Another BSJ; no end to uses for EPS

Here is another BSJ-- Mission Falls worsted in Oatmeal; Crystal Palace Merino Frappe in Cherry Pie; purple Lamb's Pride worsted button bands; Mission Falls heart buttons; knitted on #7 Addis. The second sweater (assuming the photos post) is based on the Cornwall sweater from Alice Starmore's Fisherman's Knits, but modified into a seamless raglan a la EZ. It's in Peace Fleece Father's Grey, on #6 needles that were probably a little small for the wool, and is tremendously warm. Useful in Montana in the winter.

Has anyone else seen the "WWEZD" tee shirt?

Peacefleece Tunic OTN

The story of getting as far as this cuff is too long to share here. Please visit my blog with a cup of tea for all the sordid details...

but here is a Zimmermaniacal tunic, otn in lovely Peacefleece. Bigger gauge than I generally like -- size 10 needles -- so it'll be a chunky monkey, and will go quickly. Here's what I'm wondering. I kind of imagine eating up the shoulder stitches with raglan at the top until it's time to do the final inch or two of patterning yolk. Good idea? Bad idea? Anybody tried this? Want to have a fairly open stand-up collar at the top, will add hems in one of the colors to the neck, cuffs, and bottom of the sweater. Please offer any and all advice/crit. It's not too late to change course...

setesdal kofta

i have not been in norway for my holiday but norway has been on my mind. i am knitting sweaters that are partly zimmermann and partly norwegian. and it is a blast. this little one is for albert who lives far away from me so unfortunately he can't model it right now.

the sweater is knit in rowanspun dk (lovely tweedy wool which unfortunately is discontinued now) at 25 sts to 4 inches on addis # 3 ½ mm. it is quite tightly knit. the colours are light grey and a classic navy blue

it is one tube for the body and two tapered tubes for sleeves. sleeve tops are 50% of K. the sleeve holes are steeked an cut open. the shoulders are made with the three needle bind off. and then i knit the neck hem (the rest of the neck stitches and increase 2 stitches at each shoulderpoint for a little more than an inch or whatever YOU like).

the bottom hem is the usual knit up hem line inspired by jared who has a tutorial for this in his post on the seamless hybrid at http://www.blogger.com/www.brooklyntweed.blogspot.com

in lack of anyone to model this sweater i let two strange aliens hold it for a bit. poor them. they can never knit.

oops

sorry for the duplicate posts, I was getting 502 errors when trying to post.
[I also tried to post this yesterday, got the same error, so waited to see if it would post once. I've also found that this post, while being saved as a draft, has been lost in its last incarnation, so I have to try to remember what I last added].

Update: I ordered Knitting Without Tears & Knitter's Almanac Wednesday, so am waiting with bated breath for them to arrive.

Thanks for your comments, looks like I just went ahead and grabbed these two because they were reasonably cheap. (under AU$50 for both including postage, and arriving hopefully quickly).

I had looked at Schoolhouse Press, and maybe when I get my CCards a bit more under control (hah!)...I also found lots of copies cheap through abebooks.com, but that would have to wait as well.

I find it so funny that I was leaning towards the books with the colour photos on the cover. Doesn't change the relevance of the information one iota. It's not so long ago that all knitting books had only b&w photos (which, sadly I admit, is NOT before my time, either).

Thanks for all of your input.
Judith
p.s. if this is posted twice, pls comment to only 1, and I'll delete the other

The February Gansey, or why I love EZ.

I wanted to make a more masculine non-fussy version of the February Baby Sweater for my nephew. I didn’t want to make a cardigan, but I didn’t want to rewrite the pattern to fit over a large baby head. Guess what? Those features are already there.

Unvention- Knit the yoke in garter, then lap the button band stitches and knit it in the round. Instant placket pullover!!! No number tweaking required! The pattern works exactly the same.

Project Specs:

Pattern: February Baby Sweater from Knitter’s Almanac by Elizabeth Zimmermann

Yarn: I don’t know. I’ll guess acrylic, but it feels quite nice. My SIL gave it me several years ago, it was her mother’s before she lost her eyesight and was unable to continue crocheting. Recycle!

Needles and gauge: US sz. 7 / 4.50 mm a little less than 5 sts per in.

