Projects
Feeling Unproductive? Here’s a Cure for That
Dear Kay,
Wow is all I have to say.
My goal of knitting a Bobble Throw in a week looks like it’s going to be an easy mark to hit.
What you see here is about twelve square feet of blanket, cranked in an easy weekend of knitting. When the gauge is 2.5 stitches to the inch, and you’re wielding size 13 needles, it’s just not all that hard to end up with a pile of blanket. Rowan Big Wool is ginormous. When have I felt so productive? Never!
The colors here are Mallard and Concrete.
I’m shocked, frankly, at how speedily this goes. My rough calculation indicates that this blanket has about 15,000 stitches in it. A pair of average socks has around 11,000 or so. You can knit a pair of socks or you can knit a blanket: AWESOME.
One ball per stripe, with a bit left over.
At this point, I can imagine making more than one of these. I thought this was going to be my Personal Highlight ProjectTM from MDK Field Guide No. 12: Big Joy, but now I’m feeling another blanket coming on. I may end up with Multiple Personal Highlight Projects.
FOR SCALE, YOU’RE LOOKING AT ABOUT TWO KERMITS OF KNITTING.
Left to do: the border around the edges, then the enbobblement begins. What’s good about adding the bobbles after knitting the background is that you can scheme endlessly as you knit about what exactly your bobble game is going to be. A lot? A few? Multicolor? Subtle? Wacky? I’ve changed my mind twice now.
When I’m knitting a designer’s pattern, I find myself thinking about that person a lot as I make their design. Jen Geigley, I’m thinking about you and your crazy bobbles—I never would have thought of having afterbobbles. I’m so literal about them. I thought a bobble had to be a built-in thing.
Love,
Ann
Hi Ann!
Your blanket looks so yummy! I would love to knit one, but I’m packing up – on the move again – so that only leaves socks in my backpack… this time, socks with a difference:
I completely understand the whole ‘feeling productive vibe: turning left-over carpet yarn – after a ‘rug turned floor cushion’ – I am on pair no 4!!! in 2 days!!!
I look forward to seeing your ‘after bobbled blanket’!
Patricia
Recently had to edited a pattern……..open the box….took 2 days to discover an error was made….now time to get moving on the project…deb
I love your two new words – enbobblement and afterbobble. Wish I could figure out how to use them in a non-knitting context
How about cake decorating.
Kermit looks like he’s posing for Tinder again!
He’s a looker, that Kermit!
Wow wow wow! I absolutely love the two Kermit’s worth of stripes. Stripes!! And I can’t wait to see what you end up doing with the afterbobbles. (They are so quick to make – you can lay out and preview your ideas before you commit!) This is going to be good.
How do you make bobbles after…I always thought you have to so them as you knit?
I think you usually DO have to make them as you knit … but the Bobble Throw pattern in the new Field Guide (“BIG JOY”) tells how to make AFTERTHOUGHT BOBBLES. Pretty cool, huh?
That blanket in a weekend is fabulous! Though Kermit looks rather unimpressed…
Great blanket — AWESOME Kermit.
Agree!
Love those two colors together. Can’t wait to see the final result – embobblement and all.
.
Love it.
Cozy corner and wool. Tops it all.
Joanne
Wow Ann!! Look at you go;) Can’t wait to see your enbobblement, I’m picturing bobbles using every Rowan Big Wool color
I love the stripes…how many skeins of each color would I need?
Hi Susan!
I used 4 skeins of the blue, 4 skeins of the light color. Each stripe is most of a skein with a little left over. I’m knitting the border right now and I’m thinking 2 skeins of one color for that. I’m going to use the leftovers for the bobbles.
Kermit as a standard of measurement! PURRFECT!
Uh, oh. Kermit looks like he’s getting impatient. Where IS Foodlady with his smoked salmon??
Beautiful blanket! And love that Kermit — what a guy!
I think that the Bobble Throw is officially my favorite pattern from Big Joy! I like the subdued colorway you chose, and can see a case for staying subdued as well as going Crazy with Color on the bobbles. I have actually seen the afterthought bobbles in a book from a number of years ago, and thought then how clever they were! The book is Doggy Knits, and the pattern is Bright and Bobbly, by Anna Tillman. It also calls for a Rowan yarn, the discontinued Wool Cotton. It would be fun to make a Bobble Throw and a Bright and Bobbly dog coat and see which took longer! (I looks like there are more bobbles on the dog coat.)
Wow! Speed-knitting! You can be in the Knitting Olympics!
By the way, are your hands okay with knitting with such large needles? They make my hands hurt after a while. Is there something i’m doing wrong?
It’s definitely a different maneuver to knit with big needles–I find I’m working pretty slowly, actually, to make each stitch. And my hands have held up OK, but I can totally imagine it being a problem after a certain point.
More Kermit, please!
Your blanket is beautiful, and perhaps I am the only one who cannot figure this out, but how does it work as a baby blanket? If you lie the baby on it, don’t the bobbles get in the way? Perhaps it is meant as a car blanket? Sorry for the silly question.
Our vision is for it to be a stroller blanket, basically—a snuggler to keep a baby warm when out and about. Or a lovey to drag around the house until it falls apart.
Inquiring minds want to know: What have you been watching/listening to during this project?
I hope you let us know how to make an afterbobble.
I made a large, loose vest on size 9 needles after a few years of knitting nothing but socks on size 0 or 1. It was laughably fast! I mean every time I held the work up to check progress, I laughed out loud.