Author: Lyn Leventhall

Currently - webmaster for Bookham Machine Knitting Club.
Erica demonstrating how to knit with wire

March 2011 Meeting

Lyn Leventhall

The meeting started with the chairman, Brenda welcoming members of visiting clubs and then telling us about the Bookham Village Day on Saturday June 18th. This year’s theme was “A day at the races” and the club sometimes have a sales’ table and this year a frieze to match the theme could be made. Sarah offered to coordinate this. Offers or work need to be in by Mid May so it can be assembled.

Several members had visited the Unravel show in Farnham and said it was, again, an excellent show with a good range of yarn, projects etc.

Next month was the AGM followed by Margaret’s talk.

Closeup of knitted earrings
Colourful Earrings

We then welcomed back our speaker Erica Thompson who would be talking to us about her wire knitting and about how pressing matters.

Erica Thomson showing how to block knitted fabric
Blocking knitted fabric using wires to stabilise edges
She had set up several excellent displays of work and many colourful reels of wire and jewellery findings and booklets for sale that club members had been admiring before the start of the meeting.

She started her talk by her describing how she got started with wire knitting and the type of wire she used. Then she gave us the good news – knitted wire doesn’t unravel if you drop a stitch and as it is not distorted by the machine, you can measure it right on the machine. Excellent for those of us who do not like knitting the usual tension squares. There was some bad news too – the wire is not easy to unravel if you make mistakes as it can kink.

Knitted wire neclaces
Closeup of necklaces

We were shown a huge range of samples made using different techniques and during the evening she demonstrated how to make a simple wire bracelet by knitting an I-cord in wire then plaiting or twisting it into a circle. It looked easy but as I found later it takes practice.

The second part of the talk after coffee and delicious cakes, was called “Pressing matters” which is also the name of Erica’s book. Again she described how it all started and how she came to write a book of the same name. Now,sadly out of print but available second hand from several places. She used a steam generator iron which produces high pressure steam. What she showed us was very impressive, there were very creased pieces of knitting all stretched out of shape and with the help of some wire they were blocked and pressed to perfection. Even a ribbed band was revived. many before and after samples were handed round for everyone to see. We also practised threading the wire through the edge of samples to ensure good straight edges.
Finally, she gave some advice on finishing techniques.
After the talk there was time for questions and many of us descended on the sales table inspired to buy some wire to try out the techniques we had been shown.

It only remained for the chairman to thank Erica and we all went home with our enthusiasm renewed.

Display of knitted wire jewellry
Selection of wire jewellry

Erica demonstrating how to knit with wire
Knitted wire earrings
Knitted earrings

rail full of Iris Bishops garments

February 2011 Meeting

Lyn Leventhall

Wednesday’s meeting started with Brenda our chairman reminding us about upcoming events:

  • The Craft show at Olympia next week
  • Unravel – a festival of knitting, mainly hand knitter’s event at the Maltings in Farnham, Surrey is coming up soon and it is an excellent opportunity to view exciting work done by hand knitters as well as a chance to see new yarns and buy some to try on our machines. Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 February 2011.
  • The Machine Knitting Live event in Bournemouth is happening on 5th March 2011. Dates and links for both of these can be found on our home page in the events list (on the left of the page).
  • Another Machine Knitting Live event in Croydon on Saturday 16th July 2011. At the usual venue – Ruskin College.

Brenda also told us about Metropolitan’s classes and events, Beryl Jarvis’s class in Uppingham. Some members have been to these in previous years and enjoyed them.

For the 2012 Olympics, sewing and knitting clubs, the WI and other bodies are hoping to make pennants for the athletes to take away with them. These can be any design but must not include the Olympic rings or the 2012 logo as these are protected/copyrighted.

Full details can be had from Brenda or there is a link to an alternative source of information about them here.

Next month Erica Thomson her talk is entitled “Pressing Matters”. She has requested samples for pressing. She will also talk about the wire jewellery she makes on her machine.

We will be joined next time by some members from Yateley and Fleet so please remember those extra cakes!

Iris’s Bishops Talk

This meeting’s speaker was Iris Bishop who is always interesting and entertaining so we sat hanging on her every word as she showed us samples of her latest work.
Some of the techniques we described were how to make a bulky fabric on a standard gauge machine using several finer stands of yarn as well as the usual 4 ply. On T8 you can get a wonderful bulky fabric using this method.

To prevent the yarn tangling, she suggested putting the cones in bags on the floor to keep the threads from clinging together as they come off the cones.

Iris has been revisiting some of the fairisle patterns from the 1980’s and 90’s to give then a more contemporary look and feel, fading the patterns out to give a shading by using small abstract patterns and changing the background yarns or varying the density of the patterning.

rail full of Iris Bishops garments
Iris's Knitwear

She showed us various textures she has been experimenting like with using rouleau over a fairisle pattern to make textured Celtic knots pattens.

There were also patterns with needles out of work where moving stitches every few rows made an unforeseen pattern.

Using alternate needles to match it was possible to use 4 ply double or make very interesting patterns that could be placed depending on which needles are in use.
After the usual coffee and cakes, there was plenty of time to talk to Iris and look at her samples.
We would like to thank Iris for such an interesting talk.

Arranging the food on the buffey table

January 2011 Meeting

Lyn Leventhall

The meeting in January was enlivened by a post Christmas buffet to make up for the cancelled Christmas party. Everyone brought food, the committee members worked hard to ensure a good spread enjoyed by all.

Arranging the food on the buffey table
Setting out the Buffet

The main focus of the evening was the annual competition and there were three categories:

  • Group 1 – scarf to a specified pattern or a headband, again to a give pattern or fingerless gloves to any pattern.
  • Group 2 – a waistcoat to any pattern
  • Group 3 – any item made to the knitters own pattern

All items had to have been knitted since January 2010.
As so few items were entered into group 2, it was decided to add the fingerless gloves into that category.

Competition entries for Scarves and Headbands
Competition entries for Scarves and Headbands

The winners were,

  • for group 1 – Margaret with a lovely scarf in shade of grey.
  • or group 2 – Anthea with some pretty fingerless gloves in pink
  • For group 3 – April who made a very unusual tea cosy with knitted fruit and flowers.