Interchangeable Circular Needles by Denise – They Rock!

In a previous post, I sang the praises of circular knitting needles.  This post is about a sub-category of circular needles – interchangeable.  For those who are not familiar with them, interchangeable needles come in a set with several different sized needle tips and lengths of cable.  The needles attach to the cable by either screws or snaps.  You can easily make the exact size/length needle needed for your project.  Instead of having five different circular needles of the same size with various lengths, one set will make them all (just not at the same time). 

There are a lot of brands out there – Lykke, HiyaHiya, Addi and ChiaoGoo are well-know names.  Due to the cost, I have only tried two brands.  One I love and one I did not care for (I will not talk about them).  I am going to talk about why I love my Denise interchangeable needles.

 

About 20 years ago, I was looking to get some circular needles.  I was new to knitting and wanted to get the best tools I could without spending a fortune.  During my research, I found mention of interchangeable knitting needles in a forum post.  Realizing that option could save me money, I started looking at brands.  I easily found the Boye brand at my big-box craft stores but they didn’t get great reviews.  On a different forum thread, I found a recommendation for Denise.  I had never heard of them, but several people sang their praises.  My LYS did not carry them, so I found my set on Ebay (Denise did not have a retail site at the time).  I loved them from the very first time I project and now own two complete sets.  I also have a set of their interchangeable crochet hooks and their travel knit set.

 

Pastels Knit - Supports Breast Cancer Research!

Why do I love them?  Several reasons.  First, the needles are easy to connect to the cable, require no tools and rarely come apart while stitching.  In 20 years, it has only happened to me twice.  I think both times were due to user error locking in the needle.  They are made of a plastic resin, so they are smooth but not slippery.  They are warm to the touch and very quiet.  I have yet to wake my husband from a nap while I am knitting with Denise.  A standard set has 4” needles from US5/3.75mm to 15/10mm and six cables Six cords: 5” 9” 12” 14” 16” 19” (13, 23, 30, 36, 41 and 48 cm).  It also comes with four buttons to make a cable a stitch holder or a flexible straight needle.  There are two connectors so you can connect two cords for a custom length.  It comes in a hard-shell case with a slot for everything.  From their website, this set is $69.95, and they are also available on Amazon, much more affordable that some of the other more famous brands.  My two sets are older, so the needles are white, and the cables are a light aqua blue.  The new sets have color choices – the standard blue (white needles, dark blue cables, blue case), Brights (primary colored needles, red cables, blue case) or Pastels (pastel color needles, pink cables and case – they will give $5 to cancer research with this kit).  Plus, they have lots of other needles, cables, and accessories.

Crochet Kit

The crochet kit has 4 5/8” hooks in sizes (one each) F5/3.75mm to 19/15mm, 7 cords: 2 each 3” and 5" (8 and 13cm) 9", 12" and 16" (23, 30, 41 cm), four end buttons (turn any cord into a Tunisian/Afghan hook or stitch holder), and two extenders for cord-to-cord connections.  It also has a hard-shell case.  These kits come in blue (grey needles, dark blue cables) or the Brights and Pastels (now with lavender cables), all in light blue cases so it’s easy to tell them apart from the knitting kit.  They are priced at 64.95 for the set.  Lots of accessories for crochet, too.  I don’t use these as often because I don’t do a lot of Tunisian projects.  Being able to select the cable length is great for Tunisian because you won’t have a very long needle for a narrow project, saving weight and making it easier to stitch.

 

Are there any drawbacks?  A few.  The needle ends have a moderate taper, so I’ve had issues when doing lace patterns that require knit 3 or 4 (or more) stitches together.  It is possible for the needle to discolor from a yarn’s dye.  My size 5 needles from one set are teal colored from a shawl project.  It doesn’t bother me, and I’ve used the needles on other projects with no discoloration issues on the lighter colored yarns.  One cable had a tiny rough spot near the connector.  I look a nail file and a couple of light strokes and the rough spot was gone.  If you are a person who has a lot of WIPs, it is very possible to run out of needles/cables to hold all your projects (ask me how I know).  I overcame that issue by limiting the number of WIPs I have at any one time.

 

All in all, I highly recommend the Denise brand.  Several of my knitting friends purchased them based on my recommendation and they are also very happy with them.  Full disclosure – I am not getting paid by anyone for this endorsement. 

