Fast Forward: January 1967

I do have a project from the May 1961 issue and will post about it soon, but it won’t be done by the end of May. In the meantime, I made a very cute coat for a friend’s child from the January 1976 issue of Stitchcraft, using the leftover yarn from the red and blue dress I finished last month.

The pattern — “Fashion for Tots” — encompasses a single-breasted coat with patch pockets and a collar in contrasting trim, and a pixie hat with the contrast colour in the ribbing. The coat has an A-line shape and raglan sleeves and is given in three sizes, to fit a 22-23, 24-25 or 26-27 inch chest measurement. I made the smallest size, for a two-year-old with a 21 1/2 inch chest, so hopefully it will fit for a while even if it doesn’t get used very much in the summer.

As usual, you’re supposed to make everything in separate pieces, and for once, I almost did! That is to say, I made the back, fronts and sleeves up to the raglan underarm join in pieces, then made the raglan yoke all in one piece working back and forth. Sewn raglans always look so messy (when I make them…), so it was worth it for that, and making the rest in pieces gave the sides some stabilising seams and didn’t take any longer than making the body in one piece working back and forth would have done.

The coat has a cute mitred hem at the bottom, which makes a neat join into the button bands. The collar and pockets are made separately and sewn on, and the collar has an interesting two-piece mitred construction to get the two different colours to make clean corners. The pockets are in twisted mock-cable rib.

I noticed that it wasn’t quite going to work out with the total amount of yarn in the proper colour scheme, so I played with the amounts of red and blue and ended up just perfectly using up the rest of the red with a few metres left over should the coat ever need repairing. Of course, that meant I couldn’t make the hat. The project was fast and fun, though, so who knows, maybe I’ll make another one when January 1967… wait, when will that be again… January 2025 ?!? comes around. If we’re all still here! Hang in there and stick around.

Inspired by Stitchcraft: Red and Blue Dress

This month’s project was a little bit different than usual. Instead of making something from the April 1961 issue, which didn’t have any projects that really spoke to me, I decided to finally make something I’ve been dreaming of ever since I made this little girl’s jacket from the March 1960 issue. I loved the check pattern and the bright red and blue combination. “Wouldn’t that make a great 1960s-style minidress?” I asked myself, and the idea has been percolating in my mind since then.

I chose the same yarn and colours from the child’s jacket: Schachenmayr Bravo, which is inexpensive, machine-washable and knits up quickly. It’s even historically correct for a 1960s design, which is a nice way of saying “100% acrylic.” (Though true 60s synthetic wools were more often Bri-Nylon or Orlon.)

I chose a typical basic construction with front, back and sleeves all made flat and separately from the bottom up and sewn together, and made a stockinette-stitch hem with the blue yarn. The dress shape is a modified A-line: flared at the hem and narrowed to the top waist, then increased slightly at the bust. I used another knit dress as a pattern, but had to deviate from it as the stitch pattern made the fabric behave differently. The sleeves are short, simple and set-in. The front piece is essentially the same as the back, but divided in half after the armhole cast-offs and rounded a bit at the neck. The button band is plain crochet.

After it was all done, I realised that I liked the roll of the blue stockinette stitch hems, so I decided to just leave them as is. That means the bottom hem is a little bit narrow in the blue part where it should flare out. I may or may not fix that in time, depending on my laziness levels.

It’s soft and squishy and in spite of the synthetic yarn, doesn’t feel like plastic or make me sweat uncontrollably. The only real disadvantage is the virtual weight it puts on. It’s got negative ease everywhere and is narrower than the very svelte-looking dress that I used as a pattern, but the sponginess and three-dimensionality of the stitch pattern makes me look much bulkier than I actually am. I thought a crocheted belt in blue would help define the waist area a bit more, but the belt is curly and not heavy enough. Maybe a 1960s metal ring-chain belt would do the trick? But it’s utterly comfortable and fun to wear, so I’m happy.

March 1961: Posies for Cosies

My Stitchcraft project this month was a simple embroidered spray of flowers, originally intended as a decoration for a cushion or traycloth. Having enough cushions and not using traycloths, I updated the design for an iPad cover similar to the one I made last year. The flowers are supposed to be daisies and fern, but the daisies have pointy, blue petals — which I set off against a bright pink background for maximum 60s effect. (The background fabric was left over from the embroidered blackwork cushion from last September.)

