MD Felted Bag

I decided the other day to play around with MD knitting and felting*. I used the same MD squares that I've posted about before but worked them using stockinette st. I rationalized that the stitch/row differences could for all practical purposes be tamed by felting. I remember reading in many places on the web and having some experience that items generally felt more in one direction than the other (although I don't remember which way that actually is, nor do I even now! lol). I was hoping that this uneven felting would take care of the st/row discrepancies. Plus the fact that I was going to be felting this by hand I would have better control------remember my washer is not felting friendly.....sigh.

Thus began the knitting:



I used one entire ball of Lion Brand 100% wool blue, and about 2/3 of a ball of pink. This piece was, as I said, made using the same manner of the MD squares I've posted about before. I used # 10ish needles and 12 stitches per side in stockinette.

Then I seamed it. A quickie whip stitch, nothing fancy.




The plan was to put the handles on the outer peaks and a magnetic closure on the center peak, creating a not too deep but longish bag, on the small side for sock knitting and such. Then I felted it.




Don't you just LOVE my kitchen sink!?! Gillian calls it the bathtub in the kitchen, but I couldn't love it more. For anyone interested I'll include the sink spec below.

....back to fiber stuff..... I prepared for a work out but the felting time was really only 10 minutes!! (hmmmm not bad, I think I might make some FT clogs for me and felt them by hand)

All things considered I like the shape of the original bag, but I wasn't pleased with the proportions (sorry no photo). So I cut out the seams I had made and re-seamed it into this bag:




I'm liking it. Next time, and there WILL be a next time I'll work the squares so they'll run up and down, like they did in the original design (see pre-felted photo). It's a nice size "bucket" bag. I know this pic is crummy, but I'm prob'ly not going to spend anymore time on this bag. I'm not planning on lining it, nor even bothering to put straps on it. It's really not up to my standard of bothering to finish, but it's a grrrreat proto-type! :-) I'll prob'ly use it as a project basket, just fold and tack the upper points down and ta da it's a basket!

The kitchen sink specs:
I LOVE LOVE LOVE my kitchen sink!!!!
It is a single basin that measures 42 x 24 and is 8 inches deep.
It is made of Terrazzo Marble. Think of those mosaic-like/chip marble floors you see in really old schools and that's what it is. My sink is in the green colorway, which means that the color of the marble chips span the spectrum from nearly black to the palest touch of green you can imagine. Those chips are then tumbled into a mixture of white portland cement and the sink is molded into one piece. It weighs a ton. OK I'm exaggerating but the it does weigh over 400 pounds.....nearly a quarter ton! :-P

Oy the trouble of getting it here out in the middle of nowhere plus installing it!!! OMG another Crazy Lady story to tell someday. Suffice to say, it took two trucks, a semi, and another beast of a truck, a fork lift, a farm tractor and 6 men not counting drivers and operators to get the sink into it's final resting place. Joe has since stopped cursing and it's only been two years so I guess it wasn't that bad! LOL

* felting vs fulling....I'm not going there. I know there's a difference, exactly what, I don't care. So I have, and prob'ly always will, use the word felting in regard to many types of wool manipulation that involves the meshing/tangling/and so forth of tiny wool fibers to create a cohesive no-warp, non-raveling fabric. :-)