Modifications: Very few. I realize this looks drastically different than every other FBS around, but truly, I altered none of the original pattern numbers. What I did do was to lap the 4 buttonband stitches after the yoke and knit the rest of the sweater in the round.

Features: I think these are different than modifications. After the body/sleeve division I knit the body down first. I got a little bored and added in the patterning from Gaffer’s Gansey (Another EZ pattern- from Knitting Workshop). When it was long enough I split front and back to make that nice split hem in garter stitch. The back is longer than the front, since I forgot to put in short-rows. For the sleeves I picked up sts from the body-side-underarm-cast-on (utterly seamless garment I might add) and knit down to a garter stitch cuff on 2/3 the sleeve sts.

Parting Thoughts- This whole project was quite a gamble. I’ve never tried a yoke sweater before…. Or this pattern…. Or a non-raglan top down sweater…. and…. the yoke went a bit hoopity lumpity because I did too many ridges and it won’t fit my intended recipient….

…but it will fit my son. I am a happy knitter.

where are the patterns?

Hi all,
I stumbled upon Zimmermaniacs last week following a convoluted path through several blogs, and am really intrigued about, particularly, the BSJ garment. There have been a few photos pre-seaming which give the idea of how it's knitted, which has been really interesting, and some of the colour combinations have been superb. (all hail the stash keeper!)
What I'm now interested in is finding out which books/publications have these patterns, so that I can begin the process of acquiring them for my library.
A couple of them are available in Australia, and of course from o/seas, so the difference between books here plus postage, and cheaper books plus airmail probably make them about the same price.
There are 2 available on ebay, but not really cheap (Knitting Workshop and Knitting Around), so I would be really interested in what you think would be the better one for me to get first, as in, which contains the most reasonably easy to achieve items, with a bit of a challenge. (I've been knitting for years, on and off, in spurts - like with all of my interests I seem to go through binges of one thing at a time, but as I get sidetracked I don't usually get much done). Maybe I should change my nickname to "unco-ordiknitted"!
Opinions will be greatly received.
Thanks
Judith

where are the patterns?

Hi all,
I stumbled upon Zimmermaniacs last week following a convoluted path through several blogs, and am really intrigued about, particularly, the BSJ garment. There have been a few photos pre-seaming which give the idea of how it's knitted, which has been really interesting, and some of the colour combinations have been superb. (all hail the stash keeper!)
What I'm now interested in is finding out which books/publications have these patterns, so that I can begin the process of acquiring them for my library.
A couple of them are available in Australia, and of course from o/seas, so the difference between books here plus postage, and cheaper books plus airmail probably make them about the same price.
There are 2 available on ebay, but not really cheap (Knitting Workshop and Knitting Around), so I would be really interested in what you think would be the better one for me to get first, as in, which contains the most reasonably easy to achieve items, with a bit of a challenge. (I've been knitting for years, on and off, in spurts - like with all of my interests I seem to go through binges of one thing at a time, but as I get sidetracked I don't usually get much done). Maybe I should change my nickname to "unco-ordiknitted"!
Opinions will be greatly received.
Thanks
Judith

My February Sweater (a.k.a. Gull Wing Baby Sweater)

I made my first "Best of all Baby Sweaters" a couple of months ago - this was totally seamless because I knitted the sleeves on circs.

The Apple Green yarn had no band on the ball - it was an Aussie 4 ply so used two strands together. The white was Panda Angoretta 8 ply. The whole thing came out so soft and sweet!

The little green mushroom buttons were a perfect colour match! See?

This is my year for EZ firsts - my first Tomten, my first Adult Surprise Jacket.

I hope to make my first Baby Surplice Sweater and my first Pi Shawl soon.

I have made a gazillion Baby Surprise Sweaters - so I know that these others are going to be just as addictive!

February Sweater

So, buttons are ready. Here are the promised pics.





February Sweater, Lang Soft Shetland 100g, neddle size 4mm, size 3 month

As I knit the sleeves in the round, it is a real seamless sweater.

BSJ

Hi, I´m new here. I´m a knitter from Vienna/Austria and I discovered EZ a few weeks ago. My first Zimmermann project was the Baby Surprise Jacket.







