Having You Tube at our fingertips online is such a great resource. You can see just about anything! Music, TV shows, people doing stupid things, and tons of how-to videos. Today’s post sends you over there to check out the video by Randy Comer, showing you how to fuse glass. This video provides some really cool information such as cutting glass, assembling it for a firing, a quick bit about pattern bars, using all the different components that were previously made to assemble a new piece and slumping that piece once it’s been fired. He also gets into why he would fire something more than once, which was after he fired a piece that was draped and then slumped to change the piece a bit. Randy is very good at conveying this information and I think you can get a lot from this. He doesn’t get into actual temperatures that he’s firing at or firing schedules, so I do recommend maybe checking out some other videos on You Tube to find out other information. But do remember that firing schedules for pieces do change and are not the same for every project.
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Play with Color in the Pixel Tweed Pullover
A lot of times when I share knitting patterns that are meant to be colorful I will say something about how they would be good stash busters because you can change colors as often as you like or need to as you run out of yarn.
I’m not going to make that recommendation when it comes to the Pixel Tweed Pullover by James N. Watt.
That’s because for this pattern to work it really does best as three distinct, repeating colors throughout the project.
James was inspired by the red, green and blue pixels on vintage TVs to create their color palette, but of course you can use any three colors you like. This is another pattern where looking through the finished projects on Ravelry is super helpful because you can see how different color combinations work. Sometimes if the colors are too close in value one of them almost disappears, but that’s also an interesting look.
Whatever colors you choose, this is a bottom-up crewneck is worked flat in pieces, with all over color patterning worked with slip stitches on a garter stitch base. The cuffs, neckline and bottom hem, as well as seams on the sleeves, are worked in one of the colors.
It’s available in nine sizes and ranges from a chest measurement of 36.5 to 68.5 inches, or 76 to 174 cm. It is meant to be worn with 4 to 8 inches (10-20 cm) of positive ease.
I love how this tweed pattern almost looks like crochet from a distance, and I think it would be a lot of fun to knit. This is one way to get some practice working with multiple colors if you haven’t done so before without having to pay too much attention to following a pattern or reading a chart.
The pattern is available on Ravelry.
[Photo: James N. Watt]