Of course, there was no available iron-off transfer, but this design was easy and non-geometric enough that I could copy it out onto paper freehand and then transfer it to the fabric with the “window method” and a washable embroidery marker. The stitching was easy — satin and stem-stitch for leaves and stems, slanting satin-stitch for the blue petals, Romanian stitch for the “feathery foliage” (what a lovely phrase!) and French knots for the centres of the flowers. The only (for me) unusual stitch was the double knot-stitch used to outline the large green leaves. It’s sort of like couching, except you tie a knot in the running thread with each stitch as you go along.

I made it up with an equally bright patterned cotton lining (peacock parade!) with an added layer of quilt batting and the same simple button-closure method I used for the “Gay Goslings”. I am not great at sewing, even or especially a really simple (!) rectangular (!) bag, so the lines are not 100% straight and the design is not perfectly centred. Still, I love the colours and the contrast of the very old-school, Grandma’s tea-cosy design with the modern technological device inside.

Since I don’t actually need this for myself, it will probably be given to whatever nice friend has a birthday and an iPad that needs a cosy. In the meantime, I can hold it up to a window when I want to see something that looks like Spring.

February 1961: Tiny Cardigan

After January’s time- and labor-intensive pullover for me, I wanted to make something quick and easy in February. And there’s always a friend, colleague, or relative having a baby, so I made this simple ” Tiny Cardigan” from the cardigan and slipper set.

The wool was Lang Nova, a wonderfully fluffy and very light wool-camelhair-nylon mix. There are 180 metres in 25 grams! It is essentially made of air, but softer and warmer. I suspect it is not very hard-wearing and probably pills and breaks easily, but babies grow so fast that it will hopefully be outgrown by the time it falls apart. My swatch grew exponentially with blocking, so I converted the pattern to a larger gauge. Then the finished garment didn’t grow much at all with blocking, so it ended up more like newborn size. I hope the parents send out a birth announcement as soon as the baby arrives…

The cardigan has a basic bottom-up raglan construction with the twisted ribbing featured in January’s Snowflake Sweater. I made it in one piece from the bottom up to avoid seams, and was so busy trying to read the front, back, and sleeve directions simultaneously while working the yoke that I forgot to make the little twisted-rib sleeve insertions that would have made this otherwise very basic jacket a little bit more interesting. Whoops! But by the time I realised my mistake, it was already almost done, and I have a feeling this wool really does not like to be frogged. I pepped up the plain marble-grey colour of the jacket with some red flower buttons.

And there it is! I had to buy a second skein of wool to finish the cardigan and now have some left over, so I might as well make the slippers, seeing as the baby hasn’t arrived yet.

ETA: I went ahead and made the slippers, adding a flat spiral of red i-cord instead of a pom-pom.

January 1961: Snowflake Sweater

January’s project was — like August 1960’s twin-set — one of the reasons I wanted to start this whole mega-blog-project in the first place, namely, this beautiful round-yoke “snowflake” sweater in the style of traditional Greenlandic designs. I love the combination of curvy and angled shapes produced by the diamond-shaped rings on the yoke, and the dark background colour fits my style.

Traditional round-yoke sweaters made from the bottom up typically call for the body and sleeves to be made separately, then joined in the round for the yoke, casting off stitches under the arms and on the sleeve-underarm edges to add depth to the chest width and make the first few rounds easier to work. But like all adult garments from this time period, Stitchcraft‘s version is meant to be made in separate pieces. The first part of the yoke is written with back-and-forth raglan decreases, until the patterned part of the yoke gets going, and even that is supposed to be knitted back-and-forth with an opening in the back for a zipper.

Besides being not very traditional, I find back-and-forth knitting on stranded garments not so much fun (stranded purling is annoying) and certainly not as fast to make (knitting is faster than purling, and in-the-round construction means no seams to sew later), so I was determined to make this garment completely in the round and without seams. Making the sleeves and body separately in the round was no problem, but I was at a loss as to how to do the raglan bits plus neck shaping before the patterned yoke began without completely re-writing the pattern. Also, I wanted to add in some short rows to make the front part of the neck drop a little farther down than the back.

After thinking it over, the most reasonable course was to work the little bit of pre-yoke between the armhole bind-offs and patterned yoke back and forth with raglan decreases as written, but beginning the front neck shaping (pre-yoke, concurrent with the raglan decreases) an inch or so lower than the back. That preserved the proper stitch count, let the sweater hang better, and shortened the yoke a bit. I didn’t mind shortening the yoke, as I like sweaters to be snug under the arms and not too high on the neck. I didn’t need a zipper, so I made the patterned yoke entirely in the round.