Rowan Felted Tweed in dark orange and an unknown brown tweed yarn, Needlesize 3.5mm, Size 0-3 month
Instead of seaming I did a provisorical cast on, picked up and twisted stiches on the other side of shoulder/arm and did a three-needle-bindoff.

Next was the February Sweater, I just have bought the buttons, pics follow later. And now Tomten for my nephew is on my needles...

BSJ for Dulaan Project

The lively colors in this BSJ are leftovers of Plymouth Encore. I knit this a while ago for the Dulaan Project. http://www.fireprojects.org/dulaan.htm

I had these cute star-shaped buttons on hand and think they go very well with this sweater! I think I'm in the mood to start another BSJ.....hmmm, think I'll see what I can find in my stash!

BSJ yardage

Is there a chart of yardage estimates anywhere for the BSJ in toddler and child sizes? For instance, a child's size 4 requires (fill in the blank) yards of DK weight or (fill in the blank) yards of worsted weight, etc. If there isn't a chart/table I will be happy to make one from comments to this post.

lusekofte in motion

here is little alba in her lusekofte. she is difficult to take pictures of because she is in constant motion. but i like her in it. and hopefully she'll use it during the autumn and winter.

My February Sweater

I've really enjoyed looking at all your projects here, especially the February sweaters. Here's mine, my first EZ project. It was done in Schaeffer Lola, using all of one four-ounce skein. I got 5 stitches per inch.



This shows all the yarn I had left: just 31 inches. If I'd had more I'd have done another couple rows of garter stitch on the bottom, but I think it's fine this way too.



When I make this again someday, I'll start the buttons at the top (and buy a second skein, just in case!).

I'll try to get a picture of the recipient in the sweater this week, though I'm not quite sure of the sizing so I don't know whether it'll fit. I imagine it's about a one year old size, and the baby is six months, but I could be off.

I'm quite pleased with how it turned out!

here is lusekoften

here is 'lusekoften' in all it's tweedy glory. i will have the owner model it in a few days and post it so you can see how babies and norwegian sweaters match. i hope it fits.
i am very fascinated by norwegian sweaters right now and want to make two more for my great nephews age 1 and 3.
the sweaters had a revival and became very trendy after ww2 in norway as a sign of being norwegian and there was published a book with the patterns that sold very well at the time. elizabeth has a reference to this in kwot. some of the patterns i used on the sweater are from knitting around other from this book. the eps goes like this: K=100, top of sleeve=50 % of K. they are very wide sleeves and were probably worn with a lot of other garments underneath originally.
when i go shoppinng these days i see that many designers are using 'ethnic' patterns in their knitwear now. peruvian ponchos with lamas and such on sell here at 500 bucks!!! and baby sweaters similar to the february sweater at 70.
this cost 10 to knit!!!! PURE WOOL OF ROWAN FAME.

Moccasin Socks Finally Done!

They are finally done! And they look GORGEOUS on my fiance's foot. Before I get too deep into the post though, here're the details:
Yarn: Opal Handpaint (in a pretty dark grey color I got from a swap on knitswap)
Needles: KnitPicks Classic Circs US1
Pattern: Moccasin Socks from Knitter's Almanac
Notes: So, love the pattern.. except for one thing..



EZ Assures me these "bumps" will go away with blocking, but I don't think they will. I think if I make these again I won't make the decreases on the toes and heels quite so "Sharp" I've noticed EZ isn't big on graduated shaping, if she wants something to be circular she just does everything in one row and then blocks it to stretch, which I'm not sure I like. But whether I like it or not, these socks are great, and I also LOOOOVE the pointed heel. She's so right about how nice it is. Looks great.



As you can see its a little holey where the stitches got picked up but I've since fixed that with some creative stitch tightening. Also, please ignore my fiance's crazy feet.

So, anyone have tips on the bottom feet and getting rid of the points? More graduated shaping? Please let me know!

Hey everyone, I'm a new here and posting about my first BSJ.


Despite having been knitting for 33 years now, I only discovered Zimmermann a couple of years ago - she really isn't as well known in the UK as she is in the US.

I'm a knitwear designer myself specialising in Hats and appreciate EZ's logical approach. Am in the middle of writing a book, so discovering that I'm pregnant for the first time gave me the perfect excuse to put the Hats, patterns and sample knitting down and finally knit a BSJ! It was exactly what I needed.

