Positronic

Named for the brains of Isaac Asimov’s robots and Star Trek TNG’s Soong-type androids, Positronic is a squishy garter-stitch scarf with an easy shape and flashy graphics.

Knitter needs some familiarity with short-row knitting---there isn’t a tutorial of that in the pattern, but it’s an easy knit since the entire thing is worked in garter stitch. I’m reasonably certain I napped through huge sections of knitting.

 

 

Design calls for a specific hand-painted yarn as the main color but your favorite variegated will work just as well and there’s a suggestion on choosing contrasting colors to coordinate with the main color.

Scarf can also be done in three solid colors for a more intense graphic look. Try it in two primaries and a neon. 

Pattern is available on Ravelry for $4.50 USD.

Needs More Cowbell

One day I really will do a new banner and background and hell, why not a whole new blog template.

goes back to sleep

Isolinear

Energize!

In the Star Trek universe isolinear optical chips are processing and information storage devices used in the computing systems of starships. Isolinear is a cozy garter-stitch scarf with a futuristic asymmetry and slip-stitch color blocks inspired by the LCARS (Library Computer Access and Retrieval System) touchscreens on board the Enterprise-D.

One size, length up to knitter. Sample scarf is 62” long, 15” at widest end and 4” at the narrow end.

Suggested Yarns
Knit Picks Palette, two balls Black (MC), one ball each Cornmeal (CC1), Seraphim (CC2), Golden Heather (CC3) and Urchin (CC4). A longer scarf may use more Black.

 Pattern is available on Ravelry for $6.50 USD.

 

Moody Mitts

 

Have you ever had a perfect morning, then the day suddenly went right down the toilet, or vice versa? These double-sided mitts can be flipped around to show how you really feel--vintage kittens on one side and “Fuck My Life” in a scroungy typewriter font on the other.

Suggested Yarns
Knit Picks Palette, one ball each color. You’ll use less than half of each.
Size
One size, fits palm circumference 7”- 8”

 This pattern is available on Ravelry for $3.00 USD

DIY Embalming For Fun and Profit

 

No, the blog's not dead yet.  I've got several new patterns I'm working on, a couple Industrial/Gothic, some Victorian/Steampunk, and a Miscellaneous or two.   I still have the intention of cobbling together my monster collection of filet crochet underwear patterns into one book but that project stalled after I got about half the images scanned.  I've sorted them, decided which ones should be re-charted, then left them sitting on the desk underneath a stuffed Dalek.  I rule.

I haven't been regularly blogging for, hell, donkey's years.  A few days ago I saw (yes, really) a whole cooked chicken on the sidewalk as I was walking from the bus stop.  Did I think of taking a picture or at least rambling on about it over at the Blogopticon?  Big fat no. 

I still need to put up a new banner.  I suppose I'll get to that when I'm done watching all episodes of Star Trek TOS, Star Trek TNG, and Star Trek DS9.  Oh yeah, when you buy my patterns you're subsidizing my sad, sad nerd habit.  Sorry.

spazzes away at a Rubik's Cube

Lunch Hour Washcloth Set

 

Lunch Hour Washcloth Set is the perfect gift for anyone who loves to combine sandwiches and baths.  Roll a fancy slab of soap up in it and your holiday gift-giving list will magically have one less person on it.  It may also imply that you're perfectly wiling to give them a bath, so watch out.

Be lazy!  Be cheap!  All four sandwich pieces are quick to knit and are made of inexpensive, easy-to-care-for cottons that can take a beating.  Tip:  Buy Sugar 'n' Cream in cones and crank them out like nobody's business.

Pattern includes all four pieces, plus extra ideas like baloney slices and that piece of mystery cheese you just now found way in the back of the fridge.

 

 This pattern is available on Ravelry for $3.00 USD

 

Remodeling

I inexplicably feel like extracting a pig out of something. 

I've posted my first paid pattern here and at Ravelry.  I'll keep my prices dirt cheap, like, under $5.00 for most things and under $10.00 for more complicated stuff.  Most things will probably be in the $3.00-$8.00 range.

