I have been busy making things for the holiday festival table. I have finished a number of things which I want to show.
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| This cabled sweater is like one that I made for myself years ago. It is a little small for me, but I modeled it anyway. It is made of acrylic yarn which ended up being very heavy. It is more like a jacket than a sweater. I had used cotton yarn for the one I made for me and it was heavy, but not as thick as this one. Probably because acrylic yarn knits tighter than the cotton. |
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| This shows all the pattern repetitions that are in the sweater. All together there are six stitch patterns with various numbers of repetitions. It requires a lot of stitch count recordings. The bands are twisted rib. The edges are reverse stockinette. Then it is slip stitch panel with an 8 row repetition. Next is the diamond panel with a 24 row repetition and includes the popcorn stitch. The center is the honeycomb panel of a 4 row repetition. Then it is the diamond panel, the slip stitch panel, and the reverse stockinette stitch edge repeated again. It is a very difficult pattern, but I love it. It took about three weeks to complete the sweater. This is the first year I have made an adult sweater for the festival. It is more costly to make so, I of course need to charge more for it. It may be too much for the festival, but I thought I would try anyway. |
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| I used the same yarn for this hat, scarf, and mittens that I used for the above sweater. It just looks a different color in this photo. The hat features a diamond cabled pattern like in the sweater but does not have the popcorn stitches. The top of the hat is done in a two stitch rib. The scarf has the chain cable repeated three times across the scarf. The mittens have an open chain look. The mittens felt too large inside and not very soft, so I lined them with a soft fleece and now they feel wonderful. They can be sold as a set, or separately. |
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| This is my favorite hat that has been a very popular item in the past. I love this green. I also made a pair of gloves to match which, of course, can be sold separately if desired. |
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| Headbands have also been a hot item in the past. I have just started making several in various designs and colors. I liked the diamond pattern that was with the hat above, so I just did the band part of the hat for the green band. I used a very simple, but popular, twist pattern for the blue band. |
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| Both of these bands feature cables and buttons. The navy blue one on the left is a repeated 4 times twist 2 cable. It is very wide so could be used for the cold weather in place of a hat. I started making it with another cable added and I could see it would be way too wide, so I stopped and did the four cables. If I have enough yarn, I will continue the five cable and make it into scarf or a cowl. The gray one on the right is also a cabled pattern using a six stitch cable. It is very pretty and has the front center tied in with a buttoned strap. It is also wide and could be used for cold weather. |
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| These young ladies are missionaries from my church. They came to help me harvest my grapes and make them into juice. I let them choose from my headbands as a gift for their help. They chose the green cable and the gray cable shown in the pictures above. |
I have started working on some men's gloves out of the same dark gray as in the headband above. I want to make a couple pairs of men's gloves and I may even make a man's hooded sweater. I haven't decided if I should do that this year, or wait and see if the woman's cabled sweater sells.
I will need to take a break from my crafts for the festival and make a couple of Halloween costumes. I also need to make some costumes and scenery for the Christmas pageant that my church is putting on this year. Busy, busy, busy! Loving it!
