Pouch Notes

A few weeks ago I decided I'd make a pouch for the county fair. I wanted a pouch a little bit bigger than the felted pouch I normally carry, and I wanted a pretty design on it.

I wanted a sturdy knit, so I grabbed the Jaggerspun Maine Line merino from my cushion project (inspired by Las Huelgas grave finds and I hadn't put quite enough thought into the pattern, so I was disappointed in it) to knit the pouch.

A 5x0 needle gave me a firm, but not stiff fabric, which is just what I wanted.

The bottom is double-thickness with the outside black and inside red. I started with a 4x4 stitch square and increased in the second and second-to-last stitches on the needle until I had 256 stitches.

And then I started looking for pretty patterns. I was thinking of something from Folk Knitting in Estonia by Nancy Bush, and only 2 patterns I like fit in 256 stitch repeat. A lot of the patterns are 10 or 14 stitches instead, and I didn't feel like trying to figure out how to fit those onto my base and I definitely didn't want to go mucking with the bases now that I had them attached to each other.

After joining the two bottoms, I knit a black and red 2-color yarn-over braid, then a few rows of black, then I started the sheep's eye (Lambasilmakiri on the card was the best picture I could find) pattern with a black background, red circles, and yellow grid.

It is beautiful, but still so short it's rolling up all over the place. I am briefly considering switching the red and yellow in the pattern to make it more vibrant, but this way it's less likely to show dirt. I can always make another in different colors some day or maybe pick one of the other patterns from the book if I end up liking this pouch.