Recently in Work in Progress Category
So. I am making a baby sweater, Minni, by Lene Alve. It is mostly knit sideways in garter stitch and stockinette using sock yarn and small needles. In spite of it's simple good looks it is a challenging knit and I am enjoying it very much.
If you decide to make one, my first piece of advice is use straight needles. Yes, those ancient implements that hearken back to the dark days before circular needles were commonplace. Managing the two balls of yarn as you manoeuver through the short rows is easy when there is no cable getting in the way.
I am using some Claudia Hand Painted fingering, a gift from Dave quite some time ago. (3 years?!) and some natural (2048) Fortissima Socka, plus a bit of heathered green (3098 - Heathland) St. Ives sock yarn as the trim colour.
The odd object below is the centre back, right back, and right front. Ready to be folded at the shoulder and the back and front grafted together at the side.
And here is that graft (except for the garter stitch part). Sorry for the fuzzy picture. The detail is in better focus.
At the top of that graft is the arm hole. Or what should be the arm hole.
Yes, I grafted that sucker with a full twist at the shoulder.
There was a great sigh. Maybe two. And then I started to unpick the graft, even before I thought to take a picture, which is why those garter stitches were not joined.
Another day, another graft.
Onward!
If you decide to make one, my first piece of advice is use straight needles. Yes, those ancient implements that hearken back to the dark days before circular needles were commonplace. Managing the two balls of yarn as you manoeuver through the short rows is easy when there is no cable getting in the way.
I am using some Claudia Hand Painted fingering, a gift from Dave quite some time ago. (3 years?!) and some natural (2048) Fortissima Socka, plus a bit of heathered green (3098 - Heathland) St. Ives sock yarn as the trim colour.
The odd object below is the centre back, right back, and right front. Ready to be folded at the shoulder and the back and front grafted together at the side.
And here is that graft (except for the garter stitch part). Sorry for the fuzzy picture. The detail is in better focus.
At the top of that graft is the arm hole. Or what should be the arm hole.
Yes, I grafted that sucker with a full twist at the shoulder.
There was a great sigh. Maybe two. And then I started to unpick the graft, even before I thought to take a picture, which is why those garter stitches were not joined.
Another day, another graft.
Onward!
Ah. Freshly mowed. Can you see the mower?
Okay, how 'bout now?
That first picture? That's about half of the back yard. And there is probably twice as much in the front. And it is ALL done.
Good thing I had it sharpened before I moved.
But you know what? I really like mowing this way. And it is awesome exercise because this place is mostly NOT flat. Much as I enjoy the mowing, this ancient, heavy, 13.25" baby is going to be replaced by a sporty new model, German no less. It is ordered and shipped. Here's hoping it gets here soon!
And I promised to have some knitting to show you.
Not bad, eh? Unfortunately the raglan was too deep (my error) and the front just didn't fit acceptably, and I didn't like the neck shaping. So it has been frogged back to the joining point at the underarm. Also difficult but not impossible.
A sweater! Can you believe it? This one. So far I have two sleeves. Trust me, the other one looks exactly the same.
The yarn is Green Mountain Spinnery Mountain Mohair in the colour Mesa. After turning Norma's Marta into this pile of yarngetti on the drive down to the New Hampshire Sheep and Wool Festival, I just had to have some for myself.
I started with the sleeves so that I could ponder what to do about the button bands on the main body of the sweater. As written, the pattern has you keep 8 stitches at each edge in garter stitch for the button bands. But the cabled portion of the sweater and the garter stitch yoke are knit on 5.5 mm needles and 5 mm needles respectively. And the garter stitch row gauge is different from the reverse stockinette row gauge, of course, so I can't help but think that this will mean a button band that is all stretched out vertically on the lower portion, and a different width on the upper portion by virtue of the smaller needle size.
I think I will cast on 14 fewer stitches for the body and pick up and knit the button bands and collar afterward (no hood, please). What say you, oh knowledgeable ones?
A little while ago, maybe a month, my older daughter told me that her friend Dmitri was going to Siberia (something about diamond mining) and she wanted to knit him a scarf like the ribbed one she had made herself - K1 P1 rib - but bright red. I said that I would check at the yarn store when I was there to teach my next class, and let her know what would be her best options. The requirements were that the yarn be thick (to knit up quickly), soft, warm, bright red, and not too expensive. Washable would be a bonus.
Since the red had to be a true red (not pink-red or orange-red) that narrowed the choices to Cascade Superwash, doubled, or Patons Shetland Chunky. The Shetland Chunky was definitely the more economic way to go, wouldn't involve working with two balls at once, and I happened to have two balls (not red) in my stash. So I figured I would work up a swatch to show her how many stitches to cast on, what needle to use, and what it would feel like.
I chose a 5 mm Addi Turbo that was lying about, cast on 36 stitches, and started to knit. I slipped the first stitch purlwise, worked K1 P1 to the last stitch, and knit the last stitch. It felt nice and squooshy and was working up to be about 5.75 in wide (14.5 cm). After knitting about 4 inches (10 cm) I showed it to my daughter, she approved, and I picked up two balls of the red yarn for her.
Since the variegated yarn I was swatching with (Harvest colourway) was doing an interesting stripey thing, I decided to keep knitting. That gift-giving season is approaching after all. The result, you can see below on the left. The finished scarf, unblocked, is 58 inches long, but will definitely grow in length and could easily be blocked to 60 inches or more.
It was such an interesting and unexpected result that I bought another colourway (Winter Moon) just to see if it would do the same thing. It did. Everglades is also working up nicely.
Don't you think it looks like a cross between a plaid and an argyle? I call it Plargyle. Give it a try. If you can match my gauge it should work. It is fun and makes you look very clever. But...
Not every colourway will work. Ashes of Roses just wouldn't, so it is being bias knit in garter stitch. I have a few more colourways that I want to try, so I will keep you posted on what works and what doesn't.
Since the red had to be a true red (not pink-red or orange-red) that narrowed the choices to Cascade Superwash, doubled, or Patons Shetland Chunky. The Shetland Chunky was definitely the more economic way to go, wouldn't involve working with two balls at once, and I happened to have two balls (not red) in my stash. So I figured I would work up a swatch to show her how many stitches to cast on, what needle to use, and what it would feel like.
I chose a 5 mm Addi Turbo that was lying about, cast on 36 stitches, and started to knit. I slipped the first stitch purlwise, worked K1 P1 to the last stitch, and knit the last stitch. It felt nice and squooshy and was working up to be about 5.75 in wide (14.5 cm). After knitting about 4 inches (10 cm) I showed it to my daughter, she approved, and I picked up two balls of the red yarn for her.
Since the variegated yarn I was swatching with (Harvest colourway) was doing an interesting stripey thing, I decided to keep knitting. That gift-giving season is approaching after all. The result, you can see below on the left. The finished scarf, unblocked, is 58 inches long, but will definitely grow in length and could easily be blocked to 60 inches or more.
It was such an interesting and unexpected result that I bought another colourway (Winter Moon) just to see if it would do the same thing. It did. Everglades is also working up nicely.
Don't you think it looks like a cross between a plaid and an argyle? I call it Plargyle. Give it a try. If you can match my gauge it should work. It is fun and makes you look very clever. But...
Not every colourway will work. Ashes of Roses just wouldn't, so it is being bias knit in garter stitch. I have a few more colourways that I want to try, so I will keep you posted on what works and what doesn't.
