Pirate Pants

... are what all the cool ladies are wearing to bed this summer.




Pirate Pants 1 and Pirate Pants 2

 
Some while ago I made my other half two pairs of woven cotton sleep shorts. A slightly shorter while ago, the pair made out of very light cotton decided to rip, leaving only one pair of sleep s.horts, which puts a bit of urgency on the washing/drying cycle. So I bought some random cotton jersey with a skull-and-crossbones motif on the grounds that jersey would be easier to run up a pair of sleep shorts in (I'm fussy about woven sleep shorts: they have to have french seams, since the main purpose of sleep shorts is comfort. Jersey ones have an overlocked seam right side out). I quickly put them together and handed them over, and sighed a sigh of relief... only to discover that they were so comfortable that my other half now refused to wear the surviving woven cotton pair.

So over the break I put together a plain red pair with pirate patches from the leftover fabric of pirate pants no. 1, and we now have two pairs of sleep shorts in circulation again. Yay! The patches on the centre back seam are to ensure that they go on the right way around. Sometimes when you're sleepy it can be difficult to figure out which way is the right way...

I don't know the pattern: my mother in law makes beautiful sleep pants for all her children, born and acquired, and I copied our size onto cardboard one day so that I could have a template. I'm guessing something like Simplicity 4889.

I made myself a very sedate long grey pair to replace a pair of elderly flannel ones which now have rips on the back thighs from seam to seam and are somewhat less comfortable and more drafty than they used to be.

A little here, a little there

The scaly iPod case is my current commuting knitting and I'm about half-way through it. I really only get about 1/4 hour of knitting a week now, as the train part of my commute is only about 15 minutes and I rarely get to sit down. I get most of my knitting done standing on the station waiting for the train. I'm not complaining about the shorter commute, though. Not at all.

Scaly and protective of iPods

The case is turning out pretty well and I'm pleased. I'm toying with the idea of textured i-cord for the cord, but I suspect by the time I finish knitting the main body I will desperately want to finish it off with a twisted cord. Maybe in black for contrast. The main colour is darker red than the photo would indicate.

I played with much of the fabric I washed and dried a few weeks ago. I drafted the pattern of a shoulder bag I want to make and cut out some if it, but the plain blue cotton I bought was such terrible quality that I need to buy something to replace it. It doesn't make sense to put a lot of work into something and use materials which will give me no pleasure at all.

The hemp tea towels are cut and the edge seams ironed, I just need to sew them. The hemp-cotton pillowcases have been cut to size, but I need to edge and embellish them before taking an existing pillowcase and figuring out how to fold the fabric in order to sew it up. I have plans of using black linen thread for both the tea towel edges and the pillowcase embellishment. We will see.

I've been reading lots of blogs where people spin, so I bought a spindle (from

Caroline) which came with some corriedale and made my first handspun. It's pretty bad - I think the singles are overspun and I under-plied, but I look forward to doing better. I understand why people like spinning wheels, but I can't justify it right now. Maybe some year in the future...

Over-spun and under-plied.

Today I am unpacking some of the boxes of things from Britain which have been sitting unpacked in our living room since they arrived, since we have nowhere to put the contents. I get to unpack all my indian fabric! I haven't seen any of it since before Christmas, so I am planning to take my time enjoying it. That's why I have these things.

protecting the toys

As partners of those who buy portable electronic gadgets must know, it is important to protect the toys. They're sensitive to dust and knocks and scratches and a whole host of other ills. And they're damned expensive.

Earlier this year I ran up the following bag for a PSP. Said PSP already lives in a hard case, but the case has open sections which, I have been informed, let grit in. This cannot be. Enter a garish bag constructed out of sample squares of fleece and a ribbon left over from a Georg Jensen present. The materials used can be explained by the fact that I ran it up in a hurry the night before I left for a two week business trip.

The household then acquired a DS Lite. It acquired a hard case, with similar open sections. It's taken me a couple of months but...

	Knitpicks Memories in Redwood knitted on the Bond (previously shown on 19 05 2007)
	felted
	folded
	given a cord
	sewn up the base and sides
	and put to use
	can you tell the light was fading? Detail by lamplight.

The twisted cord was made using a couple of metres of yarn, a doorknob, a ball-wider with the cone removed and the brief participation of my patient partner:

• double the yarn
• hook the middle around a doorknob so that you have two ends each of doubled yarn
• start twisting manually
• realise it's going to take several millenia
• investigate the ball-winder, remove its cone, stick the yarn ends through the convenient slits in the bit that goes around, tie ends under base
• turn the wrong way for a while, swear and turn the other way
• at the point at which the cord doubles up on itself twistily if you walk toward the doorknob, yell for your partner
• ask her to unhook the yarn from the doorknob
• grab the yarn at its approximimate midpoint and then hand the free end to your partner to hold with the other end
• massage the yarn by smoothing it from the free ends your partner is holding towards the folded end you have until all the little twisty bits give up and you have a nice flat cord
• tie an overhand knot in the free ends and snip the ends to even them up

Gosh. It's an FO.