This one will fit a 3-6 month, with a gauge of 22-24sts per inch. Knitted in 4ply & DK oddments from my stash on 3.25mm. I followed the pattern to the word (which is v.unusual for me ;) and am really happy with the result. I may however unpick the last couple of rows and reduce the buttonholes from 5 to 3, so that the bottom half of the jacket sits open.

Next stop, the Tomtem.

Edit:- gauge is 22/24sts to 10cm/4", not an inch - sorry! You can also find more photos here.

Baby Surprise Jacket

I trust the process here!

I’m letting go of having to know what color line will be where.

Hoping it’s not going to be too much of a surprise?

I will just “knit on” as the wise woman said to do….

Tally-ho. …

I’m off into a leap in faith!

Yarns - Naturwolle and worsted Malabrigo - double strand knitting. Size 8 needles. 4 st per inch. I didn't do the sleeve increases but I hope I can pick up stitches if needed at the end.

Toddler Surprise Jacket

My first BSJ. 15 sts over 4 inches. About a size 2T. Ingenius knitted origami.

The wool came from my grandmother. She knitted all her scraps into hats for my brother and I. When the hats were outgrown they were stored until the next generation needed them. My children wore these hats until I started knitting last winter.

We came to the conclusion that the hats would never be properly loved/needed again so I ravelled them and knitted the wool into this. This will go to my small cousin Adalina, great granddaughter of this wool's first knitter.

Baby Surprise Jacket--My First

Here's my first BSJ. It is made from the new Cotton Ease. There are things about it that I'm not entirely pleased with. The bottom corners are not as smooth as I would like. I think the next one will feature decreases and increases done the alternate way that is shown on the DVD. I am going to use a provisional cast on for the sleeves instead of picking up stitches to make them longer. However, it does look very cute on the baby. Sorry--no picture of that. The pattern is great fun, and I think it will be even more fun when I'm not so puzzled by it. Although I have Knitting Workshop, I used directions from the leaflet from Schoolhouse Press augmented by the DVD and hints from Knitwiki. Now I just need to do a Tomten.

BSJ

Hi Zimmermaniacs

This is my first post, I have been reading the site for ages and finally have got around to joining the fun. I'm in the UK where so many people don't know of the talents of EZ, but I am doing my best to change that.

BSJ My very first EZ knit for my 18 month old daughter, done on 5mm with various DK-ish weight leftovers, I added an extra bit on the sleeve length, next time I'd do a provisional cast-on for the sleeves but as it was my first I needed to get my head around it! Betsy has been wearing it for a bit now and what I absolutely love - apart from the obvious engineering genius - is the shaping over the bum/nappy, so very clever. She wore it on our recent holiday to Cape Cod and got comments everywhere we went, more modelling pics over on my blog.

I have a February sweater almost complete and am contemplating my next EZ assignment, what to knit...

Sarah

What Yarn to Chose?

It looks like this Tomten had a hard time chosing too!



I need help choosing yarns for each of these Tomten and Baby Surprise Jackets.

~Tomten Jacket for a Boys Size 3
~Tomten Jacket for a Boys Size 5
~Baby Surprise Jacket for a Girl 1-2 years.

Does anyone know how to make a BSJ in Kids Size 3? I know EZ says to knit the adult version with larger needles and bulkier yarn. One of my concerns is that Malabrigo might be too soft and pile. At the same time I don’t want the garment to be too itchy. It was good for me to do this collage of photos because I forgot that had some of these yarns.

lusekofte for a toddler.

well i am trying to post about it again. but it seems that it is a bit difficult to post successfully here. many other than i have many attempts and then pictures vanish once posted. it is really too bad.

i thought a few days ago that i had totally lost my knitting mojo and then i got the idea to make a 'lusekofte' for a toddler after ez's recipe. well i have looked in many other books among them vibeke lind: knitting in the nordic tradition, a book from the eighties which have a lot of (no real patterns) and annechen sibbern bohn's lovely little book of norwegian stitch pattern, which ez uses for a reference as well and which can still be purchased, at least second hand. if you are at all interested in norwegian knitting get it. it is a gem which i have used on and off for 25 years.

