I’ll admit that I have never fully appreciated the charm of felting (or fulling) knitting. It has always seemed to me that it was an adept and swift way of ruining knitting. All that work to get the stitches just right, being careful to do this carefully, only to toss it in the washer and get something completely indistinguishable from some other fabrics? (Perhaps it is that usually when I take knitting to water I am striving for the opposite, and that’s pretty ingrained.)
I didn’t get it, and I still don’t – most of the time it feels like ruining my knitting. The one exception?
The Fiber Trends Felted Clogs. I love this pattern. I’ve knit it maybe twenty times, and it never fails to charm me.
This floppy weird knitting…
that is this big…
takes a trip in my faithful washer and becomes these.
Useful, beautiful, clever, durable footwear. Love it. The pattern is fast, easy and interesting. The yarn for this pair is my favourite felting yarn, Patons Classic Merino, (colours 231 Chestnut Brown and 77011 Wedgewood) and my only qualifier for the whole thing is to remember to toss the whole works into one of those zipper washing bags or a tied up pillowcase before you felt it, or it can be a very costly pair of slippers when the washer guy has to replace the wool clogged motor. (Learning this lesson cost me $300. I beg you to heed the warning. Joe still looks a little nervous when I start knitting them.)
This:
to this.
Astonishing.
A word today about all the outrage and upset about the STR club woes I wrote about yesterday. Remember that the Blue Moon ladies were smart enough to build the business that got into this mess, they were smart enough to figure out how to fix it, and all of us need to take a deep breath while they do the work they need to do and trust what we know, that they are plenty smart enough to do the right thing (whatever that is) when the air clears and they have met the needs of their customers. Anything more that happens, releasing (or not) the name of the bank, the possible repercussions, the revenge fantasies and the plan for what comes next should all belong to them, since while we are all offended (and clearly creative about the possibilities for said revenge), they are the directly involved party. Knit on.