Thursday, October 18, 2018

The button up blue vest, continued, possibly finished.

The vest finished, buttons made and attached, I tried it on and decided I didn't like it. Too boxy and floppy, even when I adjusted for buttoning.

So I felted it. Boiled it briefly in suds, plunged into cold water, then another cold water, then wrung it out and gave it half an hour in a hot dryer with a towel. I had prudently buttoned it up ahead of time.




And ended with a really nice felted material. Much better texture, subtle design.  color really blazing away  I clipped the buttonholes just a bit, easy now it's felted, won't fray, for easier buttoning now the original holes are smaller.

And still not happy with the fit. So I cut up the sides and stitched a slanted seam like a dart. And now it's really nice. It fits. Very cosy, too.

I'm thinking of making a purse with the leftover yarn and felting it, now that I know how well it felts. With any luck that will be a bit simpler.

So this simple (!) vest involved knitting, felting, stitching, cursing and Dorset button making. Knitting's not for the faint of heart. At least not the way I do it!

4 comments:

  1. awww. well at least you got it to work at last, and the blue is magnificent. I call stuff like that a learning experience.

    I suspect the cursing was the glue that kept it all together, anyway. It usually is.

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  2. Very likely about the cursing. I always like to say my people invented those words! It was fun in fact seeing it through. I know there are knitters out there cringing at all the rough treatment, even Cutting! Boiling! Arghgh.

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  3. Wow - that vest has been through a lot! Glad that you managed to finally wrestle it into submission and have something you are happy with. Must have been all the cursing...

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  4. At one point I thought it was it or me! We both prevailed. I guess.

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