Gotta love beautiful yarn!

Yarn. It's not only working material. It's a joy to look at, a joy to pet, and oh so cushy to cuddle into, once your knitting is finished. Of course, I also own that one odd duck of yucky yarn... it happens to all of us. Or more than one, of course more than one! ;) If you are following my tuts, you are already acquainted with ACK-rylic.

But this yarn is different - it's of the stuff that makes you dream about cushy softness, joyful knitting - and lets be honest. I totally squeed when the package arrived and I cuddled the 6 skeins in my hands.

It's a high quality base from Atelier Zitron (a german yarnie), custom dyed by the fabulous Faerbulous, who I found on dawanda. Check out her store!

Since this color is extremely hard to capture in pictures, it wasn't so easy for me to tell exactly what I wished. But she knew exactly what I meant and I'm so happy with those skeins!

Also, surprise! Stitch markers are a pleasant surprise. They are cute! I actually like using the little plastic rings, so I've never bothered to buy or make some - but those are cute and I'll try them the next time I need markers! I suppose that's Faerbulous' way of saying "thank you for doing business with me"

I'm planning to design a lightweight sweater with this yarn. I love worsted weight sweaters - but I often have a problem wearing them. I'm not a person who gets cold easily. And always when it's getting cold, I'm having the same old problem - too cold with just a shirt, but too hot with a sweater. Sigh... I figure a thin sweater will be the perfect solution!

And since I need to challenge myself, I'm going to work with a zipper for the first time. I'm kinda afraid and exited about this at the same time! But I know it will totally be worth it in the end. Stay tuned!

Technique: Lateral Braid, aka Vikkel Braid

I've loved the lateral braid ever since I first discovered it. It's such a neat, decorative detail, and really fun to do. It's also called Vikkel Braid - but I have no idea where that name comes from.  But without further ado, here's the technique!

You'll need:

• your working needle
• your working yarn

and nothing else!

We are starting with a m1r, and put it back onto the left hand needle. We will always be working a pair of sts - the second st on your lhn (left hand needle) will form the next row while the first st on your lhn will form the braid. This first m1 creates an extra st that we need to keep st count consistent and get a nice start for our braid.

 Knit into the back of your second stitch, and don't drop the stitches from the lhn!

Without dropping any sts from the lhn, swing rhn (right hand needle) back to front and knit into the front of the first st.

Now, we can drop both stitches from the lhn!

But we are putting the outmost st from the rhn back onto the lhn. See the first sts of our braid? Now we can start with the next pair of sts by knitting into the back of second st, as shown in the second pic above.

This is how your braid will look after you've worked a few sts.  Not so hard, is it?

Now we've worked our way all around and are back at the start. We need to close the round and get rid of the extra st we made at the very start.

And that's done fairly simple - slip the first st onto the rhn...

... and simply slip the last braid st over the first st of next round. Slip first of next round back onto lhn and resume knitting whatever the pattern tells you.

As you can see, the jog is not perfectly hidden, but you're probably the only one able to notice. If you use darker, or variegated yarn, it's pretty much invisible.

Next one in the series: a two colored lateral braid! Also look at the link if you want to learn a perfectly seamless way to close the lateral braid.

Technique: Provisional Crochet Cast On

This is, by far, my favorite provisional cast on. It's quick and easy, the cast on edge stays nice and secure until you need it - and then, you just need to tug at one end and the cast on unzips - voilá! Live stitches. Another plus: Worked in the round, it will give you exactly the same stitch count as you initially casted on.

And trust me on this one - if you don't have a crochet hook, get one. You will totally thank me later. (There are also a lot of other knitterly uses for a crochet hook!)

But now, on to the technique!

You will need:
- Your working needle
- Waste yarn
- A crochet hook

First, make a slip know and put it onto your crochet hook. Chain a few stitches. This might not be necessary, but I like doing it anyways.

Now, take the crochet hook into your right and the knitting needle into your left hand. Loop the working yarn around your left index finger as if to knit. Your knitting needle should be held above the yarn strand. Now, reach over your knitting needle with the crochet hook, catch yarn, and pull trough the loop on your hook.

As you can see, the back loop of the crochet chain formed around your knitting needle. Now you just need to move the yarn behind the needle, and you are ready to chain the next stitch. When you are finished, you can simply knit into those loops on your needle. Neat trick, right?

Chain as many stitches as you need to cast on. Little extra tip: I'm notoriously bad at counting many stitches. I always put a stitch marker every 20 stitches or so to keep track of how many stitches I have.

When you have reached the stitches needed for cast on, chain a few more stitches without the needle in between. Cut waste yarn and pull out the last loop to secure the end.

Finished! Grab your working yarn and knit the first row or round into the chain. Now you are ready to start the pattern!

When you are ready to unzip the cast on, simply snip the last stitch of the dangling chain, find the right end and tug on it. The chain should unravel automatically.

I hope you found my instructions clear and helpful - this is the first technique tutorial in a series. I will post more tutorials like this in support of my patterns that explain the advanced techniques I use.

No more bobbins

Progress update! Almost finished!

I'm finally rid of all those dangling bobbins! Whoot! I can't believe how fast I'm suddenly progressing on this without intarsia'ing the cables! There's only a little more than an inch missing now, but I've go to take it to my friend to see where she wants to have the buttonholes, so this is in time out again.

This is how it looked at an earlier stage:

What a mess, right? But now I'm rid of all the bobbins! Yay!


Shown on "me". I only used pins where the buttons will be.

Gotta love interchangeables! :) There are three long cables joined together, which makes it possible to get an extra long circ to drape it like it should be. (I knitted with only one 120cm long one) So much more handy than fuzzing around with several circs!

And when I'm finally finished with this, and those damned men stockings, I'm finally able to knit something for myself again!