It worked out perfectly! I could hardly believe it. Raglans and round yokes may be somewhat forgiving on the body, but it is a fundamentally tricky mathematical game to make all the interdependent factors of width, depth, and pattern repeat come out right, so I was really proud of myself for making it work. My only other modifications were on the sleeves (longer) and the waist shaping (original pattern had none, I started out narrower at the waist and increased gradually at the sides to give a more figure-flattering look.)

Version 2 — Don’t let the tropically-painted background fool you — it’s cold outside!

The yarn was a mixture of plain Regia 6-ply (DK) sock wool for the dark and light blues, and some of the lovely 100% wool that my knitting colleague hand-dyes with plants (the brown and green, made with onion skins/walnut shells and some kind of green reed plant, respectively.) It is very warm and has the right balance of firmness and softness.

All in all, I am 100% happy with this pullover and will probably wear it a lot this winter.

December 1960: Baby’s Special Outfit

My December project was a warm winter dress for a baby, part of the “Baby’s Special Outfit” of dress, bootees and mittens that continued the baby set started in the November 1960 issue.

The dress has a smocked top, which I had never worked in knitting before. Of course, knit smocking is not like sewing smocking, where you gather the fabric up in regular pleats and embroider over it. Here, it’s pretty easy to do and involves taking out a long loop and knitting it back in a few stitches later — almost like cabling without a cable needle. The base pattern is 2×2 rib, which gives the same effect as gathered fabric.

dec60wip I used a lovely 100% wool that was hand-dyed by a fellow knitter in my local knitting group. She uses natural dyes from plants in her garden, or the bits of food items that are normally not eaten: walnut shells, onion skins, and so on. This green-melange wool was dyed with red onion skins! She did explain to me how that worked, but please don’t ask me, because I forgot the answer already. Anyway, it’s very nice. I was worried that it might be too scratchy for sensitive baby skin, but wash-blocking it and rinsing with hair conditioner softened it up quite a bit.

I only had 100 grams of the wool, so had to make the dress a bit smaller than in the pattern. The original pattern was for a baby up to one year or more, had a long, full skirt, measured 22 inches at the chest and had sleeves. The baby I made this for is 6 months old but still quite small, and my version of the dress measures 21 inches at the wide part of the chest, has a shorter and narrower skirt and no sleeves. In a way, that’s more practical, since it can be worn over a t-shirt and leggings and taken off if the baby gets too warm. It also won’t touch her skin, so scratchiness won’t be a problem. It buttons in the back.

And with that, I have completed one whole year of Stitchcraft projects! Goodbye 1960 and 2018, and hello 1961 and 2019. Stay tuned, and happy New Year!

November 1960: Cloche Cap

November’s project was a little cloche hat, made out of leftover wool from July’s Charming blouse. I loved the little buckled brim and the sort of mushroom shape, though I found that the hat looks better if I pull it down over my forehead like a 1920s cloche hat. Either the picture in the magazine, taken from an angle over the model’s head, doesn’t really give a true impression, or our heads are differently shaped, or both.

Speaking of differently shaped, the hat is meant for an “average hat size”. That’s… not very specific. I do have a bigger head than average for modern days, but the wool (Juniper Moon Farms’ Herriot Fine) is mostly alpaca, so stretchier than the synthetic Rimple that the pattern is written for. To be safe, I made the buckle strip for the brim a little longer, but in the end that wouldn’t have been necessary. The buckle brim band (good name for a band!) is made in garter stitch, which is really not the most suitable for hat brims, as it stretches too much and doesn’t hold the hat on your head. Though of course, if you pull a hat down over your forehead, it’s not going to go anywhere.

Not that I need any more hats, but it’s cute and warm, so I’m happy.

October 1960: No Fun Fuchsia

C7C1F427-D5D1-4647-A1AD-B3CA7258E8E6 I really, really liked the idea of this embroidery project. Sadly, there was no colour photo, but the design is fun and very 1960 and I imagine the colours (Plum and Magenta with Cream and Fawn shades on deep green) to be quite striking. Working with tapestry wool instead of crewel cotton was (or would have been) another first, so all in all, I was eager to try it.