Anyhow, all vintage patterns I post will stay free.  Free!

I'm starting to re-do some stuff here.  Most likely I'll start out with good intentions, then abandon things at the halfway point when the drywall is patched and primed but I'll lose steam before I can paint the place.  

I felt like I had to take down the "Free Pattern Emporium" sign since I now have one $3.00 shawl so I've got a manky old placeholder thing up for the moment.  All my graphics stuff is on my Windows laptop and I don't feel like hauling it out.  Everything else is on the Linux laptop I use all the time.  Why two?  Because I can buy surplus laptops dirt cheap and upgrade, plus apparently I like living in an apartment littered with old hard drives and such.

Such is life.  Meh.

Moonwort Shawl

 

This pattern is available for $3.00 USD

Moonworts are ferns of the genus Botrychium. The name comes from the Shetland fern lace patterns in the shawl, plus it’s knitted from a moonlight-colored yarn (that’s a fancy description for “ordinary gray”). There’s also the added bonus that I get to use the word “wort” in polite company.

Try it in lace weight yarns or a fine-gauge chenille for different looks, scrunch it up like a scarf and tie it, drape it, or you could even wrap raw meat in it.

Pictured shawl uses a fingering weight synthetic to withstand the chemicals I seem to wear home from work and was solely an experiment but it has become my go-to shawl for breezy days. I like the way it flaps in the wind--I’m weird like that.

Materials
Approx. 5 oz. (650 yards) fingering weight yarn---your mileage may vary
Several yards of waste yarn for casting on
3.25mm (size 3 US) single-point needles
Two 3.25 double-point needles for edging
Stitch markers
Darning needle

Size
Blocked sample shawl is 20” x 60” (51cm x 152cm)

Gauge
6 sts and 11 rows to one inch in stockinette stitch

Some Species of Update

I've finally gotten around to making printable PDF versions of some of my patterns. 

Crocheted Cogs

FrankenMitts

Jolly Roger Ski Band


I have a couple of new patterns I haven't finished writing up.  They'll be posted both here and in my Ravelry shop, most of them will still be free.

http://www.ravelry.com/projects/s3ver1na

Back to my nap.

News and Other Thingies

I've been intending on writing up two shawl patterns and posting them (dead laptop) plus I'm claiming I'm working on a book on filet crochet underthings (pure laziness) but I wrote this thing instead (brain damage).  Inexplicably it's published on Amazon where everyone can see it.

Sadly, it isn't the novel I've been working on for the past couple years.

Grace Harlowe At Overton College, Or Freshman Year Among the Undead is a mashup of an old-timey book from 1915.  I thought instead of all that basketball (brr!) I'd reanimate the dead.  Amazon has a preview and there's an excerpt over at the Blogopticon.

If reanimated old-timey college girls aren't your thing I've also got a pile of vintage patterns I've been sorting through.  I'll have a couple posted once I get the shawls written up and photographed.

Or I could take another really long nap.

New projects..mumble...grumble

Let's just pretend I never mentioned the aforementioned gray stockings.  They are oh, about three sizes too big and need to be completely reworked.  They've been in a knitting bag mocking me for months now and I'm too annoyed to bother.  Meh. 

I still want to redo the blog layout and clean up old dead links or whatever.  Meh again.  Steambustle.com is being reworked into a print version with entirely too many illustrations and graphics.  A novel is eating what's left of my brain and it's in an interminably long editing stage.  A couple people are reading the thing and probably ruing the day I was born. 

I do have three new projects on Ravelry to show you guys.  Yeah, I just now got around to joining Ravelry. Time travels in reverse here, OK?

 http://www.ravelry.com/people/s3ver1na

All my Ravelry patterns will have links here and I'll keep posting free vintage patterns at the Stitch-O-Rama.  I'll have the occasional new free design but I'll keep my prices low on the others. 

I get use that hateful program from work to make my pattern layouts.  Awesome.  Don't even ask me how much I despise that thing, but it's free so whatever.

