20100822

Now that the shower is over I can describe them in detail!

The Rust and Goldenrod one is Zombies, burning a city down, and they are walking on broken roadways. (page 165, Shadow 25, Mosaic Knitting by Barbara Walker)

The Apple Green and Black one is Ninjas! Questioning, or having an idea, if you think they are the green ones, you’re wrong, they are the black ones! Unless you thought they were the black ones, then ha ha! They are the green ones. Tricky Ninjas. (Page 171, Shadow 39, in Mosaic Knitting By Barbara Walker)

The Heathered Gray and Black one is Robots! Robots, so dull. You’d think they’d determine a colour palette in order to blend in a little, but their superior thinking and superior strength make such concessions a waste of cycles. (Page 163, Shadow 21, in Mosaic Knitting, By Barbara Walker)

And lastly, the ladybugs square is, in fact, ladybugs. I had fun working it out to be a true mosaic in three colours. And I like the results quite a bit better, so I’m glad I redid that square. (see linked pattern for the chart, a pdf of how to do Mosaic Knitting)

Why Zombies Robots Ninjas and Ladybugs? It came from a Twitter exchange with Meredith’s husband Kevin (and Meredith) for the theme for the baby’s room. Since that didn’t happen, the next best thing, I thought, was to make the four ideas into the squares I was knitting for the group afghan for Meredith.

I hope she has warm and wonderful memories of us while using it. The blanket shows all the personalities of the people who knit for her, it’s really something to see! It’ll be a great blanket for the Dragon Boy to lay on and see, so many things happening, and each one knit with love and affection for his mother (and him by proxy).

happiness

Testing some patterns from Mosaic Knitting by Barbara Walker. The kids and I chose a few and are designing one. I’m going to try the ones that are already charted and then hopefully adjust the designed one to work out.

I may make a pillow out of the squares, or if I like them, keep going and make a blanket!

20100714

Wow, this moves fast. A row or two here or there and it’s getting a lot of traction! Seems as if 50 stitches is, with the mosaic unblocked, 23cm (9”), so it will need a tiny bit of blocking to hit the 10” for the pillow form. Maybe it’ll be a blanket afterall.

I am having trouble seeing the pattern in direct light. Indirect or diffuse light is fine, or some distance from the piece, but up close while knitting, I can’t see it. Can’t see the knitting for the stitches. Again. Like with Dad’s scarf.

But it’s coming along, despite that!

20100720

Finished the first block! Started the second pattern, ran into problems with what yarn to start with, because I wasn’t thinking.

It’s going to be in stockinette, I’ll see what the difference is, and that will determine what I do for block three.

20100725

The second block will be done shortly. The stockinette is faster, uses less yarn, and the design is clearer, but the fabric isn’t as nice. I’m not certain how I’ll proceed with this.

The third block is similar to the first, perhaps I’ll do that in stockinette as well, to compare the results, and the fourth is similar to the second, so I’ll do that in garter? I’ll decide later, as I want to try to work in a third colour for the fourth block, which may not work in garter.

Onward!

later

The next one is coming along nicely. It’s a bit larger of a repeat, so I had to sort out what I was doing around the sides. It looks pretty good, though. The figures look a little thicker, because of the stockinette.

But still, quite nice!

20100728

Finished the third block, hurrah!

Starting the one the kids and I made up, but I’m going to try to run some colourwork along with the mosaic for this one. Should be interesting!

later

Almost finished the body of one repeat on the one I designed with the kids. I’ve already found issues with it, and have been altering it as I go and become more literate in what it means to have a mosaic design versus a colourwork design. This is a bit of a hybrid, as well, so there is some leeway, but not where I made the mistakes!

We’ll see if it’s effective. It’s not a shadow pattern like the others (flip flop), so perhaps not ideal?

20100731

After being dissatisfied with the ladybug, and learning a few things about designing a mosaic pattern, I have reworked the ladybug. The swatch is done, so now I’ll do another swatch. Which is totally screwing up my percentages, but there you have it.

I think the revised ladybug will work out nicely. It avoids stranding two colours, so it’s a true mosaic, while still using three colours. Fuss fuss fuss.

I may try it in garter stitch, it’s a much nicer two-sided fabric.

20100802

Didn’t do it in garter stitch. Without the stranded parts the back isn’t as chaotic, so that’s good.

With the new design, I couldn’t fit three repeats in, so the heads of the top ladybugs are lopped off.

But it looks so awesome.

I’m quite happy, will upload final photos after I block them tomorrow. Uploading the chart shortly too. Whee!

later

I am happy with these and will call them done. I’ll block them eventually.