Thing is, I have enough cushions. So I thought I could make a project bag — you can never have too many project bags, right? And I could order some of those really 60s cane loop handles, which I saw in a catalog at my local craft shop. Perfect, except…

Well, first of all, I had no tapestry wool and nowhere to buy any except ordering it online. I did have 4-ply knitting wool leftovers in the right colours, so I thought, why not use that? I also didn’t have any deep green evenweave linen, but I did see some great deep green wool felt at the store, so settled on that. Bad move! Wool yarn on wool felt is not a great idea — it doesn’t slide well though the fabric. And knitting wool is thicker than tapestry wool, at least the embroidery kind. Also, the handles I wanted have been discontinued.

The pattern was equally difficult to deal with. After getting a halfway symmetrical design copied out onto paper (difficult enough), I decided to try out my new embroidery transfer wax pen, since the green felt was not transparent enough to do the window-light-box trick. It didn’t work! It only transfers onto smooth cotton or linen. Dotting the tracing paper with a pin and transferring the markings with a white pencil was only marginally successful. Nothing shows up on green wool felt except chalk, which is is too imprecise and rubs off immediately. Then the wool was too thick, the pattern too small, the needle, felt and wool didn’t work together at all well mechanically, and with one thing and another, it was just a chore and no fun to make at all.

I stopped after one quarter of the (simplified) design and made it into a little zippered bag with purple floral lining. I have so many little zippered bags and don’t have enough little “stuff” to fill them. Should I give it away? Will anyone even want it? I like it in spite of itself, so maybe I just need to find the right use for it.

November will be more fun, I hope!

fuchsiafo1

September 1960: An Original Cushion

fishsample September’s issue had a fantastic design of blackwork fish on a cushion. Blackwork is a type of embroidery combining counted-thread patterns (the fillings) with regular crewel embroidery stitches for outlines and details. I loved the way it looked but had never tried it before, so this was another Stitchcraft Sixties debut.

It was hard to find a proper evenweave linen for the base. The fabric stores in my area only had either heavy, fairly rustic linen in white/natural or colours I didn’t want, or cross-stitch fabric which didn’t look right for a cushion. I ended up using the same linen-viscose mix that worked so well for the leaf cushion that I made in January and substituted a vibrant pink for the turquoise called for in the pattern. Not having a transfer, I used the same method as with the leaf cushion to pencil the lines onto the fabric (see that post for more detail).

I loved the fabric in itself, but the threads were really fine and close together, making the blackwork fillings time-consuming, difficult, and — I hate to say it — boring to do. At some point I stopped trying to count the threads and just tried to keep the filling pattern as even as possible without stressing over it. Of course, it was not perfectly even, but it’s amazing how the richness of the patterns draws the eye away from imperfections as soon as you move out to normal viewing distance.

One interesting detail: The pattern “plan” shows both the large fish in the middle and the small fish in the right-hand corner looking down to the left, and the small fish in the left-hand corner looking down to the right. That also reflects the directions, which refer to the “Fish above left” with buttonhole-stitch on its tail. But whoever worked the sample rotated the plan 90 degrees clockwise! The sample picture looks great and was obviously intended that way, i.e. I don’t think it’s an error in the photo set-up, but after some consideration, I decided to make the cushion according to the plan.

I ended up making some changes, especially on the big fish. I hadn’t left enough room for the black blanket-stitch edging inside the body, so I left that out, and the whole head-mouth area was tricky. The “lower lip” still looked wonky after ripping it out and redoing it twice, and I didn’t dare try a third time for fear of ripping though the fabric. White blanket-stitch or buttonhole-stitch around the eye looked weird and far too white, distracting from the rest of the picture, so I substituted some loose blanket-stitch in black. The seaweed is done in wheat-ear stitch, which was a new one for me, and easy and fun to do.

fishpanelfo The pillow was easy to make up, as I didn’t use piping (I thought the design was bold enough that a plain edge would be nicer.) All in all, I love the look of blackwork but don’t like the effort. I guess it’s easier on a looser-weave fabric where you can really see the holes in the weave to count them. It was made as a gift for a friend who I think will really like and appreciate it, and I feel happy giving it to her, as I am quite satisfied with the final result.

fishfo1

August 1960: Twin-set returns

I loved this twinset at first sight. I loved the short raglan sleeves on the pullover, the cable-and-mesh panel on the front and the very original mock-turtleneck-meets-peter-pan collar. It’s one of the reasons I started this whole long-term Stitchcraft blog project, so I’m thrilled to have it come to life.