Hurricane Plans

My plans for this weekend's hurricane involve finally (stop laughing!) writing out the pattern for the oft-promised gray lace stockings. After a few hours of digging I found the original scribbled notes that got lost in the complete disaster I've gradually let happen while I fight with this accursed novel. I've been intending on doing a nice layout in a pdf file for easier downloading and printing, unless the power goes out and I'm sitting here for the next couple days in the dark listening to the wind blow.

The black lace ones have been put on the back burner for the moment because the cotton/wool blend yarn didn't have enough wool in it for stockings. I was trying to make some summer lace things, and thought I had the perfect yarn but it had absolutely no memory whatsoever. I'd try them on, they'd stretch a little, and after maybe four times of briefly trying them on they'd grown large enough for me to but both legs into. There was no point in writing out the pattern and saying, "Hey, use better yarn, OK?" Yeah, that would've been an awesome pattern.

I think I can get a little design work going on some things I've had ideas for but haven't had the time to work on. I'm not in a novel-writing mood today so I might dust off the knitting needles and pick the cat hair off some yarn. Lots and lots of cat hair.

Questions and Comments and Suchlike Plus A Straight Jacket

Sorry to anyone who has posted a comment with a question or suggestion--my comments don't connect to my email so I tend to find them much too late. Have a go at my email in my profile and I'll get back with answers pretty fast.

I did find an intriguing question by Jess in my comments today while I was looking for a pattern to link to and it was about finding a straight jacket pattern or making up one.

Have you seen the book Naughty Needles? There's a straight jacket inspired pattern in there with extra-long sleeves that fasten in the back with a D-ring on one sleeve and a metal spring clip on the other. But you could find a sort of plain, unadorned sweater pattern, lengthen the bottom and attach a pair of D-rings at the back crotch and a knitted strap at the front if you don't want it to ride up and lengthen the sleeves maybe 10"-12" with a pair of D-rings on one sleeve end and a strap on the other to cinch them up. Or metal fasteners which might look more interesting when they're not fastened.

Yes, I'm tempted to whip one up right now. There are a couple of fetish-type things I'm in the middle of designing along with a cyber-gothic thing or two, now that the graphics rush at work is done and I can let my brain cool off again, so new patterns coming up in the next few weeks or so.

Yes, that is a threat.

Starlight Evening Gloves

Starlight Evening Gloves (c)Severina/A Murphy

Formerly published at the now defunct Magknits.

Description of Design: Starlight Evening Gloves make use of a simple all-over eyelet stitch and a faggoting stitch "seam" as their focal point. They were designed using a stocking formula to create a glove that should fit nearly anyone--the resulting fit should make it worth the extra effort. While these very long gloves were knitted from a shiny rayon/cotton blend yarn, they could look equally elegant in a soft cashmere, and for a fun look try them in a glittery lurex. The pattern formula should lend itself to many yarn variations.

Difficulty Level: Intermediate
Materials needed: Sample gloves were knitted from eight ounces of rayon/cotton blend fiber hand spun into a shiny/nubby two ply yarn. One set of size 2 US (2 mm) double pointed needles. Stitch holders. Stitch markers. Tapestry needle. Yarn substitutes: Jaeger Silk 4 ply, four 50 gram balls, Jet Black or Tapestry. Schachenmayer Regia Stretch, four 50 gram balls, Black. Garnstudio Cotton Viscose, four 50 gram balls, Navy, Scarlet Red, or Shocking Pink. Rowan Cotton Glace, four 50 gram balls, Black, Excite, or Passion.
Sizes: Palm circumference: 5 inch / 13 cm (6 inch/ 15 cm, 7 inch /1 cm) Arm sizes adjustable with formula.
Gauge: 32 stitches and 40 rows measured over 4 inches.

Schematics:


Stitch instructions

Simple Eyelet Pattern: Multiple of 8 stitches.
Row 1: (Right side) Knit.
Row 2 and all other wrong-side rows: Purl.
Row 3: *K 6, yo, k2 tog, rep from *.
Row 5: Knit.
Row 7: K2, * yo, k2 tog, k6, rep from *, end last rep k4.
Row 8: Purl.

