Knitting, dolls, and knitting for dolls
May. 5th, 2009 05:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tephraIn an attempt to keep the knitting posts from being huge, and from my journals from being neglected for months, an update before I have tons of photos to link.
Anjeni has been basically hanging out around my PC since I got her. She has a stand in front of my knitting books and sometimes sits on the edge of the shelf above my monitor. Other times she sits in her favorite chair on top of my stacking drawer units on the shelf over my monitor. The chair and the stand are basically out of the way so she's there most, but neither place is very cat resistant nor are they good for photography. What to do about that? Clear out a shelf in the bookcase obviously.
She can stand in there, with about an inch of head room, so the ceiling is definitely low, but it works. The dresser is an old jewelry box, all drawers without a flip top for rings as most boxes of the style generally have. The chair and love seat were given to us by Kris.
Now dolls don't need beds really, but when you have set dressing you really should go for the whole shebang. Given the lack of room on the shelf she could have a narrow bed and her chair and dresser with basically no floor space, or she could go for something less Western traditional, such as a futon (no frame, so it would be folded when not in use) or, say, a hammock. A really spiffy and decorative hammock. A lace doily draped over a hammock "frame" (stretcher bars and edge lines the doily could be stitched to). Maybe some bead edging. It could be arranged decoratively in the corner when not in use perhaps. The first problem is the doily, the mechanics can be determined after that is made.
So I went looking for a good doily pattern to use and immediately hit on a problem. Most doily patterns don't have a firm size. Depending on your yarn/thread and needles/hook you can make any pattern in multiple sizes. In fact, a lot of the knitting patterns just tell you how many rounds they have. So I figured the best way to work around this problem is to make a small doily with the yarn and needles I plan to use and measure it to figure out how many rows my target doily should have.
Thirty two rows and barring the loops from the crochet cast-off, seven inches in diameter. I'm looking for a sixty round doily pattern. That turns out to be a rare, rare beast so I may be using an 88 on smaller needles.
So what to do with my test doily? As it turns out it's a bit small for a proper shawl for Anjeni, and the girl doesn't have anything to wear one with yet anyway. For now, it gets to live on her dresser.
In other knitting news, still doll related, pants with booty coverage in progress:
Japanese short rows are awesome, just saying.
Anjeni has been basically hanging out around my PC since I got her. She has a stand in front of my knitting books and sometimes sits on the edge of the shelf above my monitor. Other times she sits in her favorite chair on top of my stacking drawer units on the shelf over my monitor. The chair and the stand are basically out of the way so she's there most, but neither place is very cat resistant nor are they good for photography. What to do about that? Clear out a shelf in the bookcase obviously.
She can stand in there, with about an inch of head room, so the ceiling is definitely low, but it works. The dresser is an old jewelry box, all drawers without a flip top for rings as most boxes of the style generally have. The chair and love seat were given to us by Kris.
Now dolls don't need beds really, but when you have set dressing you really should go for the whole shebang. Given the lack of room on the shelf she could have a narrow bed and her chair and dresser with basically no floor space, or she could go for something less Western traditional, such as a futon (no frame, so it would be folded when not in use) or, say, a hammock. A really spiffy and decorative hammock. A lace doily draped over a hammock "frame" (stretcher bars and edge lines the doily could be stitched to). Maybe some bead edging. It could be arranged decoratively in the corner when not in use perhaps. The first problem is the doily, the mechanics can be determined after that is made.
So I went looking for a good doily pattern to use and immediately hit on a problem. Most doily patterns don't have a firm size. Depending on your yarn/thread and needles/hook you can make any pattern in multiple sizes. In fact, a lot of the knitting patterns just tell you how many rounds they have. So I figured the best way to work around this problem is to make a small doily with the yarn and needles I plan to use and measure it to figure out how many rows my target doily should have.Thirty two rows and barring the loops from the crochet cast-off, seven inches in diameter. I'm looking for a sixty round doily pattern. That turns out to be a rare, rare beast so I may be using an 88 on smaller needles.
So what to do with my test doily? As it turns out it's a bit small for a proper shawl for Anjeni, and the girl doesn't have anything to wear one with yet anyway. For now, it gets to live on her dresser.
In other knitting news, still doll related, pants with booty coverage in progress:
Japanese short rows are awesome, just saying.
no subject
Date: 2009-05-05 09:58 pm (UTC)i will see if i have any 60 (or so) round patterns. i collected knitted doily patterns for a while. yours looks fabulous, btw. i would never have guessed it was your first.
and as for the short rows, they're excellent for booty coverage. i used them when i was knitting diaper soakers. cloth diapers make for a huge baby booty, lol.
any idea what one of these dolls costs and where to find? i'm wondering if this might be a project that riley (step daughter) would enjoy......
no subject
Date: 2009-05-05 10:37 pm (UTC)I've basically only used short rows for toes and heels on slipper socks and was using the wrap and turn method. It was driving me nuts because it would look great on the side where I picked up the wraps on the purl rows and and would be a bit loose or even messy and hole-y on the other. That's probably because those wraps were made on the knit-to-purl turn and were looser to start with. Anyway, the way I did them for Anjeni's pants is a Japanese variation. When I turned I'd put a paperclip on the yarn (cheap removable stitch marker :) and hold it to the purl side of the work, slip the first stitch and work across. When it came time to work over the end of the short row I'd knit/purl the stitch I slipped and then, on the knit side, pick up the paperclip and put the loop of yarn it tugged up on the left needle and knit it with the next stitch. On the purl side I'd slip the next stitch, then put the loop from the clip on the right needle, and poke the left into the two loops to work a p2tog. It works awesome. If the yarn weren't variegated I wouldn't be able to find the ends of my shortrows.
The most reasonable place I've found for the Asian ball joint dolls is Denver Doll Emporium. Anjeni is a Bobobie March, which costs $100 with her face painted on (the "face up" adds $10 to her price) in the normal and white skin colors. They come naked with randomly picked eyes (yeah, you can change their eyes too), everything else is extra. I probably would not have ever had a doll had Kris not given her to me. Now I'm itching for the spare cash to get Anjeni a friend (I'm inclined to the Bobobie Bei).
no subject
Date: 2009-05-06 12:14 am (UTC)riley is perusing the website, excitedly, as we speak, lol.
she has more than enough money in her 'OMG!!!! i need that RIGHT NOW!!!' stash, lol. she will need to talk to her papa first though, because it will require using his credit card to order it and then paying him back.
if she does buy one, i will encourage her to make a yarn wig. she's learning to knit, etc, and i while she's still at the garter stitch on largish needles stage, she desperately wants to make doll clothes. i think this could be just the thing to wean her from bratz dolls (which i loathe, lol)
no subject
Date: 2009-05-06 12:26 am (UTC)