Monday, September 22, 2014

DBJ Sampler Wall Hanging

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(Click on photo to enlarge)


A while back, I ran onto a fairisle knit sampler project in an old magazine and thought it would be a wonderful double bed jacquard (dbj) wall hanging for a special occasion such as a wedding, a new baby, a milestone birthday or anniversary, etc.  So I put it in the back of my mind until now when we have a friend's wedding to celebrate.   I wanted to frame it to make it a bit more professional looking than just running a dowel thru the top to make a banner type design but I really didn't want to invest in the cost of having a custom frame made....so I was off to knit it to fit a ready made frame.  It went pretty well but I ran into a bit of frustration with several swatches to accomplish that.  Once I got a good gauge and used a bit of math, the end product turned out really nice.  I'm really happy with it and hopefully it will become an honored keepsake for the bride and groom. 

One thing I did learn with dbj is that even with aggressive steam blocking, stretching in length proves to be stubborn.  The knitted size is basically how it will stay even after steaming.

I did this project at T6 with Tamm 3 Ply Astracryl for the background and Schoppel Zauberball in blues for the contrast color on my standard gauge Brother 965i with ribber and color changer.  I designed the pattern in DAK with 108 sts wide and 160 rows high, knit with a birdseye backing which after steam blocking fit a 14 x 18" frame opening nicely. 

To see my lesson on how to do dbj, go to my post of March 12, 2013.  DBJ is not hard at all but the setup steps must be followed to a 'T' for it to cooperate.