Latest EBay Yarn Purchase

Newest Skein - Ignore the Started
Project (I Frogged It)

A few months back, I purchased a skein of Lana Grossa Twisted Cashmerino from WEBS.  It was a closeout sale with a price of $27.00 for a 150 g skein (900 meters), 90% merino and 10% cashmere, fine yarn (size 3 needles).  The original price was almost $60.00 so I couldn’t resist trying it at the “bargain” price.  Of course, I fell in love with it.  It has long color-ways in combinations that I would never put together.  It has great stitch definition and a lovely feel.  I managed to find another color way from a yarn store in Germany (yes, really).  I used that skein to make the Lana Grossa shawl below, complete with the ball tassel trim.  I love it and want more but where to find it?

I have a bad habit of buying clearance yarn, falling in love with it and not being able to get more.  Universal Handprints Fusion is another recent example.  I bought the yarn about 6 years ago from Tuesday Morning.  Finally stitched some up and the finished product is beautiful.  You would think I would learn.

 

My Fav Crochet Shawl from Lana Grossa

My old friend, EBay, to the rescue.  I have a saved search and check it every few days for new listings.  This yarn doesn’t get listed too often so it doesn’t take much time to look.  There was a skein listed a few months back, but the seller wanted $29.00 and I could not bring myself to pay more than I paid for the two new skeins.  So, I passed and waited (somewhat) patiently.  About 3 weeks ago, a skein was listed for only $9.99, buy it now.  It was the same colorway as the skein I had passed on a few weeks ago.  The colors are a little more muted that I would usually select (creamy white, light blue, light grey, medium grey and light tan)
but I think it will stitch up beautifully.  It took the USPS forever (almost 4 weeks) to deliver the package.  I am very tempted to make another one of favorite crochet shawl pattern from Lana Grossa.  Decisions, decisions.

Tatsiana Kupryianchyk – Crochet Genius

Thanks to a random post on one of my Facebook groups, I have found an amazing crochet designer - Tatsiana Kupryianchyk. Her Ravelry store is full of patterns for beautiful sweaters, unique mandalas, afghans, pillows and even amigurumi. All the pictures in this post are from her Ravelry page. 

The post that I saw featured the Alma Sweater complete to the armhole splits. But the pattern that makes me drool is the Fjell Cardigan. She has 26 sweater and accessory patterns.  There are a few shawl patterns that really caught my eye, too.

Alma Sweater

Fjell Cardigan

If you love mandalas, she has 35 different patterns. All are beautiful and unique. My favorite is the Sakura Cabled Mandala. The texture on this one is made it stand out to me. It is shown as a pillow and the fact that is has pom-pom on the edge has no influence on my love of this pattern (and those who know me start to laugh).  Don’t skip the Squares and Pillows section with 26 patterns. Several of the squares have a mandala feel and all are quite lovely. 

Sakura Pillow

She has 11 blanket patterns and if you are looking for something different, check here first. I want to try the Coral Story pattern featuring crochet brioche. Several of her patterns feature the crochet brioche with stunning results. 

She runs a permanent sale on her Ravelry page where you get discounts when you buy multiple patterns. I will be buying the three patterns that I mentioned here but there are so many wonderful designs, I suspect I will be buying many more. I don’t get any kind of compensation for recommending a designer. I just write about what I love.  

I know there are people who don't like Ravelry.  Personally, I'm glad that there is a platform where talented, independent designers can share their work with a wide audience.  Especially when they are from other parts of the world.

Jane Crow – The Designer I Want to Be When I Group Up

Fruit Garden Crochet-A-Long

Jane Crow is amazing.  I first saw an example of Jane’s design on the Deramores website for the Fruit Garden Crochet-A-Long in 2019.  I was stunned at the unique squares she designed and the beautiful afghan she created.  I downloaded the pattern and discovered that it wasn’t that hard.  Her instructions are clear and she provides lots of comments to help you along.  I did not purchase the yarn kit at the time because I foolishly thought I would be able to get it later and stitch it up when my schedule allowed.  I must devote the time needed to get all the yarn ordered and start on this one.  Although I have the technical skills to make this pattern, I'm still a bit afraid of it.  It is always good to be challenged on your projects.  

Persian Tiles Afghan 

 

She is also the genius behind the popular Persian Tiles afghan that I have seen all over the Internet over the past few months.  I've seen this afghan kit for sale at Mary Maxim and other online yarn companies.  There are several other color ways for this one available and it seems to be sold out quite often.  

 

I like this pattern but I prefer the William Morris-esq feel to the Fruit Garden pattern.  I am a big fan of William Morris designs in general.

Here are a couple of her other designs.  All of the picture are from her website and the patterns are available for purchase.  Enjoy!

Frida's Flowers Afghan

Magic Circle Afghan