Sunday, January 03, 2010

Trees.....

Felted ones at that

You all said you wanted to see the final outcome and here they are!
Felted Trees
The one farthest right (and you can see it closer right below) is knit with Araucania Nature Wool, doubled using US 7's. Pre-felted 9" tall x 7" wide, post-felted 8" tall x 5" wide. This one stands up well.

Close up of Ultra Alpaca
This one on the left was my favorite to knit. Berroco Ultra Alpaca . This was knit doubled and it's so soft! If I wasn't afraid of it growing so much, I would love a sweater in this. Used US 7's and I did felt it twice, since I was re-felting the other one, figured what could it hurt. This one didn't shrink size wise much at all, but I did lose the stitch defination. Pre-felting it was 6" tall x 5" wide; post-felting it was 4" tall x 4.5" wide. This stands up well.

Big tree
The largest one is Knitpicks Wool of the Andes in Emerald. I used size 9 dpns/circs for it and only a single strand. I used 1 full skein and was a bit afraid as I still had at least 6" left to knit. Whew, I found another skein in the stash. I had bought them a few years ago to knit some felted oven mitts, but never got around to it.

It started out about 19" high x 9.5" wide. Finished size is 16" high x 8" wide. It did have to be felted 2 times. Once in my front loader (where I sadly learned this newer one won't unlock if stopped mid-cycle) and once at Megan's. It stands up pretty good, but I will be getting one of those styrofoam cones to try to get some of the folds out. You can kind of see it on the left of it. I've tried pressing them with no luck.

Buttons, they are sea shell buttons. Got them in a bag, very cheap too.

Pattern is from Mason-Dixon Knitting Outside the Lines. It's an easy pattern to knit, heck the large one could turn into a Santa hat if you wanted it too. Normally when felting you want to use at least size US 10+ needles. I think this pattern needed a tighter knit so that upon felting it would stand up on it's own better. I'll make more...I have some yarn saved for them...maybe next fall though ;)

14 comments:

Bezzie said...

I love your forest!

Beverly said...

Very cute! What a fun idea. The buttons look nice!

Karen said...

Those came out absolutely adorable!! I'm thinking they might make cute Christmas gifts for next year. I'd love to knit up some very small ones and use beads for ornaments, and then tie them on top of gifts!!

chemgrrl said...

Trees! I love your trees. I've been wanting to make those forever, and I want to even more now that I've seen how cute yours turned out.

Sandra said...

the best thing about those trees as - they can be used as witched hats for Halloween, right?
(

Stacey said...

those are adorable! :D

cpurl17 said...

Very cute!!

Now you can add little felted deer and santa and elves...

weezalana said...

Very cute! I may have to make some of those next year!

IrishGirlieKnits said...

So cute!!

Pam said...

OMG! Those are awesome!

Anonymous said...

I love those! I have that book and just might have to make some myself.

Batty said...

They are incredibly cute. The little buttons make them irresistible.

Lynn said...

these are REALLY cute!!! Great idea too.

DPUTiger said...

1. Nifty trees!
2. I've heard really good things about sweater-knitting with Ultra Alpaca. I believe that with the 50/50 wool/alpaca blend, it doesn't grow nearly as much as "plain" alpaca would.
3. I'm dying to make a pair of felted boots. Bought the yarn. Have the pattern all picked out. But I know that felting will be a PITA until I can get back up to the Lake to use the top-loader this summer. Ugh.