Semi-Success!

Anne and Lauren need new slippers.  We have talked about this several times.  Most recently Laura sent me colors.  Those colors were not available in the 100 percent wool I needed to make felted slippers so I got some Patons Classic Wool in cream/natural.  Another day we will talk a Kool Aid dyeing and how simple it is to fail at getting the color you want, or better said, we will talk about a way to enjoy the color you create!  Another day.

Looking through Ravelry for felted slippers I found a pattern which looked quite the thing:  sort of Argyle-looking slippers which were made with 8 squares of garter stitch.  What could be easier?  Well, no problem with the knitting, but the folding to sew, THAT is another issue.

There is a YouTube video showing you how to do it.  I sewed the first slipper together by starting and stopping the video a hundred or two hundred times, but it worked.  Because I want to show Elsie how smart I am (since I WASN'T that smart yesterday when we were knitting together with Sharon and Cameron) I decided I needed to write out how to do the folding and sewing.  It is possible that I have succeeded at writing it down.  We will see soonish...

This is the plan:
Knit a gauge swatch and felt it.  Take measurements to see if your project will fit the feet you are covering.  I did the swatching and felting but did not do the checking.  I may have made slippers for a giant and not for a dear little girl.

Here are the "markers" I made for each square:

 Each marker was placed on the squares in the same direction, so "A" was always the top of the square.

Here is the "L" of garter-stitched squares.  The lower left brown (I thought I was dyeing it purple...!) square is number 1.  The upper right brown/purple square is number 8.

This shows the first fold which is Square 4 folded diagonally across itself.

This shows the second fold--Square 6 is folded flat over Square 5.  Now the sewing begins!

FIRST SEAM:  Sew 4A to 6D, 3A to 7D, 2A to 8D,  then flip over sew the sewed edge is lying on its tummy.


The picture below shows the slipper flipped over and ready for first "flipped" sewing.

SECOND SEAM: Sew 7B to 5C.
THIRD SEAM: Sew 2C to 3C.
FOURTH SEAM: Sew 1C to 4C.

Your slipper is now sewn together!

This picture shows the slipper stitched together without markers:

You can see the toe easily, and the heel, sort of.  The brown/purple flaps are not as easy to see but they are there.

Now comes the fun of felting.  Next post I will hopefully show the completed slippers.  I am going to suggest that Anne decorate the toes in some fashion that she likes...either with some other benighted dyeing project or maybe just sew on a button she likes.  We shall see. I might come up with something myself...


Having just gone to all this work on pair one, I have found this pattern which looks much more do-able.  What do you think?

Easier pattern for felted slippers