The yarn I used was ideal in terms of wearability: Lang Merino Bébé which is extremely soft and smooth and can be worn next to the skin with no problems at all. It is a little thicker than Patons Beehive Fingering, for which the pattern is written, so I had to work with a modified gauge (6 1/2 stitches per inch instead of 7) and ended up making a combination of the small (34-35 inch bust) and medium (36-37 inch bust) sizes to get a slightly larger size in the end. I guess in terms of actual measurements, I ended up with the second size, which fits fine.

Of course, the pattern is written to make in pieces and sew together, but I love making raglan-sleeve garments in one piece and working them together without seaming. It was a fun challenge to integrate the different decrease speeds of this compound raglan (the sleeves decrease every 4 rounds for quite a long time whilst the front and back decrease every other round), as the instructions are on different pages.

The cables have an interesting twist — literally. You put four stitches on the cable needle, knit the other four and then give the cable needle an extra 360 degree clockwise twist before knitting the stitches off of it. This gives them a cool extra definition. I forgot to do it once and it was almost unnoticeable — almost — but I didn’t want to rip back that far, so when everything was done I looped a little tiny thread around one of the cable stitches and just pulled it over more to the side and tacked it down by tying the thread ends in a knot on the wrong side. Look at the close-up picture above — can you tell which cable it was? I can’t on the finished garment. Good to know.

The collar is knitted separately in two pieces that are then knitted onto the picked-up stitches around the neckline, sort of like a three-needle bind off only without the binding off. Then you continue for an inch of mock turtleneck. The back of the pullover is open and you are supposed to put in a zipper, but I went for the keyhole effect and just added a button with a little crochet chain loop for a buttonhole. The final result is comfortable and pretty.

The cardigan is somewhat more plain, as it doesn’t have the cables, but it makes such a lovely set with the pullover — not to mention it’s an excellent “everyday” cardigan to go with lots of other outfits. The sleeves came out a bit long — I was obviously over-compensating for my long arms and the fact that I always have to lengthen the arms a bit — but it looks just as good with the cuffs turned back, and I can turn them down for extra warmth under a coat and gloves. I hadn’t expected the raglan sleeves to have so much armhole depth. I thought about adding facing ribbon to the button bands, but it turned out to not be necessary, as the cardigan fits fine whether buttoned or unbuttoned. In short, I am thrilled with my new twin-set and it will surely get a lot of use this winter.

July 1960: Charming blouse

This “charming and unusual design for larger sizes” (37-38 or 39-41 inch bust) features narrow dolman sleeves, crochet insertions, and horizontal bust darts.

I was intrigued by its construction, having made tops with bust darts from modern patterns or while working without a pattern, but never having seen vintage patterns with them. Oddly, instead of making short rows, you are supposed to cast off stitches, cast them back on again, and then sew up a seam! I guess that makes it look more like sewn fabric? Or the “editress” thought short rows would be too difficult? I can’t imagine that, though, since patterns from this time regularly call for short-rows to shape the back side of baby rompers and leggings. In any case, I made the bust darts with short rows to avoid having to make a seam. I also made the back and fronts up to the armhole shapings in one piece, again, to avoid seaming more than necessary.

I was interested to see how it worked out with the dolman sleeves. When I think of “dolman sleeves”, I think of those 1950s, or worse, 1980s garments with a huge triangle of fabric under the arm, which must have been very uncomfortable and inconvenient to wear. But after my April 1960 blouse with the horizontal cap sleeves worked out so well, I was willing to give this one a try. And it turned out great! There is no more extra fabric under the arms than there would be with set-in sleeves, and the horizontal construction gives plenty of room in the upper chest/back area, where I am quite wide. I guess the secret lies with the number of stitches cast on for the sleeves per row — this one had 2×8 rows and then 10×16 rows, making the sleeves narrow and more horizontal, thus less triangle-like.

The knitting was slow-going at 7 stitches to the inch, but of course once the body was done, so were the sleeves. Seaming was a nightmare, as the yarn (Herriot Fine from Juniper Moon Farm) curls more severely than stockinette stitch in other yarns and I had to block it well to even find the edge to sew. I was willing to put up with that, though, because the yarn is absolutely fantastic. It is warm, soft, weighs practically nothing (300 grams made the blouse with about 20 grams to spare) and it is the only alpaca I have ever worked with that I can wear directly next to my skin. It is the perfect, ideal wool for this type of knitted blouse.

