Videos for beginners and for experienced machine knitters too!

I love looking at the videos that Diana Sullivan posts on youtube!
This morning while I was trying to find info to pass on to a new Machine Knitter I "found" on one of the machine knitting lists, I was browsing on Diana's blog. The blog is   http://diananatters.blogspot.com/

  I found that in mid October she had organized her many videos into Playlists. Thanks, Diana, for making it easier for us to find the specific videos we are looking for. I am sorry I did not find this sooner, so I could pass it along to others who need the info

Here is the link to get to her playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/user/dianaknits/playlists

I love that she makes it so easy to find her Beginners Lessons, all 31 of them!!

Machines for sale in Raleigh area

I have many friends who contact me when they have machines for sale. I do not believe they want to pack and ship the machines, but contact me if you are interested in buying these machines.  Maybe shipping could be arranged, please ask.

One friend  wants to sell a Brother KH 930 machine.  It was cleaned back in April of this year. She is selling this Brother KH 930  for $300.00. She added some things, i.e. Carriage ,etc that were missing. She is selling this machine for what she purchased it for.  She spent about another 100.00 on parts and cleaning. She just wants to get some of her money back.  This machine knits fine. The problem is you can¹t add a ribber. She found this out when she had it cleaned. (Rita believes this is related to either the km or the ribber being warped. Some people on other lists have managed to straighten out a warp.)

This same friend (#1) also have a Brother KR 830 ribber, for sell for $200.00.

Another friend has a SR machine which is a studio 360 with ribber and lots of extras. She is selling  this bundle for $300.

Still a third friend (I am so lucky to have many friends) has a Passap e6000 with lots of extras for sale. Price is negotiable.

If you want to make an offer on any of these machines by my friends, please contact me, Rita in Raleigh, NC.  My email is   rita27612 at yahoo dot com   (put this together with the proper signs).

Thank you,

Rita in Raleigh

Warmth for Maine 2014

Once again I have knitted hats for the Country Knitting of Maine, News&Views magazine contest to be given to Warmth for Maine. Most of my hats were machine knit, but a few were hand knit.

I had a lot of fun combining colors and using up bits and pieces of leftover yarn. The berry hats were adapted from the Knittens pattern, which was for standard gauge, but I knitted mine on the midgauge brother machine. The ribbed hats were done on the standard using the gc, so I could knit in the summer with almost no effort! This year I did very few on the Passap.

I get bored easily, unless I change the colors or styles of the hats.

Why not try your hand at hat making. Lots of charities need hats now!

 Here are some photos.

Whoops, more Hand Knitting

I do hand knit when we ride in the car on trips. I love knitting hats. Using Bernat Alpaca yarn on these hats in the car was really easy, but then I found out that my favorite place to send charity hats (Country Knitting of Maine, News&Views hat contest for Warmth for Maine) preferred acrylic fibers, for ease of laundry. I can't fault them for that preference, but what was I to do with these lovely hats??

Along came the Hats for Syria project, introduced to me through the All Crafts for Charity group on Yahoo groups, to which I belong.

So I rounded up my hats which were already knit and the little balls of scraps which were leftover. I used the leftovers to knit more hats. I just love stripes in hats!

Here is the result, which I sent out in late July.

I put tags on them for the washing instructions. These hats felt so soft.

Charity knitting

Our local km group, the Triangle Machine Knitters, is making knitted items to donate to Interact," a private, nonprofit United Way agency that provides safety, support, and awareness to victims and survivors of domestic violence and rape/sexual assault. "

We are giving our items to be part of the Christmas presents given to those who need it.

I knit a few fisherman's rib scarves on the bulky machine and on the standard to include in this group donation. Here is the photo of the scarves.

These scarves were fun and quick to knit. In fact the fringe took longer than the scarves! Some fringe was knit on the knitting machine and some was added later using a rug making latch hook. 

I also "cheated" and hand knit a couple of baby sweaters. Again, these were things that the hand knitters had been talking about and I found the pattern on Ravelry. 

As all the handknitters said, these are fun, fairly quick, and very addictive!

Machine Knitting Entries in NC State Fair 2014

Each year I have high hopes of entering each of the machine knitting categories of the NC State Fair. They have now expanded the categories to 7! What a challenge to enter each of the 7 categories. Well, this year I succeeded in getting all 7 items finished!!

