Sometimes when I design a larger stitch pattern, there’s a part of it that I think would be good as a smaller pattern. I think of these as excerpts or outtakes. Often they work well as a coordinating stitch pattern for the original; this mesh is one such case. It’s a slightly modified version of the bottom four rows of Holiday lace.
(This excerpt isn’t a coded word anymore.)
Follow link for charts and instructionsSometimes I come across a motif I want to play with from a larger design. The repeating shape in this one is from a mosaic chart that didn’t work out for other reasons, but I wanted to see what I could make of it. Here’s one result. This is not one of my secret code patterns.
A nice thing about mosaic knitting is that the charts are similar to the final appearance of the knitting, so I’m not going to provide a swatch. Mosaic knitting looks difficult, but it’s not as hard as it looks! Basically, knit two-row stripes, and slip stitches from the row below to make the contrasting pattern.
Here’s a detailed blog post I wrote about how it works.
Follow the link for charts and instructionsThe word I drew from my word hoard for this stitch pattern is Holiday, suggested by Cathy D, a Patreon supporter.
Each month, my Patreon backers have the chance to suggest words for me to encode as knitting stitches. I make three of these into knitting stitches each month: the second and third (posted on the first day of the next month) are drawn from the collection of new words; the first is drawn from the collection of unused words. A random number generator helps me choose these, and then I get to work, first turning the letters into numbers, then charting the numbers onto grids in various ways. Finally, when I make the chart into lace, I turn the marked squares into yarnovers and work out where to place the corresponding decreases. (I usually make lace; occasionally I make cables instead.) I also made a Holiday needlework chart for any craft that uses a square grid for designing.
The stitch patterns are not meant in any way to look like the original words; the words are the seeds of my creativity.
Follow link for charts and instructionsThe random number generator picked Holiday from the suggestions for this post, suggested by Cathy D, one of my Patreon supporters.
I developed a lace stitch pattern for Holiday, but I also like to provide a basic chart for any craft that’s worked on a grid: beads, cross stitch, whatever. I try to provide at least some digital art of the pattern repeated all over not as a chart. It doesn’t necessarily look like a finished object for any particular craft, but I want to give a sense of it in use. (I try to make it look like knitting when it’s got floats short enough for easy stranded knitting.)
Follow link for charts and more informationM1 is a good, basic increase, but it leaves a visible hole. There’s a slight modification of the technique that mostly hides this hole. The two versions of this are M1L (make one left) and M1R (make one right), which are mirrors of each other. This post is about the paths the yarn takes while forming the stitches, not how to make them. Here are some good illustrated instructions showing how to make m1 L and m1R.
My other stitch structure posts can be found in my stitch structure tag.
Continue reading M1L & M1R: knitting stitch structureThe random number generator picked Merci from the suggestions for this post, suggested by Catnach, one of my Patreon supporters.
I developed a lace stitch pattern for Merci, but I also like to provide a basic chart for any craft that’s worked on a grid: beads, cross stitch, whatever. I try to provide at least some digital art of the pattern repeated all over not as a chart. It doesn’t necessarily look like a finished object for any particular craft, but I want to give a sense of it in use.
Follow link for charts and more informationThe second word I drew from the words suggested on Patreon last month is Merci, suggested by Catnach, a Patreon supporter. Merci is the French word for thank you.
Each month, my Patreon backers have the chance to suggest words for me to encode as knitting stitches. I make three of these into knitting stitches each month: the second and third (posted on the first day of the next month) are drawn from the collection of new words; the first is drawn from the collection of unused words. A random number generator helps me choose these, and then I get to work, first turning the letters into numbers, then charting the numbers onto grids in various ways. Finally, when I make the chart into lace, I turn the marked squares into yarnovers and work out where to place the corresponding decreases. (I usually make lace; occasionally I make cables instead.) I also made a Merci needlework chart for any craft that uses a square grid for designing.
The stitch patterns are not meant in any way to look like the original words; the words are the seeds of my creativity.
Follow link for charts and instructionsEarlier this year I wrote up a series of blog posts about the structures of plain knitting (part one, part two), slip stitches, and brioche (part one, part two). I had some requests to do more structural posts about knitting, and so here is the next one. I’ve added a tag to all my structure posts so far so you can find them all in one place: stitch structure
I had a specific request to do one for kfb (knit in the front and back of a stitch to make two stitches), but I’m not going to start with that. I’m going to go through a whole sequence of basic increases, starting with M1.
M1 (short for “make one”) is actually a tricky abbreviation, as it sometimes gets used for all kinds of increases. (The Mon Tricot books, for instance, use m1 as the abbreviation for any increase throughout, and define it within the instructions for each stitch pattern.) However, there is one increase called m1 which has no other name that I’ve ever seen*. So I’ll start with its most basic form.
*I haven’t seen every knitting guide in the world by a long shot, so I’m guessing someone has probably called it a “lifted increase”, which would be confusing given that there’s a different increase I know with that name.
Continue reading M1: knitting stitch structureThe random number generator picked Osprey from the suggestions for this post, suggested by Enting and Bookwyrm, two of my Patreon supporters.
I developed a lace stitch pattern for Osprey but I also like to provide a basic chart for any craft that’s worked on a grid: beads, cross stitch, whatever. I try to provide at least some digital art of the pattern repeated all over not as a chart. It doesn’t necessarily look like a finished object for any particular craft, but I want to give a sense of it in use. (I try to make it look like knitting when it’s got floats short enough for easy stranded knitting. This has a float that is a little longer than I’d like, but TECHknitter has a method to tame them.)
Follow link for charts and more informationThe first word I drew from the words suggested on Patreon this month is Osprey, suggested by Enting and Bookwyrm, two of my Patreon supporters.
I’ve already made a stitch pattern with the leaf motif that shows up in Osprey; it doesn’t quite match up in terms of the stitch repeat, but Cariad Leaf could be modified to suit, I think. Also, I *think* Osprey and Cariad could maybe work in the same design? I’d have to chart it out to be sure, but it’s worth a try.
Each month, my Patreon backers have the chance to suggest words for me to encode as knitting stitches. I make three of these into knitting stitches each month: the second and third (posted on the first day of the next month) are drawn from the collection of new words; the first is drawn from the collection of unused words. A random number generator helps me choose these, and then I get to work, first turning the letters into numbers, then charting the numbers onto grids in various ways. Finally, when I make the chart into lace, I turn the marked squares into yarnovers and work out where to place the corresponding decreases. (I usually make lace; occasionally I make cables instead.) I also made an Osprey needlework chart for any craft that uses a square grid for designing.
The stitch patterns are not meant in any way to look like the original words; the words are the seeds of my creativity.
Follow link for charts and instructions
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