Well Red! Well, umm Red

OK bad pun!   but I realised yesterday that a lot of my recent projects are of a reddish hue ...
Have listed this scarf on Etsy -

It is hand-knitted from 2 Japanese (Habu) yarns held together - one is cotton the other is a very fine stainless steel thread wound with silk.  Fabulous stitch definition and you can stretch the edge into frilly-ness and the steel wire will hold the shape - Wonderful!   It wasn't very pleasant to knit ... 2 yarns held together gets 'splitty' and you have to concentrate.  But it isn't scratchy at all - that steel thread is very fine.

More knitting - this time for a very good friend.

Not quite as plain as it looks - there is darting at the waist to make it nicely fitted and the 'sleeve heads' (top of the sleeves) are shaped as you do in sewn garments ... a little bit more fabric at the back of the arm & a little less at the front.

The shawl collar is shaped with short rows and I worked the shoulder seams with grafting. 








Another job for a friend - this jacket needed alterations to make it smaller - love all the fabulous styling and details!




 Very Tyrolian - rich red wool fabric with dark khaki -






rustic (plastic actually) buttons (all non-functioning, the edge-to-edge fastening is with hooks & eyes)  and some fancy stitching at the faux pockets and ...

at the back.

Love that fabulous tiny insert of the green down the centre back seam and on the shoulders.
There is the label -

And now - some knitting for Bythe Dolls - for sale on Etsy

A Candy Cane top - all asymmetrical & striped.

And a Bright Red swimsuit - quite " Va Va Voom " as worn by Audrey the Super Model.

What we did on our Holidays - part 3 - Melbourne

After the turquoise blues of Perth's beaches the grey/brown of Melbourne's came as a disappointment ... they say it is storm water run-off.   However, I had been knitting yet more cossies for Blythe dolls and BiBi did some modelling for me.

BiBis is my daughter's French Trench, she was the 1st Blythe in our family.  She has a classic beauty - rather posh & classy though her 'bed-hair' suggests that she likes to party ... on expensive champagne. 
BiBi has claimed this classic plain black one-piece swim suit.

The photo-shoot was at Brighton Beach with those wonderful beach sheds as the perfect back-drop. 

 

This cossie is more 'vintage' style with a modesty skirt - I'm thinking of opening another Etsy shop, to sell clothes etc for Blythes & this might just be the first item made for it. 

The dolls love going to Melbourne and catching up with their friends there ...

BiBi & Lillian enjoy nice long chats

Took the grandkids to the museum one day - the Melb museum has this wonderful whale-bone on display.  I've made reproduction corsets, I've handled real Victorian corsets and I've done a lot of research on corsetry - so to me, this is fascinating.  

The whalebone that was used in corsets and clothing is not really bone, it is the baleen.  The filter-feeder business in the mouths of the baleen whales that feed on krill.  And look - it is like compressed hair - this is why it was so strong yet flexible (so much better than the modern plastic boning and thinner than the spiral steels we use).  It is made of keratin - just like our hair & fingernails, also birds' feathers & beaks.  It is also practically black, though I have seen old 'whalebones' in vintage garments that were cream colour (also some very dark ones) not sure of the reason for such variation in the colour.

I also did some crafting with the grands - 

cheap little kits to make Chrissie Decorations but we'd lost some of the bits and so the children had do be imaginative ... I love what they came up with.

Penguin?

Naturally, we all did plenty of eating - and I realised that I'm constantly taking photos of my granddaughter eating - she does enjoy her food! 

Now for some random Melbournian photos - 

saw these pretty lead-light windows in a house not far from Brighton Beach.  Love that one window had green round the edges and the corner window had the pink...

I also finally managed to get a photo of The Hand at Flinders Street station - pointing the way to the correct platform for St Kilda ... wonderful old tiles!

Finally - some more Brighton Beach photos - the dolls didn't mind the E. Coli count!

Audrey made sand-castles...

   

   

While Lillian and BiBi went for a stroll and chatted away some more!

Violetta & BiBi play beach ball, despite the wind!

Cossies for Blythe Dolls

I have been making Cossies / swimsuits for Blythe dolls - trying to develop a knitting pattern for them and giving my dolls plenty of opportunities to channel their inner "Bathing Beauty".

 

Lillian's cossie is a classic vintage style with a 'modesty skirt' - the colours and stripes make it a little bit nautical.

And yes, she nearly did get her feet nibbled by the gold-fish!

Audrey got a boy-leg suit in candy stripes - it has a low back.

 


Violetta's is purple (but of course) with a frilly bottom edged in white just so you notice it!


Violetta's beach towel is a face-cloth (or flannel) cut in half and hemmed on that edge - the beach ball is a ping pong ball with texta colours.

Now - all these swim-suits are my own knitting pattern/s.  They all have the same halter neck top and, except for Audrey's boy-leg suit, they are basically the same shape in the body & bottom.  They can be worn over the doll's underpants - taking those on & off is an ordeal I was keen to avoid!

Lillian's old ADG body (see this post all about Lillian's body transplant) makes a wonderful dressmakers' dummy - I'm calling it Elle (after a certain supermodel who was known as The Body).  The dolls are really relieved that they no longer have to try on half-made garments with knitting needles and sewing pins that scratch and get all tangled up in their hair ... and I guess this photo should come with a "Partial Doll Nudity" warning!    

Pattern-making in progress ...

But wait - there's more ... I've made some swimsuits as swaps & things too.  So more Bathing Belle photos ...

This suit & bag was part of my Secret Santa pressie at the WPWD's meet last weekend. Mandy got my parcel - hope her dolls like it.

In soft aqua, a very girlie version with a frill skirt all round - this time edged with pearlised embroidery thread.  The beach bag is crochet.

And this was for a swap done through WPWDs.  I couldn't post about this until my swap partner got her parcel ... she lives on a Pacific Island which (predictably) made me think of resorts and lazing about a pool ... 

Doesn't Audrey make a wonderful swim-suit model?  The suit is a plain maillot but in a variegated sock yarn - there are some glass beads at the decolletage.  Another ping-pong / beach ball but this beach towel is knitted - stripes of left-over sock yarns in moss stitch (aka seed stitch) for a rather vintage look.  A knitted beach bag with crochet trim.

  And to complete the swap parcel - a maxi-dress.  This is from the halter-neck dress pattern I have for free (at the top of the page).  I used a self-striping sock yarn that I bought in Versailles :-)   it is "Opal Planète" for Bergère de France, the "Rosa" colourway.

Well, you've seen some beach bags above,  I made my own dolls a bag each too - to match their cossies.

 

Lillian & Audrey's are knitted in bamboo yarn - with trim to match their suits.   I used the "Turkish Cast-On" to make these ...

Audrey & Violetta both have really alabaster complexions - so sun-hats are a necessity.  Audrey's is crochet from the same bamboo yarn I used for most of the beach bags - the frill makes it rather like a May Gibbs gum-blossom baby's hat.

Violetta's hat & bag are both crochet from a metallic tape-yarn that I found un-banded in an Op-Shop.  Makes a great dolly hat as it is rather stiff.   I went a bit flamboyant with the purple nylon ribbons - but why not when she looks so cute!

Well, after all that modelling of swim-suits the girls decided to have a picnic and they tested the carrying capacity of their new beach bags.