(On that note, why on earth did knitted blouses go out of style? They are wonderful! The perfect garment for autumn days in a damp, chilly climate. Note to self: make more.)

What took longer than expected was the whole crocheted edging-collar-button-band extravaganza. The crochet bands are extremely fiddly — they are crocheted onto each other as you go, it’s difficult to make them all exactly the same size, and each one needs its own, new piece of yarn. There are a total of 50 elements, so that’s 100 yarn ends to weave in right there. Then there’s the “inner” collar, the “outer” collar and the button bands, all of which are made separately and sewn on, and somehow need to end up symmetrical and fit properly on both sides. Of course, I sewed the collar on backwards the first time, forgot to switch the right and wrong sides at the collar fold, etc, etc. It all worked out in the end, though.

My only modification (besides the short-row darts) was to make the sleeve ribbing 3 inches long, like the waist ribbing, instead of 1 1/2. The sleeves are still not full-length, nor are they supposed to be. I don’t like the idea of 3/4 or 7/8 sleeves, but it worked out better in practice than in theory.

To sum it up: Pattern was wonderful, yarn was wonderful, knitted blouses are the coolest thing ever and I am 100% satisfied with this project.

Version 2

June 1960: Fast Forward (March 1969)

To be honest, the June 1960 issue didn’t really have any designs that enticed me. The little summer tops were nice, but I still hadn’t finished the little summer top I started in April, the embroidery and tapestry designs didn’t excite me, and I have plenty of hats and don’t wear stoles. However, way in the back of the issue, along with the comic, the “teaser” ad for the July issue, and the “Suggestions from Readers” there was a little motif for a knitted or embroidered parakeet. Perfect, I thought — I can make a little cross-stitch picture as a cute wedding present for two friends who are getting married in August and love budgies. A parakeet and a budgie are the same bird, right? Just the American and British names for them? But wait — Stitchcraft is a British magazine. Why would they use the American word?

And then I noticed that the parakeet in the motif is not a budgie at all, but an actual wild parakeet — like a smaller parrot. It’s cute, but not quite what I wanted. I thought I could use the motif as a starting point to create my own design that looked more like a budgie, so I made a copy and thumbed through my ideas notebook to see what I could do with it.

And what do you know — at some point in time I must have thought ahead and copied out a little motif from the March 1969 issue of Stitchcraft — a “Special Request for Bird Lovers” — and forgotten about it in the notebook! There are even two birds in the motif, so I didn’t have to try and mirror-copy a modified parakeet. So this month’s project is a sort of fast-forward to March 1969 in lieu of a project from June 1960.

This was my first time working in counted cross-stitch and I thought it would be easy. You just have to count the squares and thread the embroidery cotton through the holes in an x, right? I was so, so wrong. First of all, I didn’t know what “gauge” fabric to buy, so I chose one that seemed medium-sized to me, where I could see the holes pretty clearly. I should have chosen a size bigger, since the holes were still absolutely tiny to my (perfectly good) eyes. Counting the holes was much more difficult than I expected, since they all looked the same and seemed to move around when I tried to count them.

To top it off, the fabric was too pale, so that the white in the blue-and-white bird didn’t have enough contrast to show up properly. Not wanting to buy more fabric, I tried dyeing the fabric slightly darker with tea. I simmered the fabric in a pot with the tea for about ten minutes, then rinsed it in hot water with vinegar to set the colour. It worked perfectly, so at least something about this project was easier than I thought it would be. Here is the original fabric (top) and the dyed fabric with practice stitches in pink and brown (bottom). The brown stitches are the beginning of the branch on which the budgies are sitting.

The embroidery itself was slow-going and not totally accurate, i.e. I do not think I always got the right number of threads (2×2 for each cross). Even when I did, the stitches were uneven and raggedy. (I did make sure that the stitches are all going in the same direction and the same top-bottom stitch pairing.) Also, it was just plain no fun to work. What a pity — the idea was so good!

So I did what I had to do: quit and started over. On larger-weave fabric (Aida). Which was also too pale and had to be dyed. Where the dye didn’t take as well because the fabric was not 100% linen like the other. Where the design was obviously much larger than the first try and I actually preferred it smaller. But at least it worked! So fast, so easy! I embroidered one entire bird in a day! And it actually was fun to make.

budgiesback After I finished the birds, I embroidered the initials of the happy couple underneath in simple block letters (not that it was simple to get the right stitch count and center it) and framed it in an embroidery hoop with the help of this helpful YouTube video. I just happened to have some leftover fabric for backing that had a giant bird on it — how perfect! (The buttonhole-stitch framing is not perfect, but that’s life.)

