KITTY BLANKETS!! - Page 2

thisisme7899 · 02-04-2011, 09:03 AM

lol awsome! thanks!

Mokumegane · 02-07-2011, 09:16 PM

If you have plenty of yarn that will felt, you can do the kitty pi. I've made several of these from stash ends for friends' cats and dogs. http://media.wendyknits.net/knit/kittybed.htm

KatzKnitter · 02-10-2011, 06:02 AM

I've volunteered at a cat shelter. Knitted blankets are not a good idea, because cats' claws will get caught and/or the blankets will get ripped up. I've had cats for 40 years and know them pretty well. The shelters around here always ask for old towels, and when they get ripped up, the shelters throw them out. Felted items still have the underlying stitches, but I have no experience with them, and my own cats gets their claws clipped every few weeks.

Did you ask the shelter what they need?

Mokumegane · 02-10-2011, 01:52 PM

If you felt them well enough, felted objects are just as good as or better than the towels you mention. A welll-felted object no longer has the holes and knit stitches in it, really.

KatzKnitter · 02-11-2011, 12:41 AM

Then it sounds like a wonderful project. Curious--do they have to be 100% wool to be felted?

Mokumegane · 02-11-2011, 02:10 AM

They don't have to be 100% but the more wool, the better. You also don't want whites or superwash... those won't felt. Something with the lightening to make it white ruins the properties of felting in wool and superwash keeps it from shrinking or felting. You do want a fairly high percentage and avoid whites/superwash but the rest is pretty much fair game. If you're not sure and your LYS doesn't know (for some odd reason) just get a 100% non-white, non-superwash wool... that'll felt really well every time. As for anything with knitting, there are some stuff you just have to do a test patch of. With felting, there's no un-doing it and once felted, it won't felt again, so felt it to what you want in the first place. In a washing machine, check every ten minutes... by hand, you have the chance to check any time you want... The main components of felting are: wool, heat, agitation and cold (cold rinse and heat/agitation to work it to felt). I have been able to successfully felt a natural off-white color really well, though. I was lucky to catch a wool that was light in color, really.

Mokumegane · 02-11-2011, 05:27 PM

Just to be clear on the felting... http://www.woolcrafting.com/boiled-wool.html That page seems to say it all rather well. Read through it all and you'll get a good understanding of the felting process.

chj · 02-16-2011, 04:47 PM

I just noticed this thread - I've been knitting kitty blankies for my local shelter for the past year+. They LOVE them, and every time I take some in, the staff members are very happy. I do use acrylic - some that is donated to me, leftovers from other projects, or I buy cheap stuff on sale or use my Michaels/Joann coupons. I knit them approx. 24x24", on size 10.5 needles, using a double strand throughout.

Good job for those of you helping!

KatzKnitter · 02-16-2011, 07:58 PM

That's wonderful. You can't felt acrylic, so there were no complaints about the cats ripping them up?

You're all inspiring me. We have many shelters in my area, and there will be more blizzards this winter...

KatzKnitter · 02-16-2011, 08:03 PM

Originally Posted by Mokumegane

The main components of felting are: wool, heat, agitation and cold (cold rinse and heat/agitation to work it to felt). .

Well, I knitted a wool hat years ago, and unintentionally felted it just slightly in the wash.

Rescued it just in time. But I think the term "felting" didn't exist 40 years ago. Now I wash all my hats by hand.