How Did I Miss This?

In my last blog post I talked about how much I hate trying to work that first row of crochet into the starting chain, and contemplated starting with a knitting cast on in place of that traditional crocheted chain. I haven't gotten around to trying that just yet, because I discovered the Foundation Crochet in single, half double, and double heights. I stumbled across them completely by accident while perusing patterns on Ravelry.



No more starting chains for me! :D

Pressing Matters

Just a quick link post this month, to an article I wrote some time ago for the AntiCraft. It's just a simple why-to/how-to about preparing your fabric for sewing, before it ever sees the cutting table.

Ironing Sucks!


Enjoy!

Count-free Flat Round Crochet

There are lots of tutorials on the web that show you how to crochet a flat circle, working in joined rounds or in spirals. The problems I have with these tutorials is that they're either too vague ("keep adding stitches on each round" - how many, how often?) or too rigid, requiring careful counting that's hard to follow, especially on spiral work where it's hard to keep track of what round you're working on. When I'm designing my own project, I want to be able to pick up the work and just go, without a lot of confusing counting and fiddling with stitch markers.

Through experience, I have learned that my stitches will tell me when it's time to increase. Once you can read your stitches, you never have to count again to make your own free-handed flat circles. (If you're following someone else's pattern, you'll still want to match their directions, of course, to make sure the stitch count comes out right.)

So, here's what single and double crochet stitches look like, worked in straight rows. I show this as a base comparison:




I know, the single crochet doesn't look like a straight row, but that's just because I wasn't careful enough laying the piece out for the photograph.

Here's what the same stitches look like worked in a flat round, between two increases. See how the single crochet stitch looks like a V at the bottom, and the double crochet stands up straight?



And here are the stitches telling me it's time to increase. See how the left arm of the V in the single crochet is straight up now, and the double crochet visibly leans to the right? If you're working left handed, your stitches will lean toward the left, instead.


When you see that lean, add another stitch in the same place.



Then continue on, placing one stitch in each stitch of the previous round until you see the lean again.

That's it, no more counting stitches to keep your work flat, and no more frogging to fix unwanted curling or cupping. If you need to end up with a certain number of stitches (say, to add a shell stitch edging, or somesuch) just count up how many stitches around you have at the moment, figure out how many more you need, and stop stitching when you've added enough increases to get to that number.

Everybody gets hot pads for Christmas! :D

Make Your Mark

(Dateline: April 98th, 2010 ;) )

My dad and I recently learned about letterboxing. It's an informal treasure-hunt sort of game, similar to geocaching, that began with a gentleman's calling card left tucked into a bottle near a remote English pond in 1854. In the modern version of letterboxing, one follows clues left on a website to find a secret stash containing a rubber stamp and a logbook. The adventurer brings their own signature stamp and logbook along, stamps an image from their signature stamp into the letterbox's book, and takes an image of the letterbox's stamp away in their own logbook.

While there's no rule against using a store-bought stamp, either for your signature or for the letterbox, it's so much more personal to create your own design. Indeed, the vast majority of letterboxers use stamps of their own design. They may have the stamps custom made by a stationery company, or carve them themselves from rubber erasers. Being somewhat uncertain of my ablility to carve a rubber eraser, and displeased with the small size of the erasers I found, I went looking for an alternative material. I found it in craft foam sheets.

You will need:

One sheet of adhesive-backed craft foam
One sheet of 6 mm thick craft foam
A craft knife
A cutting surface
A stamp pad with a raised surface, or a watercolor pen
Your stamp design


Your design can be quite detailed, but you should probably try not to get too fancy with your first attempt. You can hand draw your design or use a graphics program to create one. Consider the size of your image carefully. It should be small enough to fit on a small logbook page, but large enough to be easy to cut out of the foam. I chose a daffodil design that I use elsewhere as well, and my dad created a simple radio tower design, alluding to his ham radio hobby. We decided that three inches in the largest dimension of our designs would likely fit well in most logbooks.

