yourself. If someone else damages them, forget about it - you are not insured. Then of course there was the electrical aspect of some of the machines - PAT testing would be required. With all the red tape to wade through, I can see why people don't organise more events. If the Guild hadn't kindly offered to let us use their public liability insurance, the event would not have gone ahead at all, as it would have made a loss - I would have been happy to break even, of course. I had to draft up a disclaimer to cover the machine aspects, and I visually PAT tested the electrical items before they were plugged in (which is all you can do for 1980s electronics apparently).

It doesn't take much to disrupt my sleep at the best of times, but worrying about the legal aspects, combined with work pressures and other events meant I pretty much gave up on sleep for the fortnight proceeding the event, only sleeping every other night or only getting a few hours. Still, it meant I lost 8 pounds in weight, and I got plenty of typing done. I rang Covknit in a blind panic, and she kindly offered to help out with the programme and the typing up. Couldn't have done it without her - lack of sleep meant my mind was driven to distraction, so clear thinking went out of the window. Turns out she used to organise events for a rotary club, so she was perfect, and logically thought of lots of things we should pack that I'd not even thought of. The venue wasn't as large as I remembered (thank goodness for measuring it up, and taking photos), and there was a large stack of easels in one corner that we needed to work around. This actually helped me decide which machines I must bring, and which would have to stay behind - and meant I could cancel the transit van I'd booked, because that would have come out of my own pocket, and being a bank holiday weekend would cost me more for the extra day.

So I took Friday off to load the cars and print up programmes and posters. As it turned out, had I gone into work I'd've only got an hour's work done anyway, as I had a dental appointment first thing (two fillings needed! Boo!) and the servers were going down at noon. I spent the day packing the cars and rationalising what I was taking, then making a trip to Sainsers for nibbles and supplies.

By 6am the next morning I was raring to go, and I unearthed the Cog with breakfast (works every time!). We were outside the venue and unlocking just after 8am - and HilaryGermany surprised us both by being there before us (she and hubby drove from Suffolk). I spent two hours unpacking and arranging things as everyone arrived. We had a sales table in the kitchen area with lots of magazines and other goodies.

rmbroo started off with a description of her vintage record machine, which is a glorified knitting loom that does garter stitch. Alas it doesn't work at the moment because one of the feet is damaged - they look like wedge-shaped door stops and control the tension of the machine. HilaryGermany demonstrated her Passap Duomatic, which I think could probably take a whole day in itself, they are such interesting machines. I demoed the circular sock machine, the Hague linker, and the Weavemaster. The latter didn't go to plan as I pulled the wrong lever and the warp came out. Yes, I had forgotten how ruddy fiddly it is - and it's not possible to set it up beforehand, because the machine isn't clamped down and would get damaged in transit, so it's not very portable. Kathy demonstrated her KISS knitting frames, which are very cleverly made modular knitting frames. Martync demonstrated seaming on the knitting machine and navajo plying using an electric spinning wheel. I got my garter carriage working and then tested three others - we couldn't get them working properly because we didn't have the right rails, but they appeared to function correctly so I see no reason why they shouldn't work on the correct machine. Cynthia gave us a short talk on tips and tricks she's picked up during her many years as a machine knitter. Bookishbee brought an MK70 which has a fascinating pulley device for tensioning yarn - no taking your eyeballs out with tension wires.

Of course, it was all over far too quickly. We were packed and ready to go by 5pm, and nipped around the corner for pizza. It was lots of fun, and I think most people enjoyed themselves. Not sure if I want to do it again just yet - I need to let the dust settle, and my brain/sleep to recover - but there's definitely some interest in another event like this. I think next time I would simplify it by having folks only bring one machine, and maybe bring a pot luck lunch.

Trying to set up a Weavemaster - this was before it went pear-shaped.

Demoing the Hague linker

Brother's toy machine - sooo pink, sooo cute!

Lots of knitting machines to play with.

HilaryGermany demonstrating the deco

The CSM in action

More photos here

Current mood: exhausted

FO: Cowl

100_2329
Originally uploaded by steel breeze

This is Kriskrafter's pattern. More details and a link on Ravelry. Made on the Brother KH950i with the KG93 garter carriage. Uppinghams baby acrylic 4ply, T7.

Garter carriage in action

gc_in_action
Originally uploaded by steel breeze

I also videoed this but it's not a very exciting video. This is what is currently beavering away on my Brother 950i.

Still no further forward with the Passap E6000 (well, I managed to change the program, but not to get past error 200). I'm taking the hoover to it tonight, and then also checking the cable to see if it is damaged.

The saga continues...

Got my repaired SK860 carriage back on Tuesday. Was very excited to try it out. Guess what? Same problem still - put a cam between approx. 28L and 73L and it disappears. Then himself spotted something - the back rail (on which the cams slide) is 2mm further back into the machine at the left hand end, meaning the cam is also 2mm further away from the back of the carriage. Could this be why it can't "see" it?

It's gone back down south for inspection and testing. And possibly a few incantations whilst waving a rubber chicken. Sigh.

Put away my SK840 combo last night and got the Brother 950i and the garter carriage out and deliberately did NOT get the ribber out - this will force me to use the Passap for ribbing. Started a cowl a la Kriskrafter. Can't get past error 200 on the Passap. Grrr.