17 November 2016

The black, green and red colours are already in my stash leftover from knitting my felted Roses bag, so it seemed sensible to continue with worsted weight although the pattern uses DK.

I have started this by knitting in the round. I assume the designer wanted the strength of the 2 joining side seams to give stability to the bag, so at the beginning and end of each side I have added in an extra 2 stitches - in the round this means I have 4 stitches extra at each side seam. This makes the equivalent of a gusset for a steek. Once the bag is off the needles I will cut and seam the steek, this should give structure to the bag. There is no way I will be doing colour work by knitting back and forth!

At present I am at a complete loss to understand how the beads are attached from the instructions given. I may leave them out. I have only ever added beads by the crochet hook method which places them exactly where you want them. I thought perhaps the beads were therefore pre-strung onto the wool for this, but I can’t see any instructions to do this. I am probably being stupid and missing something. I shall look at this nearer the time, though I would have liked to order the beads now.

Update: I have now found the instruction to pre-thread the beads. Though why this info is not put beside the “how to place beads” section of the pattern I am not sure.

Using my Addi long lace needles in 3.75 mm and moving up to 4 mm on an 80 cm cable.

21 November 2016

2 pics of progress uploaded. One shows a close-up of the gusset/steek allowance at one side of the back and front of the bag, to allow for me seaming to add strength to the side seams, yet allow in the round knitting.

07 December 2016

Knitting completed yesterday. Today I took the sewing machine and secured the 2 sides of each panel before hacking them apart with scissors eeek! I thought the whole bag was a bit soft so decided to do a light felting. Exactly 20 minutes on a cotton wash at 40 C in my front loading machine worked perfectly, it’s usually around the 18 minute mark I find. Removed immediately and squeezed out surplus water before doing the towel dance on top of the panels.

Both panels now drying before seaming, though in hindsight seaming before felting would have been much easier for matching up the pattern using mattress stitch, however too late for such bright thoughts now.

I have bought 50 cm leather handles and had a magnetic clasp for closing the bag left over from another bag, also 1 metre of green/red floral cotton fabric to line the bag. I have some brass feet for the base but as the base it only a seam and not an actual panel, not sure they will work. I am glad I have already made one bag, my felted roses bag, as I learned a lot about bag making from that, see my notes here:

http://www.ravelry.com/projects/Lady-Aga/22---32-felted-r...

Steek now cut and mattress stitch (after felting) has gone better than I might have imagined. Started in the centre of each side seam & stitched my way out to each end to try and get all lined up. Cutting the steek allowed me match up more easily, as inevitably knitting in the round creates the next row out of kilter with last and a jog appears.

I have also managed to keep the slight increase bulb at the base of each side seam to give shape to the bag, though I think this increasing could be even more in the pattern to make a more definite shape. Drying off now. Next job to line with green fabric.

13 December 2016

I have sewn the handles on a number of times now and finally think I have them placed correctly. I am not too keen on the handles that have the attachment point shaped all in one, and chose leather ones with the hinge as you can see, this helps not distort the knitted bag as they lie flat against the bag.

Behind the anchor points for the handles, I applied patches of iron on velcro to give substance to the bag at this point for stitching them in place.The closure is a magnetic clasp. I have lined with pretty fabric.

I did not put any beads on my bag and felt a Dorset button may look a bit glitzy, so did not make one. I did make 3 little pom-poms for the charm but it did not look correct on my bag so at present it is plain and simple letting the design shine out.

I have just been outside to photograph the bag at various points around the garden as a watery December sun appeared. The bag looks rather flat in the photo taken hanging on the gate, as I forgot to put in anything in it at that point in my haste.

All in all a fun project which I look forward to using.