Knit your heart out

Those who know me personally know that Michael Jackson was and continues to be an extremely important person to me. Needless to say, last summer was very difficult time for me, particularly as I held tickets to the first of what were going to be the O2 Arena concerts. Since my plane tickets were non-refundable, I ended up going to London anyway.

Life goes on, as they say, but there has been soreness in me about his untimely passing ever since that day in June. As an attempt to purge some of that soreness and to pay my respects to him, I decided that a knitting project was in order.

The idea was loosely based on Poster Boy from Debbie Stoller's book Stitch 'n Bitch Nation. However, I don't like knitted tote bags, so I decided to knit something and felt it, then sew it onto sturdy fabric for the rest of the bag. Therefore not only did I not use the same chart and yarn as the pattern, I also used different techniques and dimensions. So I don't know if I can even call it the same thing.

Tristan was a great help in drawing up the stitch chart. He measured my gauge in width and height, then produced a chart out of a photo that I chose and tweaked. Indeed, this was the first time that I'd ever knitted something that wasn't straight out of a pattern.

Watching the face I love so dearly emerge from stitches of yarn was magical and nothing short of therapeutic.

The yarn I used was Schachenmayr nomotta Wash+Filz-it! fine (100% wool, obviously) in 00122 (dark brown) and 00102 (off-white). The width of the project was 85 stitches - the height was "enough".

The photo on the right shows what the finished knitted product looked like. Once finished, I knew I was supposed to toss the thing into the washing machine to be felted, but I felt uneasy for some reason. In the end I put it into a pillowcase and washed it at 40°C for 1½ hours with towels for friction to prevent it from felting too much.

FAIL. The panel shrunk to about 35% of its original size instead of the expected 60-70%. Also, the brown yarn felted much more than the white (which I've heard is common), so it was also awkwardly stretched and pulled across the pattern.

What a disappointment! I hate it when you really put thought into something, thinking it will become an heirloom of sorts, and then it turns out unusable. Mind you, I haven't given up; I intend to knit this again, only wiser. I will not twist the yarns on WS (after all, they will be felted into the fabric) and I will do the felting by hand to control the results.

I guess this is the universe's way to tell me that I have more healing to do. (And more learning about felting wool.)