As you work with the adhesive-backed foam sheet, be careful not to press your fingernails into the foam. It will take impressions from your nails rather easily, and your stamped design may have small crescent-shaped voids as a result.

I found that carbon paper refused to transfer to the foam, so I cut the designs out of their paper print-outs with the craft knife, then used them as stencils to apply the design to the foam. My daffodil design was already created in a stencil-like negative image, with the pieces of the flower cut from the background. With the finished stamp, the background would be printed, while the flower remained the white of the paper. My dad's radio tower, however, was a positive image with crossbars that needed careful handling in cutting the transfer stencil. I left thin bands of paper between the crossbars and the uprights on the paper stencil, to hold the design together. I would later cut through these lines when cutting the design from the foam sheet.

Place the stencil on top of the adhesive-backed foam and ink through the stencil with the stamp pad. (If your design has letters or any other element that requires a certain direction, make sure to put your stencil down backwards.) I had a little trouble getting all the smaller parts of the pattern inked, and by the time I did, there was a good bit of ink bleeding through the paper onto the foam. I think a smaller, dauber-type ink pad or a water color pen would have worked better, but I didn't have either of those, and I was able to see the design clearly enough on the foam to cut the design out.

With your craft knife, cut the design out of the foam. There are a couple things to which to pay attention as you cut. The first is that you don't undercut the edge of the stamp. It's best to angle the blade of your craft knife away from the piece at the point of the blade, so as to ensure adequate support to the edge of the foam. The other is that you either start at one side of the pattern and work across, or start at the center and work your way out. This is so that the piece you're cutting always has as much support from the surrounding foam as possible. On my daffodil, if I had cut all the petals first, then cut the trumpet out, I would likely have broken through the lines as the lack of support allowed the foam to stretch and flex.

If your image has several separate pieces, and their exact placement on the stamp is important, don't just cut the pieces out willy-nilly. With my dad's radio tower, I chose to cut the tower out first, as the anchor of the design. I stripped the paper backing off of the adhesive back of the tower, and placed it on the 6 mm thick foam sheet. Then, one by one, I cut a lightning bolt, but did not remove it from the surrounding foam. Instead, I removed the paper backing from just the lightning bolt, fitted the surrounding foam around the tower on the 6 mm thick foam sheet, pressed the lightning bolt down, then removed the surrounding foam from the now-adhered bolt.

Once you have all the pieces of your design adhered to the 6 mm thick foam backing, cut the stamp from the rest of the sheet. Cut off any excess backing that isn't supporting the image. Doing this will help prevent accidental stamping of the edges of the backing. Ink your stamp and make a test imprint on a piece of paper. If you use watercolor pens, you can color different parts of the stamp different colors for a multicolor image.

Congratulations! You've made your very own personalized stamp. Now, go gently clean it with water and an old soft toothbrush. The ink will never completely dry on the foam, so cleaning it off will reduce accidental stamping on your clothes and furniture, as well as prevent a buildup of residue that can reduce the quality of your impressions.

Not only are craft foam stamps easy and fun to make, they are incredibly cheap! Having a 3" x 3" custom stamp made professionally costs about $25. Both the self adhesive foam and the 6 mm thick foam were a mere 99 cents per sheet. I made two stamps, and have enough foam left over for at least another four stamps of the same size. This means that each stamp used about 30 cents worth of foam. That's what I call thrifty!

Happy stamping!



For more information on letterboxing, visit the Wikipedia entry at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letterboxing .

A Turning Trick for Hookers

The date on this post is wrong. Today is March 34. ;)

Traditionally, when you're crocheting something with more than one row in it (which is anything other than a simple edging, of course), you get from the end of your current row to the beginning of the next row by crocheting a few chain stitches, which count as the first stitch of the next row. On flat pieces, this can make an edge that's a little wobbly looking, and on round pieces, it leaves a visible seam.

YouTube video poster TXCr1cket demonstrates a method for creating a freestanding double crochet stitch to replace those wobbly, seam-ly chains. It makes a nice even edge in flatwork, and a nearly invisible seam in round works. Watch and learn:

You're getting veeery sleeeepyyyy...