So all in all, it was a long and difficult journey, but I learned a lot and am happy with the result. Also, I think my friends will like it, which is the most important thing.

budgiesFO

May 1960: “Summer Song”

cosy This is definitely a “cosy of unusual charm”! (Despite the ripped corner on the back cover photo.) It features appliqué and embroidery with different designs on each side and instructions to make it up into either a regular cosy to put over the teapot, or a “nest” to put the teapot into.

My version isn’t a teapot cosy of any kind, since I don’t use them or know anyone who does. Everyone needs a pretty little zippered bag or two, though, to put current projects in, or materials for crafting, or pencils or any kind of small “stuff”, so that is what this project is going to be.

I started with the “bird and strawberries” side. As always, the first question is “how to get the pattern onto the fabric and cut-out bits, since there is no existent transfer.” Remember, back in the day you had to write to Stitchcraft to get the iron-on transfer as a supplement! I used the same graph square technique previously used on the leaf cushion and the gay goslings. It was trickier in this case, since the only good photo was taken at an angle, but I got it to work somehow.

Then I copied the pencil sketch, cut out the individual shapes by pinning them to the felt bits, and pinned them out on the base fabric.

Stitchcraft gives pretty good instructions for the embroidery — which colours for what parts of the appliqué and how many strands. The embroidery work itself was not too difficult, using stem-stitch, Romanian stitch, loop stitches and French knots as well as a bird_straw_emb bit of herringbone and the tiny straight stitches in the strawberries. Still, it was more ambitious than any embroidery I have tried up until now. It doesn’t look quite like the picture and I did take a little bit of licence, but on the whole I was pretty satisfied… except for the legs. Oh dear, oh my, oh no, the legs. I did them three times and they still look weird. Either the angle is wrong, or the thickness, or I don’t know what, but I figured doing it again would only chew up the fabric more, so it is what it is.

Creating the template for the second side, “Bird and Blossom” presented an extra challenge, as there was only a tiny black-and-white photograph in the magazine, where the tea cosy “nest” was open and made the design appear at an angle. I am definitely getting the hang of this copy-grid-paste-and-cut method though, because it went quite quickly and easily and I think I matched the design pretty well — or at least made a decent interpretation of it.

Again, I sewed the pieces down (noticing along the way that I had forgotten one leaf, and adding it) and then did the embroidery as outlined in the instructions. Well, that was the plan at least, but the picture was so tiny and “unreadable” that I ended up doing most of the embroidery freehand. Winging it, so to speak…

Making the finished embroidered panels up into little bags should have been the easiest step, but it was oddly frustrating and nothing worked properly the first time around. The zippers are a mess. The lining of the “Bird and Blossom” catches and the ends of both zippers are not properly sewn into the top seam. Also, the embroidery is not bad considering my level of (in)experience, but I’m not as happy with it as I could have been. So I’m still deciding whether to keep both of the bags for myself, or give one or both away. What do you think? Here are the finished objects!

BirdStrawFO

BlossomFO

May 1960: Dear little matinee coat

baby2 My first project for May was a “matinee coat” for a 6-month old baby. The baby I knit it for hadn’t been born yet, but I always like to make a six-month size for a newborn. Of course it will be too big at first, but eventually the coat will fit.

Don’t you love the positioning of the baby in the photo? “I’m 6 months and almost sitting up!” means it was probably pretty difficult to get any sort of picture of the baby wearing the coat in a way that you could see it, not to mention without crying, flailing around, spitting up, etc. I have a real respect for anyone who can get a decent photograph of a small baby, especially one where you want to see what it is wearing. Sadly, there is no colour photo.

The coat is made in one piece from the top down with raglan armholes. This kind of construction was pretty rare in mid-century knitting patterns — most baby clothes, like almost all adult clothes, were meant to be made in pieces and seamed. This garment does have seams, though — after the division for the fronts/sleeves/back at the underarm, you are supposed to work each bit flat and then sew the side and sleeve seams.