Faggoting Stitch: Multiple of 4 stitches.
Row 1: K1, yo, k2 tog, k1.
Row 2: K1, k2 tog, yo, k1.

Pattern: In order to calculate stitch count for arm you will have to take several measurements: Circumference of upper arm, wrist, and palm; and length from armpit (or desired length) to wrist.
Multiply number of stitches per inch in your gauge swatch by the number of inches in upper arm circumference and wrist circumference. Round off both to even numbers.
Subtract wrist number from upper arm number. This will be the number of stitches you will decrease between upper arm and wrist. Divide this number by two since you will be decreasing two stitches each time.
Length between upper arm and wrist divided by number of stitches decreased will give the frequency of decreases.
Sample gloves started out with a measurement of 10 inches at the upper arm. 8 gauge stitches X 10 inches = 80 cast on stitches. Wrist measurement was 6 inches X 8 gauge stitches = 48 stitches. 80 - 48 = 32, divided by 2 = 16. Two decreases were made 16 times, and since arm length of sample glove was 18 inches decreases were made approximately every inch.
Circumference of palm gives glove size. Stitch count at wrist may be the same as palm or some stitches may have to be increased.

Right Glove
Arm: Cast on stitches from upper arm number and divide between three needles. Work in K1, P1 rib for 1 inch (2.5 cm). Count stitches on first needle and subtract 4, then divide resulting number by two. Place marker at this point. This is where the Fagoting Stitch "seam" will start.
Work Simple Eyelet Stitch to marker, work Faggoting Stitch, place second marker, then work eyelet stitch around the rest of unworked stitches. Work in pattern for at least 1 inch before starting decreases to establish eyelet pattern.
Decreases are worked on either side of markers. Become familiar with how the eyelets are placed as they are worked so that the pattern stays uniform as stitches are decreased.
Continue to work arm in pattern, making sure you try the glove on to check fit and desired length.
When desired length to wrist has been reached discontinue Faggoting Stitch.

Glove Preperation: Size small is 46 stitches, medium is 48 stitches, and large is 50 stitches. You will have to rearrange stitches on needles: small 23, 11, 12; medium 24, 12, 12; large 25, 12, 13. The largest number is on the first needle with the faggoting stitch in the center as for upper arm. This will make sure faggoting is in center of palm.
Discontinue eyelet stitch on palm of glove (first needle) to ensure that the pattern will line up properly. Line up eyelet pattern on back of hand.
Palm: Work 4 rounds as established, discontinuing eyelet and faggoting stitch on palm and increasing stitches for hand as needed.
Thumb increases: K2, place marker, inc 1 sts, k2, inc 1 st, place marker, work in pattern around. Work without increasing for 2 rounds. Repeat these three rounds until there are 12 (14, 14) stitches between markers, working thumb only in \b eyelet stitch\b0 .
Work in pattern as established until piece reaches desired length from wrist to base of thumb. K2 sts, place next 12 (14, 14) stitches to stitch holder. Cast on 4 sts and work to end of round.
Work hand in pattern as established until piece reaches desired length to base of index finger.
Index Finger: Take 6 (6, 7) sts from palm and 7 (7, 8) sts from back of hand and place remaining sts on stitch holders. Divide the 13 (13, 14) stitches between three needles. Cast on 2 sts between palm and back of hand. Work around in eyelet stitch, lining up eyelets with pattern on back of hand, until index finger is 1/4 inch from tip. *K2 tog. Repeat from * around. Next round-K around. Break yarn, leaving a tail. Thread yarn through tapestry needle and pull through remaining sts and pull tight. Darn in end.
Middle Finger: Take 6 (6, 6) sts from palm and 6 (7, 7) sts from back of hand and place remaining sts on stitch holders. Place the 12 (13, 13) stitches between two needles. Cast on 2 sts between palm and back of hand and pick up 2 sts from cast-on sts of index finger. Divide sts between three needles. Work around in eyelet stitch, lining up eyelets with pattern on back of hand, until index finger is 1/4 inch from tip. *K2 tog. Repeat from * around. Next round-K around. Break yarn, leaving a tail. Thread yarn through tapestry needle and pull through remaining sts and pull tight. Darn in end.
Ring Finger: Take 5 (5, 5) sts from palm and 5 (6, 6) sts from back of hand and place remaining sts on stitch holders. Place the 10 (11, 11) stitches between two needles. Cast on 2 sts between palm and back of hand and pick up 2 sts from cast-on sts of middle finger. Divide sts between three needles. Work around in eyelet stitch, lining up eyelets with pattern on back of hand, until index finger is 1/4 inch from tip. *K2 tog. Repeat from * around. Next round-K around. Break yarn, leaving a tail. Thread yarn through tapestry needle and pull through remaining sts and pull tight. Darn in end.
Little Finger: Take 5 (5, 6) sts from palm and 6 (6, 6) sts from back of hand and place remaining sts on stitch holders. Place the 11 (11, 12) stitches between two needles. Pick up 2 sts from cast-on sts of ring finger. Divide sts between three needles. Work around in eyelet stitch, lining up eyelets with pattern on back of hand, until index finger is 1/4 inch from tip. *K2 tog. Repeat from * around. Next round-K around. Break yarn, leaving a tail. Thread yarn through tapestry needle and pull through remaining sts and pull tight. Darn in end.
Thumb: Divide sts for thumb on three needles, picking up 4 sts from 4 cast-on sts. Work in eyelet stitch until thumb measures 1/4 inch from tip, decreasing as for other fingers.