the sweater will once finished fit a 1 year old + . the wool is rowanspun in a greyish and a brownish shade. the wool is discontinued but i have a lot of it in my stash and i think it is the most lovely wool ever. i cut a swatch in two yesterday and it does not unravel at all. i can't wait to do the steeks. it is so interesting since i haven't made anything of the kind for so many years.

lusekofte for a toddler.

well i am trying to post about it again. but it seems that it is a bit difficult to post successfully here. many other than i have many attempts and then pictures vanish once posted. it is really too bad.

i thought a few days ago that i had totally lost my knitting mojo and then i got the idea to make a 'lusekofte' for a toddler after ez's recipe. well i have looked in many other books among them vibeke lind: knitting in the nordic tradition, a book from the eighties which have a lot of (no real patterns) and annechen sibbern bohn's lovely little book of norwegian stitch pattern, which ez uses for a reference as well and which can still be purchased, at least second hand. if you are at all interested in norwegian knitting get it. it is a gem which i have used on and off for 25 years.

the sweater will once finished fit a 1 year old + . the wool is rowanspun in a greyish and a brownish shade. the wool is discontinued but i have a lot of it in my stash and i think it is the most lovely wool ever. i cut a swatch in two yesterday and it does not unravel at all. i can't wait to do the steeks. it is so interesting since i haven't made anything of the kind for so many years.

Seamless Raglan and EPS

This is EZ's basic raglan recipe, sized for a 5 year-old. I made very few modifications, but tried to add lots of kid-friendly features like the shortened sleeves, pockets, zipper, and hood. The front and hood were both steeked so the whole thing was knitted entirely in the round. If you want to see more I put up lots of pictures, and explanations, on Flickr.

This was the first time I've knitted a hood and it really got me thinking about how to apply EPS to hoods. This is what I've come up with and I'd appreciate any input other have.

The Tomten. This is the only EZ design I know of that incorporates a hood. For the tomten hood she instructs you take 1/14 of your 100% and do that many increase pairs. That means you are adding 1/7 of your 100%, which is about 14.3%.

With the tomten the neck has 50% of the body sts, and you add 14% for a total of about 64% for the hood. This fits a child really well. However, Tomtens knitted for adults have been known to end up with giant hoods or need serious modification.

EPS for the neck opening is 50% for a child -as in the Tomten- and 40% for an adult. Should we then infer that a child's hood should be knit on 64% and an adult's on 54% ???

What do you think?

row 57

Hi:

My name is susan and I'm working on my first ez jacket. I'm having a bit of trouble with row 57.

can anyone help

thanks

Proper Knitting Box

Proper Knitting Box
Originally uploaded by K2Karen

This, my friends, is a proper knitting box. A variety of yarns, tools, and--yes--the entire Knitter's Glossary on a video iPod. Details on how I did it are on my blog at http://k2knits.blogspot.com.

Adult Surprise Jacket

Adult Surprise Jacket
Originally uploaded by K2Karen

Done! Well, almost. I decided I didn't like the buttons and I still want to add afterthought pockets, but it is done enough for me. Blocking is amazing. The sleeves were about 3 inches too short. Now? Just right.

Sleeves on February Baby Sweater

Hi,
I was hoping to get some clarification on the sleeves for the February baby sweater. Some knitters suggested knitting the rest of the body and then returning to knit the sleeves, which is what I have done.

In EZ's directions for the sleeves, she says to cast on 7 stitches to the 21 stitches that are already there. Am I casting on 7 stitches to both sides of one sleeve, for a total of 35 stitches? That seems like a lot of stitches to add on. Or just a total of 7 for 28 stitches to a sleeve?

Thanks again!
-sue

Adult Tomten Jacket

Pattern: Adult Tomten Jacket*
By: Elizabeth Zimmermann
Source: 'The Opinionated Knitter' or 'Knitting w/o Tears'
Materials: Beaverslide McTaggart Tweed
Amount: 8 skeins 'Mountain Mahogany'; 1 skein (partial) 'Autumn Dogwood)
Needles: 5.0mm/US8

Start Date: 29 May 2007
Finish Date: 25 June 2007
Buttons added July 3, 2007 (not pictured)

*I modified EZ's classic into an adult version for myself. Most severe modification happened to sleeve caps, neck opening and hood.

See the full write up over at my blog for more details.