Linen Ponchette - This one is for me!

“What are you going to do with all those shawls?” my friend, Nancy asks me. She would like to see me knit pieces to include in my quilts and wall hangings. Nancy's quilts were always works of art. Now after years of perfecting her piecing and quilting skills, she is flourishing as a fiber artist making art quilts.

Yes, I’ve knitted a lot of shawls, scarves and ponchettes. And I’m knitting more. But I really don’t have too many because after I knit them, I give them away. When a daughter, sister, or friend admires something I’ve made, I might give it to her right then. Or I might wait until her birthday. I am happy when my work is admired, when I know it will be worn. It is what an artist feels when her work is hung in a gallery. As a knitter, having my work worn, is having it displayed. Isn't that what every artist wants?

And giving one away gives me reason to knit another. So, when my daughter admired the Cool Hemp Ponchette knit in Allhemp6, it was hers. I had another planned.

This time I knit the pattern in Euroflax sport weight linen. It was the color, willow, that first drew me to the yarn. This was my first experience knitting with linen and I found it behaved very much like the hemp although the linen wasn’t quite as rough and itchy on my hand. Once again this was a quick, easy to knit pattern. After knitting the basic rectangle that forms the ponchette, I tossed it in the washing machine with a load of whites (no bleach!), then into the dryer. I took it out while still damp, blocked it to the size recommended in the pattern as I would any lace project, stretching out the points as much as I could. When it was dry I seamed it. The linen and the hemp both biased quite a bit but the pattern seemed designed for that and the ponchette hangs with a bit of swing and a casual elegance to dress up a warm day.

I’m going to wear it.

Cool Hemp Ponchette

I’m wearing my new Cool Hemp Ponchette made without deviation from the Lanaknits pattern. And I like it! The design in the lace shows up clearly, the opening folds into a slight cowl and the hemp has a lovely drape. It is a fun little cover up to add just a touch of style to my tee shirts. Later I’ll be meeting a friend for lunch and the ponchette will dress me up just a bit. And it's always nice to have a wrap in a restaurant with the air conditioner running on high.

I’m very impressed with the way the ponchette drapes. You can see this on many of the project pictures other knitters have posted on Ravelry. After knitting, I washed it in the washer and dried it in the dryer until almost dry. Then I laid it out on the blocking mats and blocked it to size, stretching out each of the points in the lace border.

This was the first time I’d knit with hemp and I’m curious to see how it wears. I know it will be both soft and strong. I know it will be soft because after I redid the seam three times to get it to meet my standards, that little bit of yarn was soft as silk. And I know it’s strong because as soon as I put it on this morning I caught a bit of the lace on the sharp edge of a house fan and pulled out a big loop of yarn. I gave it a good tug and all the strands were nicely back in place.

Knitting with hemp was like knitting with kitchen twine. It seemed to make my fingers itch and its resistance to being manipulated exacerbated my early arthritis. After I was done I read on the Lanaknits website a suggestion to soak the hemp in hot water and hair conditioner before knitting. I’ll try that next time. The end product is so nice I don’t want the stiffness of the yarn to keep me from using it.

Blocking Lace

What happened here?










Some knitters say they hate to block. I’ve even heard a few say they refuse to block, limiting themselves to patterns and yarns that don’t require blocking. Not me! I love to block because I love what it does for my knitting. I am not as good a knitter as I would like to be. My stitches are not perfectly even. My edges are not perfectly straight. This is particularly true of lace. The intricate stitches don’t lie flat and neat, the pattern is lost is a rumple of yarn that looks nothing like I intended. Blocking turns that unruly pile of yarn into beautiful knitted lace right before my eyes.

As soon as I bound off the last stitch of Swallowtail #2 I set out immediately to get it blocked. I am a fan of wet blocking. I want every bit of fiber thoroughly saturated with water to insure the blocking can work its magic. I soaked the shawl in lukewarm water in the bathroom sink with a little bit of shampoo and rinsed it with a little bit of conditioner. It is hair! After about half an hour, I drained the sink and squeezed out the excess water, first by pushing the shawl against the side of the sink and then rolling it in a big towel and squeezing the towel.

The magic comes when the shawl is laid out on the blocking boards. This time I had new soft linking mats purchased at Lowe’s. These are 24 inch square plastic mats that fit together like a jig saw puzzle, sold as a play surface in the flooring department. They come four to a package. I bought two packages and fit 5 squares together in a triangle shape on my cutting table. One side of the mats has a gridded surface. I put this side up and the grids seemed to grab and hold the damp shawl in place as I worked. Pins went easily into the pads and, because of the grip, fewer were necessary. In short order Swallowtail #2 was drying, pinned tightly on the pads.

And that’s when I saw this conspicuous hole, impossible to ignore against the playroom yellow of the blocking mat! It looks as if I tried to pick up a dropped yarnover several rows later and somehow ended up with the right number of stitches without getting all the stitches in their proper places.

But I know the shawl won’t be stretched out like this again until I have to wash it some day. And blocking had done for the shawl what I hoped it would, revealed the beauty of the pattern, evened out my stitches and gave the shawl a beautiful drape. The hole will disappear into gentle folds falling over my shoulders. I’ve decided not to see it!