A Little Monkey Love
September 28, 2006 at 9:47 AM
by Ashleigh
To stay the disappointment I present Mr Monkey (de aap de Monkey heet), in his ever so elegant intarsia knit from Fiona McTague's Knits for Children and their Teddies. Knitted on 3.25 and 4 mm needles. 100g of main colour, oddments of others.
This was so fun to knit. I'm knitting the big version simultaneously in a reversed colourway. I love this grey wool. It's a 15% wool/85% acrylic blend from Lanastop, which is a Spanish brand. I picked it up at the market and it was dead cheap - around 3 euros for 100g!
I know there are fibre snobs out there who won't let an acrylic touch their hands (hah!) but for our family, acrylic is great. It dries quickly! Holland is one of the dampest places on earth (or so it feels during the interminably grey winter) and I don't want wool behemoths hanging on radiators in every room.
I used an intarsia method on the snowflake and stranded the wool across. Learning to knit with one colour in my left hand and the other in my right was interesting! For a while I thought I couldn't do it and then suddenly I had an aha! moment and it clicked in and I could. I remember when I first learned to knit, aged about 7, it took me forever just to complete a single row. I felt a bit like that with the stranding at first. I'm sure with more practice it will flow smoothly.
Isn't it a great idea to be able to knit a little garment first, check on the fit and the styling and then commit to the bigger version? I love it!
I have Joe's red version on the needles at the moment. The back is completed and I'll do the sleeves next I think - that zigzag pattern on the sleeves is so fun to knit.
I intend to go back to the market tomorrow to pick up more of this grey wool to keep for another garment - maybe an Aran style jacket?
In other crafting news, I have one exchange sent off, another to go this weekend and three *gulp* to stitch before October 15th. Best get stitching, hadn' t I?
Comments
Absolutely adorable!!!
Ashleigh,
The sweater looks great! I love grey and red, it's such a nice combination. The monkey sure is lucky to have such a nice sweater! I'm looking forward to seeing the one that you're knitting for your son. I really enjoy reading your blog. Thanks for the time and effort that you put into it.
Julianne
Mr Monkey is cute
I enjoy reading your blog. You are such a prolific knitter! Your knitting is an encouragement to me. I also appreciate your information concerning South Africa and Zimbabwe. My daughters visited SA on a missions trip in March of this year. The missionary also visits Zimbabwe often. I have gained a lot of knowlege by reading the weekly reports from Cathy Buckle.
I think it is wonderful that you are able to speak a foreign language so fluently! I have started to learn Spanish, and I have a long, long way to go!
Again thank you for your posts. I will continue to look forward to reading them!
Gigi
I'll say again how incredibly cute this monkey is and how much I envy him (her? it?) that lovely sweater!!
Hi Ashleigh, I've lost your email address so I'll have to hope you see this and get in touch. I've found your "Baby's First Year Journal" that you kept for Seb and then lent to me, you said you might want it back at some point. Well we are getting rid of loads of books and this is one of them. Would you like me to send it back to you? Otherwise it will go to a charity bookshop. Let me know please!
What a lovely jumper you clever person. I'm sure I couldn't do it even a small toy sized one. Great idea as you say to try it out in a small size. By the way thanks for the sizing for the Debbie Bliss jumper.
This is one great small sweater! I love snowflakes. And no, I am not a fibre snob, just the other way round, I "hate" wool, even the least amount of it in a garment itches.. I spent the last two days searching for fabric to sew a "vest" and all the fabric I fell in love with had wool in it..Aaargh!
Ashleigh it's fabulous, and the monkey has such a cute face.
September 28, 2006 10:51 AM