Denise's NeedleWorks

Denise's Needleworks

Name:
Location: Ames, Iowa, United States

I am wife to Jeff, homeschool mom to 8, a knit and crochet teacher and totally addicted to knitting, crocheting and other fiber arts. After knitting, crocheting and sewing my own clothing from the age of 10 on, I studied textiles & clothing in college. That lead me to 25 years of custom dressmaking and alterations work, while sewing, knitting and crocheting for my growing children. I have worked in the yarn industry for the past 3 years and have been designing my own knitting patterns. Visit my web site at http://www.denisesneedleworks.com Find me as DeniseInIowa on Ravelry.com

Saturday, November 24, 2007

Barnevott - inside and out

I finally finished the first pair of Selbu mittens. Barnevott #10 in the Selbustrikk book. It is a child size pair of mittens. They just fit my 5 yo.

I have already started on the next pair which is a slightly larger size child's mitten. Again it is in the black and white. That is the traditional colors for the Selbu mittens.




Details of the mittens:

Pattern: Barnevott #10 in Selbustrikk LVS-5 from Rauma

Yarn: Rauma 2tr. Gammelserie Strikkegarn, 50g/160meters, one ball each of #400 and #436

Needles: size US2


I thought you might find it interesting to see the inside of these stranded projects. The floats of yarn show the design in the reverse colors.

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Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Finished knitting

Some finished item pictures:

My Candy Wrapper Hat pattern done in Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted yarn. This will be a nice warm hat!
More mittens for the International students. They are 100% wool. Should feel good to someone who is not used to Iowa winters I hope.


And lastly, a child size hat. I knit this during Amy's basketball game. Remember how I said that I could knit simple things without looking at them? I was surprised at how quickly I finished it. I had it cast on before the game so I didn't have to worry about counting. I almost finished it during the game. I think I knit faster when the game gets exciting! Amy made the first basket of the game for her team! It was also the only basket made in the first half I think. It is a very inexperienced, young team. They lost 59-12 but they had a great time playing and felt good about how it went.

Four boxes of yarn have been donated recently for the knitters at church. Of course it came to my house because I am in charge of the group. We don't have a very large group at this point so I guess I better keep busy. I certainly won't run out of yarn any time soon!

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Friday, November 09, 2007

Fun with Vamsegarn from Rauma

I have been playing with Rauma's Vamsegarn. It is a 100% wool worsted weight yarn. Slightly heavier than Nature Spun worsted or Patons Classic Merino. It has a really nice hand though and I love how crisp the pattern looks and how even the stitches are.

I had a lot of fun designing this hat. It is done on size 7 needles. The snowflake pattern is the same one that is on the Selbu mittens that I am making.

The kids had a great time trying it on to see who it would look the best on. I liked it best on Wesley my 17 yo but he wouldn't let me take pictures. So here are Rosie and Carl hamming it up for your enjoyment.

I am hoping to make some mittens to match next. Then I will try to get the patterns written up.



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Saturday, November 03, 2007

Selbu mittens

Well, my knitting has been going rather slowly in the past week. I have been busy working with Arnhild and learning all about the Norwegian company that she works with and the Rauma yarns and patterns. Their yarns come in so many beautiful colors! Many of the yarns are in the lighter weights which are hard to find. But Rauma has them! And Finullgarn comes in 100 colors!

I have been working on mitten #10, a child's mitten, from the Selbustrikk book that Arnhild translated from the Norwegian. I started it on size 0 needles in Gammelserie which is the traditional yarn for the Selbu mittens. I knit it just past the thumb but found that it was way too small. The mitten was so small that it didn't look like it would fit a one year old. It was supposed to fit 5-7 years. My 5yo couldn't get it on at all.

It was difficult to find time to knit this past week. The kids have so many lessons, practices and activities that I was only getting to knit a row at a time. By the time I would pull out the chart and get the yarn and needles arranged it would be time to go do something else!

I moved up to a size 2 needle though and tried it again. One row at a time I got back up to the thumb again and finally last night I was able to sit down and knit for a longer stretch of time. I was so excited about how this one was coming out. Now it fits the way it should!

At first the Gammelserie yarn seemed a little scratchy but I think that was mostly because of the tiny needles. It was really difficult to knit because it was so tight. With this yarn though, I think these will be very hard wearing mittens.

This is one of my favorite designs. I love the snowflake and I think it came out very nicely. I just need to knit a thumb for this one. The thumb will have a little person on the outside and the palm pattern will continue across the inside.

Be sure to ask your local yarn shop if they carry Rauma yarns. If they don't, tell them that they can easily order it from Arnhild's Knitting Studio There is no minimum order for the shop to meet and she will even drop-ship it directly to the customer at no extra charge.

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