At Her Leisure

I finished the shoes for the 1921 bathing ensemble I started last year. They went a lot faster than I expected.



They're based on the ones here - https://www.1860-1960.com/xs0408p0.html.

I think these should work going back to about the beginning of bathing costumes through to the end of shoes for bathing.

They have cork soles covered with canvas, two layers of canvas for the uppers, cotton tape binding and laces, and cotton batting insoles covered with canvas. The originals strike me as being homemade, mostly because one of them seems to have three pair of eyelets while the other has two pair.

They're patterned after a pair of flats that I have that have enough structure to the uppers to allow me to pin fabric around them tightly without collapsing. I think they came out quite well, though if I were to do something like this again, I'd make sure to get more of the fabric eased around the toe instead of the heel. It's not worth redoing, but they'd look a little better that way.

I meant to take more in progress pictures, but I got on a roll and churned out a few steps with the uppers without a picture so you just get a picture of the soles and insoles.

I went back to the 1921 trunks and picked up the cast off stitches to add more ribbing to the top of the back. I started with 12 stitches each side of the seam (six would have been better) and picked up six additional stitches at the end of each row until I had wrapped a little over halfway around the waist. I also did it with needles a size smaller. They are much more satisfactory now. I'm not sure how they'll do in the water, but I'm less worried about them and probably won't be constantly concerned they're falling down when dry.

Last night I knit a gauge swatch for my 1930's bathing suit, and I think holding the fingering weight yarn double is going to work. I also taped together the pattern for the 1940's dress that I bought fabric for in July. I would like to get both of those projects started today. I already cast on the bathing suit, but I'd like to get a mockup of the dress bodice cut out. That won't happen until later.

There are about ten rows left on the first leg of the 1921 bathing trunks. I expect I'll finish that today. They wouldn't have been quite as far along except that I ran into terrible traffic on the way to work Tuesday morning - we averaged about 1.5mph for 1.5 miles. I was glad I had some very easy, very plain knitting.

I usually like to think I'm pretty patient. I also usually don't care whether things I order online are shipped immediately. With my current yarn order, I'm finding myself unusually impatient. Yesterday it was "Why hasn't it shipped yet?" "Oh, I only ordered it yesterday. I shouldn't expect it yet." Today it shipped. Here's hoping it doesn't get lost in the bowels of the postal service for a month as has happened a couple of times before. I want to finish my socks! And koshka_the_cat working on her next swimsuit is intensifying my desire to work my 1930's one. I already wanted to work on it, but now I want to even more. Sock first, though, sock first. It won't take long since I'm already into the foot.

I finished the main piece of the 1921 bathing suit.



I still need to knit the trunks and finish the socks and figure out what goes on my head. I also want to try making boots to go with it like in the pattern illustration.

I basically crocheted it as given except that I knew I wanted it a size smaller than given so I started the decreases for the waist three rows early and did one extra row of decreases at the end. That worked out perfectly. It took a little more yarn than I had anticipated, but if I hadn't been just a little over the given gauge, I might have come in at the 9 balls called for by the pattern. Instead I used 9.75. The socks call for 2 but will need about 3. I had assumed 3 for the trunks, but they'll take 4.5. I used just over 4 balls of the yellow, when the combination of socks and suit called for 4. The socks definitely used less than 1 so the dress probably used close to 4.

The point of this project (other than making a 1920's bathing suit, of course) was to get more comfortable with crochet, and I achieved that purpose. I learned to hold the hook more loosely and got better at seeing stitches. I'm still not great at it, and I still don't much like the look of crochet so I don't think I'll be doing it a lot in the future. Still, I do think that when I get to the crochet part of the 1902 vest I'll be more comfortable and confident. Of course, it's actually got a pattern to it so it will be more difficult. And smaller. And slicker. I didn't say it would be easy. Fortunately, that's an undergarment so no one is likely to see it.

I finished the first bathing sock and started the second one. I’m through the hem and just starting the stripes. I think I have enough yarn to turn the heel, but then they’ll be on pause until I get more.

I do have the yarn I need to finish the main body of the bathing suit so I’m going to try to do that this week.

I think I have a decent estimate of how much yarn I need now. I spent yesterday and today knitting away madly at the trunks and managed to finish one half.* Math should be good enough to estimate what I need for the rest of the dress. I cast on a sock and did the first three rows, but my left forefinger is sore from pushing the needle through the stitches on the trunks so I'm not going to knit any more today.

I used just over 4 balls on the back of the dress. Since it's 144 stitches wide and the front is 194 stitches wide, if we assume the back took 4.25 balls (it certainly didn't take more), then the front should take 5.75 balls. The trunks used just over 2 balls of yarn for one leg. The other leg is to be identical.

I looked up a couple of modern knee sock patterns on Ravelry that are knit on about the same size needles with sport-weight yarn, and they seem to need about 600 yards of yarn.

That means that I need ten balls for the dress, five for the trunks, and about four for the socks. I started off with fourteen so I need to buy five more. My coupon isn't good until mid-August so I'll work on the sock I cast on to see if I can get a better estimate by then.

*I mostly knit the trunk leg directly from an old Zouave bodice thing that I hated so the yarn was all kinked up. It looks rather awful so I'll be pulling it all out and straightening out the yarn and reknitting from scratch, but I learned what I needed to learn. That includes learning that the old yarn's dye lot is definitely different from the new yarn so I'll be using new balls to start each leg and switching to old yarn higher up.

I evidently spent too much time crocheting on Sunday because my hand was sore last night when I sat down to do my two rows. I only finished one of them. Fortunately, it's not sore for anything else. I'll just take it easy with the crochet until it feels normal again.

Fortunately, knitting didn't hurt so I finished another two repeats on my stocking which puts me halfway through the stocking and therefore three quarters of the way through the project.

I finished the back of the swimsuit.



I started the front but am only three rows into it. I keep thinking - "ooh, I could finish by the end of the month" - and then I realize that even if I finish the main garment, there are still trunks and a pair of knee socks. I couldn't possibly finish all that by the end of the month.

I've been trying to work down my stash the last couple of years. This year has not been so successful. I made the eyelet dress from stash materials, but then I bought fabric and embroidery threads for the Regency dress. I made that dress, but since I bought extra fabric with a couple of other small items in mind, it's not a net zero project from a stash perspective. I made the 1840's nightcap from stash materials but then bought yarn for the 1921 bathing suit. It should use up some leftovers from previous projects too, but if I overestimated what I need, it might leave the stash in worse shape. I made the 1876 dress from stash materials, but over the weekend I went to a fabric store with my mother and bought fabric for a 1940's dress. At least the 1876 dress used 11 or 12 yards (plus a ball of yarn!), and I bought 3.5. The Eleonora stockings and the 1902 vest are both from stash materials, but I bought yarn for a sweater when I bought yarn for the bathing suit. I also bought the materials for the "Street Scene" cross-stitch.

Here's hoping I can spend the rest of the year making the projects that I already have materials in hand for. Ideally next year too.