Roz’s Woven Placemats by Roz Porter By Roz Porter http://www.pineymountaincottage.com/

offered by Natalie http://www.nataliesknitting.com

These placemats look so great done in cotton your weaver friends will think you made them on a weaving loom. I ran across some linen/acrylic mill ends at a weaving shop and luckily had the sense to grab it. I used Savannah II (color Ivory) as the knitting yarn and the linen blend as the weaving yarn. The colors were close to the same shade of beige but the linen has a different texture making the finished results spectacular. Another combo I tried with the same knitweave pattern was darker brown Savannah II (Linen) for the knitting yarn and Ivory Savannah II as the weaving yarn. Again, the result was fantastic. I’ve also made this placemat using Bramwell’s Artistic in brown and white and that looked OK but nowhere near as nice as the cotton /cotton or cotton/linen mix.

Whatever you use, make a swatch and wash it. If you use cotton, remember cotton shrinks when washed so your placemat won’t be the proper size when it comes off the machine but when it’s washed it will be perfect if you use the washed swatch for your gauge. Start your swatch with the tension you would normally knit the background (knitting) yarn.

My placemat directions actually came from the knittingmachine group’s files. Barbara Mock hosted a Weave-Along for us.
Since the directions were so good, why should I reinvent them? What I did was find a weaving pattern I liked and 2 yarns that
I thought were spectacular woven together.

Materials:
Bramwell Savannah II cotton color Ivory for knitting yarn
Bramwell Savannah II Cotton color Linen for weaving yarn
Pattern # 416. Stitch World III (Brother 970) (or see below)

Make your placemat 13 X 19 inches (or whatever measurement you prefer)

Ewrap cast on enough stitches to equal 13 inches, I used 114 sts on a 970 machine, tension 7 (on Natalie’s Brother 910 machine,
we used tension 6 which just goes to show, you need to swatch)
Knit 12 rows plain stockinette
Set your machine for knitweaving, following your machine manual
            Brother machines: I prefer to keep the weaving yarn in front of me on the floor. Using KC 1 (end needle selects)
             I lay the weaving yarn across the selected needles each row, skipping the first and last stitch so that the edge remains plain.
Knit and weave enough rows for 19 inches.
Knit 12 rows plain stockinette
Latch Tool Bind Off
Weave in any ends.
Wash and dry your placemat
Steam your placemat to block.
           If you used cotton or a yarn that can be ironed, use Steam-A-Seam or Stitch Witchery or whatever you want
           to fuse the hems down. If the Steam-A-Seam doesn’t hold you probably didn’t fuse it long enough try fusing it again.
You can also whip stitch along the edges to help hold the hem down.

PLACEMAT WITH SELF FRINGE Make as above but after knitting your 12-row hem do this:

Go out to the side of the knitting, leave about 20 stitches out of work and pull 3 needles out to E position, ewrap them and knit across and do the same thing on the other side. You will have a float going across the 20 needles out of work on both sides of the knitting. This will form the fringe. Set your row counter to 0 and select your needles for your pattern and start weaving. To make a nicer edge, don’t weave the first and last stitch in the body of the mat. Weave all the way across to the ends where the 3 needles are knitting. Be sure to use weights and use a little weight on the 3 end needles too.

Before washing and blocking as above, go to the sewing machine and sew right along the line where the fringe begins. This will keep that last knit stitch where it belongs.
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The information, patterns and images contained on this page are for personal use and may not be altered, converted nor uploaded to any electronic system or BBS nor included in any compact disk (CD-ROM) or collection of any type without the express written permission of Rosalind Porter. port3280@bellsouth.net

Roz Porter, South Carolina US
www.geocities.com/rozport3280
photo album @ http://tinyurl.com/7ova