This spiral block is one of the crochet designs I'm using for a block swap I'm involved in. The other swappers liked the design so well, they asked if I had a pattern I could share with them. I don't, really, though if you can crochet a flat circle, I can tell you generally how I did it. Again, this isn't a pattern, so much as a guideline, and you do have to have at least a little experience with crochet to do this.

Start with a large slip knot, either color, doesn't matter. Into the loop of the slip knot, sc, hdc, 4dc. Pull your working loop large, and drop it off the hook. Attach the second color after the last dc (I just made a small slip knot, like you would start a chain with, and brought it through the loop from the back, then started working around the loop.). Repeat the same sc, hdc, 4dc in the loop. Pull the loop tight.

Now, still with the second color, work 2dc in each stitch of the first color. Enlarge and drop the loop, pick up the first color, pull the loop back down to working size, and work 2dc into 6 stitches of color 2.

So, at this point, you should have a center with 6 stitches of each color, and the first round of the spiral with 12 stitches of each color, with the colors ending on opposite sides of the spiral. From here, you just work flat, taking one color to the end of the other, and count the stitches you make, then take the other color to the opposite side of the spiral, making the same number of stitches in the same increase pattern.

When the spiral is almost as large as you want it, measure it across the ends of the spiral arms (we'll call this the X axis) and perpendicular to that (the Y axis). You will find that it's slightly larger across the X axis. Mine was about a half inch difference, much less than the height of 2 rows of dc. (Remember that what you do with one color you also do with the other, so each round increases the size by 2 rows.) What you have to do is work until you're about 6 stitches away from the narrowest point. Then work 4 hdc, 4 sc (this is going across the narrowest point), then 4 slp st, and stop, but don't break off yet. Repeat for the other color, also not breaking off yet. (Unless you're not making a block. This would be a nice design to make in a heavy natural fibre for trivets and coasters.)

As for turning a round spiral into a block, this is actually the hardest part to figure out. Count the stitches around your motif. Divide that by 4. Now take a good look at the edge of the piece, and decide how many stitches could reasonably be considered straight enough to be part of the edge of the block (we'll call this number N). Subtract N from your previous number. This is how many stitches need to be enclosed in a corner.

Decide how many sections of mesh you want to work into this area. A number that divides evenly, or within one stitch of even, is good. I made three sections worked over about 18 stitches total, each section worked over 6 stitches.

It gets a little confusing here. If you read slowly and work along with the instructions, I think you'll be okay.

From the end of one spiral arm, chain 1 or 2 more than the number of stitches that the first section is worked over, preferably an odd number of chains. (I chained 7) Join to the spiral at the appropriate place (6th stitch, for me), then repeat this until the last section. On the last section, chain half as many, then work a tall stitch to match the height of the chain (I worked a treble stitch), placing this stitch in the last stitch of the spiral to which the corner is attached.

Turn the work, chain a section of mesh, join to the middle of the next chain loop, continue to the last section, and work the last section as before, with the tall last stitch. You'll work 1 fewer sections of mesh than the previous row. Continue like this until you make a single last mesh section in the corner. Bind off.

Remember "N"? Count N around the spiral from the end of the mesh, join, and make another mesh corner. Then pick up the yarn from the other spiral arm and do it all again.

That's it. Please ask any questions in the comments here, so that others may learn from the answers as well. I'd love to see your interpretations of this pattern!

[Credit where it's due: Photo by S. Kelley]

How to Grade Seam Allowances

Here I am, again, after 3 months away, to fill another tutorial need. If you want something done right...

When you're sewing thick fabrics, or several layers, or just sewing a small enough project that every detail matters, you may want to grade your seams. It's simple to do.

On a garment with a lining or facing, when all the layers of a seam allowance are cut to the same width, they can leave a bulky lump along the edge of the garment. I've sewn together three random fabric remnants to illustrate:



I've run the iron along the edge of the seam allowance to make it show up better for the picture. You can see how thick the edge is, and how sudden the transition is from the seam allowance to the main expanse of fabric.