I actually did just that, because the written pattern was very difficult to follow on the first few rows after the underarm divide. The raglan increases at the top are done with eyelets and make-1 increases on a each side of a bit of moss stitch, and after the underarm divide, the same type of increase is done on the fronts and back to make a flared skirt. That all makes perfect sense, but the way the pattern was written made it difficult to find the placement of the increases if making the fronts and back all in one. So I just went ahead and followed the pattern exactly. Except for the sleeves, which are supposed to be long, but I ran out of yarn.

As with many early baby things, the tension/gauge was 8 stitches to the inch — on No. 11 (3 mm) needles — much smaller than I can ever manage to get no matter how small the needles or how thin the yarn. I used Lang Merino 200 Bébé, which is wonderful, but my gauge was too big even on 2 1/2 mm needles. No matter, the coat will be a little bit bigger and hopefully fit a little while longer.

matineeblock If you are looking at the first picture and wondering what went wrong, let me assure you that it was NOT a tangled mess! As long as the sleeve stitches were on holders, there was no way to make the thing sit down flat for a photo. Kind of the same problem with the baby, if you think about it… Here’s a picture during blocking (at left) and here’s a picture of the finished garment. I am very happy with it!

matinee_fo

P.S. Yes, it is supposed to have long sleeves. I ran out of yarn.

April 1960: Popular neckline

Version 2 My second project for April (obviously not finished before the end of the month, seeing that I started it two days before) was this cute lace blouse with a “Popular neckline.” I do love the neckline, and the leaf pattern.

The pattern is written for wool, of course, but I made it in cotton for summer. It is very, very difficult for me to find any kind of yarn, especially cotton, that is fine enough to get the pattern gauge of 8 stitches to the inch in stockinette stitch. I can hardly even get 8 stitches to the inch on lace-weight wool on 2 mm needles! But crochet cotton thread would be too thin, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen it in black. So I found a cotton that gets me 7 stitches to the inch on 2 – 2 1/2 mm needles and fiddled with making the middle size and having it come out as the large size.

popneck_wip The biggest problem was making the side-seam increases. The lace pattern has a repeat of 12 stitches, but a sort of varying number of edge stitches. I honestly had no idea where to fit in the extra stitches, or how to keep them in pattern when the increases and decreases within the pattern are broadly spaced. Time to hit the Ravelry forums! I did try charting it out (the pattern has written instructions only) and at first it made it easier to “read” the knitting, but didn’t give me any fundamental technical answers. I realised I had to chart out not just the pattern itself but all of the increases and decreases, with the changes that had to be made row by row. That worked, but by then I had already made the back piece, so those increases on the sides weren’t perfect. But everything else was!

The fit is incredible. I was wary of the horizontal cap sleeves, which are really just made by casting on extra stitches instead of decreasing under the arms. I thought it would make a lot of baggy fabric under the arms, like those 1950s (or 1980s) dolman-sleeve fashions that must be extremely inconvenient to wear. But no! The armholes are snug without being too tight, and I appreciated the extra width and give in the upper chest and back, where I am quite wide.

All in all, it is wonderful and I am very happy. Here I am having fun “recreating” the original picture. The bag is from a Stitchcraft pattern, too!

April 1960: Gay Goslings

Version 2 “Cheerful goslings make gay kitchen ideas” — who could resist? There are patterns for a serving glove and a felt tea cosy, neither of which I particularly needed, but the tea-cosy pattern is just about the right size for an iPad case. So this became the modern version.

As always, the pattern came from a transfer that is no longer commercially available, but since the appliqué was so simple, it wasn’t a problem. I used the good old pencil-grid-transfer method that had already worked so well with January’s leaf cushion, and it worked fine.

I had never done appliqué before, but it was really quite easy, especially with felt, so this was a great beginner project. The eyes, wings and feet are embroidered in simple satin stitch and blanket stitch. There were supposed to be yellow stem-stitch outlines around the eyes, but I tried it and it made my poor innocent gosling look kind of demonic, so I stuck with plain black dots. I made it up with a scrap of fun blue cotton print for lining (Geese… In… Space…!) and a simple closure made out of a bit of twisted yarn cord and a sparkly white button.

Everything worked great and the whole thing took only about 5 hours total to make, including sewing all the seams by hand, as I didn’t have my sewing machine on hand at the time. Definitely a change from the never-ending John’s new pullover! Now I have the gayest, warmest, best-dressed, space-age spring fever iPad that anyone could wish for and am very happy.

goslingsfo1