Left Glove: Work as for Right Glove, reversing shaping by putting thumb increases at end of first needle and starting left index finger above thumb shaping.
Finishing: Darn in yarn ends. Wash according to yarn label and lie flat to dry, pulling arm to length slightly.

Not Dead, Just Brain-Dead

I'm brain-dead and I've been embalmed.

Not much of an excuse for not posting anything new here for at least a year, but other than that I got nothin'. I mean, there's no point in claiming laziness as an excuse.

But I have got ten (count 'em, ten!) new vintage patterns that I posted today and as usual I've got a couple of odd ones since I'm more than a little tired of finding only afghans, baby clothes, and crocheted edging when I'm perusing the internets for free vintage clothes patterns.

So check out the Vintage Pattern List and print some stuff up.

Coming soon: I'm designing some new stuff like I mentioned a few posts back, whatever I said. Yeah, those things.

The Stratford--One-Piece Dress, Hat and Purse, 1933

Ladies Knitted Under-Jacket, 1875

Not really a jacket, but an undershirt. Usually these things are called "vests" or "undervests" or something less likely to conjure up the thought it was meant as an outerwear garment.

Like most patterns of this era no finished size, gauge, or needle size is given. Mmmm, helpful.

Knitted Under-Stays, 1875

Meant to be worn beneath the corset for extra warmth. No finished size, gauge, or needle sizes given and no explanation of how it should be closed in the back. Possibly it was sewn up the back like a tube top and the buttonhole stitching is around the top and bottom edges. The only similar patterns to this I've found thus far have been crocheted out of cotton cord, laced up the back, and were meant to be used as lightweight stays for ladies and children.

Bead Bracelet and Chain, 1863

There was no illustration of the finished bracelet in the book I found this pattern in, but it's easy enough to picture if you read the instructions.

Ladies Knee-Caps, 1885

My only comment is that people's knees must've been frickin' cold during the Victorian days because I've run across at least a dozen different knee-cap patterns for both men and women. You'd think with all the flannel undies, voluminous skirts and petticoats, and woolen stockings that they'd be happy for their knees to get a little breeze now and again.

This one I particularly liked because it looked creepy and orthopedic, and I thought if it was knitted in black it could be part of a Victorianindustrial getup, or it could even drift casually over into steampunk mad-scientist territory. Or something.

Maybe I like these damned things a little too much.

*scampers away*