June Knitting 2017: Tote Bags

I've been knitting up a storm this summer and neglecting recording the results here in my blog. So I'll try to remedy this in a series of postings. First are two tote bags I knitted, one for myself and one for my sister after she saw the first one.

The one on the left is knit from yarn I bought at Downtown Knits in Apex, NC, at the Spring Yarn Crawl. After my sister said she'd love one I went back for another cone. As you can see they're both black and white (the colorway is called "TV Static"), but due to the source of the yarn there are always variations. 

The yarn is Wool and the Gang's "Jersey Be Good" T-shirt yarn made from factory offcuts. 

The pattern is called "Zigzag Shopper" and is also from Wool and the Gang. It's knit on size 19 needles so it knits up very fast. The resulting piece is rather heavy so I don't think it would be comfortable in a garment. Years ago I knit my daughter a T-shirt out of T-shirt yarn and she found it much too bulky and heavy to wear. (It probably ended up as a charity shop donation.)

Because of the source for this yarn, it apparently does not have the uniformity of most yarns. One thing I noticed when I started the second bag was that the yarn on that cone was wider than the yarn on the first cone, making a much thicker fabric. I was concerned that I would run out of yarn because the cones are measured by weight, not yardage. Rather than risk having to buy yet another cone to finish what is supposed to be a one-cone project, I took scissors to the yarn and split it into two narrower bands. As a result, I have the equivalent of a third cone still in my stash for a later project.