The first word I drew from the words suggested on Patreon this month is gansey, suggested by Bookwyrm, a Patreon supporter. This is a choice that made me laugh, since a gansey is a kind of sweater from the island of Guernsey; there is no lace involved. (They are wonderful sweaters.)

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 make a chart for any craft that uses a square grid for designing; this goes in a separate post.

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

The word I drew from my word hoard for this stitch pattern is Starfish, suggested by Lara, a Patreon supporter. For some reason, finding the right encoding to make a good stitch pattern was really difficult this time; I ended up having to encode each word separately, then stack the results one on top of the other. I haven’t swatched the words individually yet, but experience suggests that it should work out, though I might need to edit the decreases a bit. (I’ve generally had good luck with stitch patterns that are only two or three right-side rows high.)

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 make a chart for any craft that uses a square grid for designing; this goes in a separate post.

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

The second word I drew from the words suggested on Patreon last month is Snow, suggested by Naomi T. and Natasha, Patreon supporters. I’m pleased with how it came out, not least because it has no double yarnovers. (It’s very hard to avoid them entirely with my design methods.)

I think it’s fun that one of the two panels is essentially Star Rib Mesh, though with somewhat different decreases.

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 make a chart for any craft that uses a square grid for designing; this goes in a separate post.

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