To ease the transition from seam allowance to main expanse, trim each layer of the seam allowance to a different width. This photo shows the innermost layer trimmed to about an eighth of an inch from the stitching.




And here you can see the second layer of the seam allowance trimmed to a width between the outer fabric and the inner fabric. See how the edges of each layer are a different width from the seam?

On a lined garment, you can usually trim quite close to the stitching without fear of it raveling enough to come apart at the seam. If you're really worried that the fabric won't hold up, you might try running a bead of Fray Check along the cut edge after you trim the allowance. Make sure the Fray Check dries before you fold the seam closed again - it could mark the garment if it bleeds through to the outside.




Here is the same seam seen from the outside after grading. Notice how much smoother the transition is from edge of the garment to main expanse of fabric. It's best if the widest seam allowance is the one closest to the outside of the garment, for the smoothest finish possible. It's just one trick, of many, for a more professional finish on your home sewn garments.

How to Measure and Cut Needlepoint and Crosstitch Canvas

When I went looking for a link to include in an AntiCraft article about how to measure and cut canvas for counted needlepoint, I found exactly two. They were both by the same person, and they were both Wrong. (Seriously, I'm still spluttering over just how wrong!) None of the sites devoted to needlepoint and cross stitch seem to realize that before you can get to "step 1: bind the edge of the canvas to prevent fraying," you have to figure out where that edge should be.

So, I'll tell you. Isn't that kind of me? ;)

There are many different kinds of canvas that can be used for needlepoint. You can even use plain woven fabric if you're a masochist expert. But, if you're new enough to stitchery that you don't already know how to measure your canvas for your project, you'll most likely be using aida cloth, so that's what I'll talk about here.

Aida cloth comes in many different "counts" or "points," which refers to the size of the weave. A point is the space for one stitch in basic continental or cross stitch; it's where the vertical threads and the horizontal threads intersect. The number of points refers to the number of stitches you can make over one inch. 11 count aida will have 11 stitches in one inch. 16 count will have 16 stitches in an inch, and so on. It's possible the canvas may be a point off here or there, but unless you're planning to stitch a wall-sized tapestry, it probably won't be enough of a difference to matter.

If you have purchased your pattern from a regular pattern company it may tell you how many stitches high and wide the design is. If you can't find this information you'll have to count the stitches yourself. If the design is not a regular shape, be careful to count from the very lowest stitch to the very highest, and from the left-most to the right-most. Write these numbers down.

Now, divide each of these numbers by the count of your fabric. For example, lets say that our pattern is 200 stitches high by 150 stitches wide.

On 11 count aida:
200/11 = approx. 18 inches high
150/11 = approx. 14 inches wide


On 18 count aida:
200/18 = approx. 11 inches high
150/18 = approx. 8.5 inches wide


On 22 count aida:
200/22 = approx. 9 inches high
150/22 = approx. 7 inches wide


You can see that the higher the count of the canvas, the smaller the pattern will be when it's finished.

So, that's how you figure the size of your stitched area, but it's not the size you want to cut your canvas. Once you have your stitched size, you want to add a minimum of 3 inches to each side (adding 6 inches total to each dimension), possibly more, depending on the size of the stitching frame or hoop you'll be using. Using our 200 by 150 stitch example:

On 11 count aids:
18" + 6" = 24" high
14" + 6" = 20" wide


On 18 count aida:
11" + 6" = 17" high
8.5" + 6" = 14.5" wide


On 22 count aida:
9" + 6" = 15" high
7" + 6" = 13" wide


That's the size, at minimum, you cut your canvas. Any less and you'll risk not having enough room at the edges to mount the canvas in a frame or hoop to work the design completely, or to mount or sew the finished design into the display frame or other project for which you've stitched it.

Now you can proceed to "step 1: bind the edge of the canvas to prevent fraying."

Let me know if you need help with that, too. ;)