Well, here they are. 6 of them got First Place/Blue Ribbons, and one got Second Place/Red Ribbon. Of the First Place items two also got Best of Show (meaning best of the machine knitted garments, and best of the machine knitted household items).  The state gives a small money award for each First, Second, and Third place winners, which ranges from $25 for an afghan to $9 for a clothing item. Also our Triangle Machine Knitters provides the prize money for each of the Machine Knit Best of Show items....so I won $25 for each of my Best of Show, besides what ever the State gives me. I am just rolling in dough....hahahaha!

 The lady's top, above, is a lace and garter carriage item done from a pattern by Danis McWest.

 The white blanket with the pink ruffle was made with one strand of 2/24 yarn in a double bed tuck pattern on the Passap. The ruffle was two strands of 2/24 done on the brother 965i, using a pattern from Enchanted Edgings by Diana Sullivan.

 The Minion hat was an original design. Okay, I browsed Ravelry in the hand knitting department and adapted what I found from various sources. I knit this on my brother 260. For the eyes I followed the pattern for knitting flowers! I made many of these hats and have sent the others off to charity. Some of my minions have only one eye, which is crocheted.

 This red and white afghan was done on the Passap, using one of Michael Becker's Passap afghan patterns. It spreads out very wide after taking it off the km because it is knit in a double bed tuck stitch pattern. That afghan is spread out on my fake king sized bed (two twins together). I need to remember that when I download a design from DAK, the colors get reversed! I meant the background color to be red and the design to be white! Oh, well, it looks fine as it is!

 My toddler's pullover was a basic shape done in stockinette on the 260. I shaped the sleeves because I like set in sleeves. I made sure that the neckline would go over my head, just to be sure that it would not bother a pre-pr
eschooler. The stars are just buttons, which add more color and dimension to the sweater, as does the white-blue-white stripes on the sleeves.

 This blanket-buddy has a story behind it. I had knit a baby afghan with the gc on the 965i and it was very soft, but boring. I needed something to enter in the "machine knit household item enhanced" category. I had been browsing on Ravelry and saw many hand knit or crocheted blankets with a stuffed animal head attached. These are for toddlers to hang onto for comfort....or to drag around. So I searched for how to knit a bunny head, and found one for handknitting, on Ravelry. I knit the head while riding in the van coming back from the Fingerlakes Machine Knitting Seminar in NY. I realized that the blanket needed something to tie the head to the general item, or to unify it in color, so I decided to crochet around it. I tried many styles (okay just two!) and settled on this one. I crocheted the edging while we were on a cruise in the Caribbean. So this machine knit blanket is enhanced with hand knitting and with crochet.
By the way, the crochet looked really rough and uneven until I steamed it to block it!

Front and Back of Table Runner shown below.

My Table Runner was made of Wool Crepe Deluxe and Skinny Magisty , both dress yarns. I did this on the Passap e6000 with one of the built in designs. It might be a mosaic or maze pattern.

I had fun creating these items for the NC State Fair. Next year I hope more machine knitters enter. These were definitely not perfect, but I tried very hard to cover my mistakes. The judges found only some of them!

Another e6000 for sale

We have some busy people here in Raleigh who like machine knitting but do not have the time to use all their machines.

My friend Manju wrote this to me:

My Passap e-6000 is back up for sale. A lady in South Carolina wanted to purchase it before the end of Sept, but she is undecided until she returns from her trip abroad. 

I would like to sell this ASAP and am negotiable on the price. It is listed for $2,700 with everything I own that belongs to the Passap. 

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/art/4645465178.html

Passap E6000 comes with a motor, books, video tapes and DVDs, magazines, Tricofit, color changer etc. 

Link to facebook page with photos of the machine. 

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.359704287373744.101413.161818940495614&type=1

If you are interested in this machine you can email me, Rita, at fmcelroy@aol.com and I will forward your message to Manju. Or you can contact her through the craigslist link.

Wow, two Passaps for sale...Manju's and Raeanne's. Passaps are fun to use, but you must spend some time at the beginning learning to use them. They make gorgeous textured fabric, and using the color changer is so easy. Double bed work in general is really great with the Passap....you don't usually need to use a comb and weights.  I have made socks on the Passap and find it much easier than on brother machines. (But, of course, I love my brother machines too!) http://raleigh.craigslist.org/art/4645465178.html

Passap e6000 for sale

A friend of mine in Raleigh has an e6000 for sale. Because of its weight and size it is for pickup only.  Contact me or Raeanne (if you know her) for more info.

This is a well cared for but seldom used machine. She has had this machine since the early 90's and might even be the original owner (I am not sure).
Thanks for reading this.