Octicraft is on the way to being a Master Knitter!

I recently found out about the knitting guild and master knitter program, i knew i had to find out more. The rules and regulations are simple but strict, perfection. Master Knitting Guild

After reading the blogs that showed up in the first few search pages and of course looking over the knitting guild website and ravelry pages, images of all the swatches in the basic level one of the three. I was easily thinking i would complete in in a few hours or a weekend. I have since changed my mind.

After knitting every swatch as a pre warmup something, i blocked and measured realizing ive got a few small things to work on. This is very helpful since they like progress, thats what this program is all about, finding YOUR weak points and pushing yourself to find the answers technique or whatever to being a Master Knitter. Soooo im officially starting and im starting slow, i have plenty of home time with my own office/workroom but again this is about personal improvement with tedium sprinkled all over.

  ONLY THE DETERMINED WILL SURVIVE!!

Anyways, so i started with swatch number one again. The first time i used a sz 6, but in attempt to make this easier on myself answering the questions on each swatch (in comparison to the label suggestions) i used a sz 8. Very quickly i noticed how loose it was between the knit to purl stitches and of course tighter when going from purl to knit. So ... i was going to have to overcome this and it happened to be one of the later questions about the first group of swatches.

Thus the Google search began.....

 I usually click on a bunch of random things to get me going, whatever comes up in the first few pages. Something will point you in the right direction. Common problem and i will just skip the details of the askew thing i knit trying different ways of tightening my rib-work, what finally worked at making a drastic improvement (other than working at getting comfortable with it) was to do a combination of eastern and western knitting.
 http://www.trulymyrtle.com/2012/02/ribbing-east-meets-west.html
Pictures to help!

 cast on-
row 1: knit western, knit western, purl eastern purl western, rep to end of row
row 2: knit western, knit eastern, purl eastern, purl western, rep to end of row
rep row 2 till end of project section.

if you dont top an eastern purl with a ws eastern knit the stitch gets all twisted. its very apparent when its on your needles and your actually going through the motions.

I found this way of doing a 2 x 2 rib very helpful, very fluid and easy to pick up the motions of. Next is the 1x1 rib, i will have to re-examine to see if i need apply the stitch combo to this as well.

Remember, bigger needles show your mistakes and short falls better, use this to show yourself where you can improve or have become lax in.

Knit armor for the lovable barbarian cont. (pattern secrets!)

Since my earlier post of some knit armor prototype i have kept working on how to make it a little more decorative and interesting. Finally this green and purple set was made just for the 13' fashion show of  Knit1oxford.  The scales of course were knit first then knit into the background base, the scales are a mix of a hand dyed wool and a wool and acrylic blend giving them a very interesting look and all are individual. the background is good ol' red heart black. the purple parts were some simply soft acrylic i had lying around, this i cabled and tried out increasing and decreasing the cabling both in size of cabled strands and in the number of strands cabled.

This red one was an earlier one that was made in all acrylic and the scales stood stiffly and nicely. Next time i think i will try all acrylic for the scales.

Woven two color gloves

This pair is done with elclatic knitting. Easy once started, it gives you this bulky snuggy setup. Make a set with a hat or matching leg Warmers and its a lil party already!