Mason-Dixon

I started this post a while back but stubbornly refused to post it with out a picture. Well, the stars aligned and a photo  was finally taken this afternoon so I'm posting this even though I wrote it a bit ago.

Continued from 1/5/11:
It's been a lean knitting season for me and I have no idea why. Haven't worked on anything much knit-wise especially if it involved any concentration on a pattern. So I've found myself falling back on a fairly mindless project. What's great is that it's so full of color that it relieves what could become boring very easily...garter stitch. It's the Log Cabin pattern from the first Mason-Dixon book. All the colors really keep my interest. I'm going to make an unbleached canvas or extremely heavy muslin pillow cover to attach it to...I think.

Note:  I haven't blocked it yet.

I used Classic Elite's "Four Seasons" yarn (discontinued) which has enough wool content so the cotton content doesn't stress my hands. I learned very quickly last year when I planned to make wash cloths for gifts that knitting with 100% cotton (Peaches and Cream) is very stressy and within 6 rows of knitting, it does my hands in...to the point I can't knit anything for at least a week. Ouch! I found I can crochet with it, but knit, no way! So the cotton yarn sits. (Unfortunately I'm not crazy about crocheting. I really have to be in the mood to crochet and haven't been.)

Because the pillow top is knit I'll probably make a whole pillow cover of fabric (front and back) so you can't see the stuffing through the stitches and adding a zipper will be a whole lot easier. Then I'll stitch the knit part to it...I think.

Or, I'll stitch the knit part to a front square of fabric by hand and then put the knit with fabric face to face with the back of the pillow. From there I'll baste it by hand in hopes of being able to pick up 1/2 row of the garter stitch evenly all around the pillow. Of course, I'm not going to futz with a zipper if I go this route. The back would be made so it can open in the center to stuff the filling in and then close with buttons. I've also been toying with red and cream mattress ticking or a dark grey wool suiting fabric for the backing. Not sure which course I'll take. Will think about it while I'm looking for the fabric.

Originally planned on backing it with red felt but then worried that it could never be cleaned (I mean dry-cleaned of course). So alternate plans emerged. Any knitters or seamstresses out there with any ideas?

Initially I planned on making the afghan as it appeared in the book but the length of the logs towards the end sort of overwhelmed me so I settled on pillows. I've already started on the next pillow square since it's such a lovely, mindless knit!