Sunday, February 27, 2005
 
Pattern: Rebecca 28, #41 Sweater with Diagonal Ribs and Cables
Yarn: Lion's Brand Kool Wool, 12 skeins x 60 yds = 720 yds total
Gauge: 14 sts to 10cm over 2x2 rib, size 10 needles
Hey they're different colors! Actual color most resembles the photo on the left. The photo on the right showcases the main reason why I picked this pattern to knit - those dainty yarn overs in between the ribs, coming together in such a pretty V. How clever to use yarn overs in lieu of a simple increase. I really love that detail. Here's another photo to show the side.
Me 'n my cozy winter sweater with the lovely side detail
lounging on the couch with an [empty] mug of coffee
This sweater was a fast and easy knit if you remove the whole seaming bit. It took me all of yesterday afternoon and most of the night to just seam and oh god I was so miserable. Pulling at my hair, cursing, crying, turning purple. D was all, "Girl I'm confused. I thought knitting was supposed to be relaxing?" I hate hate hate seaming the sleeves on.
None of my reference books had anything useful to say, except: "Pin center of sleeve to shoulder seam, ease into shape, and sew." ...And? AND??! So many pages devoted to how designing and charting sleeves and neckholes and this and that, but nothing on putting it together.
The cap sleeve seaming fiasco. I used white yarn first to see what I was doing. A very ad hoc process.
I started seaming from the top center of the sleeve down to the armhole, and then did it again for the other side. The Vogue Knitting book did mention using backstitch, but I couldn't make sense of how to do that when starting from the center of a piece? Instead I used a version of mattress stitch to attach the top of the sleeve to the shoulder, picking up about 2 shoulder stitches to 1 sleeve stitch. It seemed to work out ok mathematically, but the end result is sloppy. I look like I'm wearing shoulder pads. The bulkiness of the yarn could be to blame for that. D thinks it looks fine and maybe it does, but my eyes can't help but zero in on the awkward shoulder seaming.
Someone needs to show me how to do this properly. Otherwise from now on I'm sticking with raglan sleeves. So send any tips my way!
Also still having issues with neckshaping. There's a small hole boo boo in the back. If you don't look really hard you won't see it. But I know it's there and that's all that matters. Strangely enough even though the knowledge of the hole's existence will haunt me at night, I never considered stopping to rip out rows in order to fix it. Laziness always wins in the end.
The verdict is still out on the Kool Wool. It's a really heavy drape, and it looks like it's starting to pill already. On the other hand it's super soft and cozy. And cheap! Relatively speaking. I would definitely knit this sweater again.
And can I just say what a pleasure it is to follow a graphical pattern than it is to follow pure text of endless "row1: k1, p3, *[yo, k1, p3] repeat from * 14 times, k1, p3 blah blah blah"? American and English pattern books need to step it up and draw me a picture.
Another sweater, with cables, with turtleneck, in neutral.
This one's going to be HOT.
Next up in the queue - that other chunky cable sweater from Rebecca 28. From this point on I'm calling it Savanna, rather than "Sweater with Cables." I've already started it, using DB chunky merino, in yet another neutral color. I love her yarns - they all have this certain sheen, even for wool.
I've already made a mistake with this one though. Not enough yarn. After knitting up that first skein and seeing how little it produced, I knew my stash was not going to be enough. My mistake: calculating the amount of yarn I needed using weight instead of yardage. I was substituting GGH Savanna with the DB, both are 50grams, but GGH has more yardage. Thus I am short 3 skeins. However I have a workaround that does not involve buying more, so fingers, paws, eyes crossed.
Filed Under: Completed Projects | Rebecca 28 | Savanna | SWDR
Friday, February 25, 2005
In between work and sleep I managed to finish a sleeve, and thus the SWDR is finally all knitted up, blocked and ready for seaming. I think I enjoy the seaming least out of the whole process, especially now that ratios will have to be calculated before seaming in the cap sleeves. I'm saving that for the weekend. In the meantime after casting off the last sleeve I immediately casted on the Ribby Cardi, without swatching. Look at me, renegade knitter. This morning however as I clomped in my snow boots on the way to work, bitter wind howling and snow drifts swirling, I decided to start the other Rebecca chunky merino wool instead, while we're still enjoying this 20 degree weather.
Filed Under: Rebecca 28 | SWDR
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Errrrr. Planet Earth rotates too quickly. Three whole days at my
disposal and still no sweater. I want to start a new project already.
Hmm so what's going to be next in the queue
- Ribby Cardi or Angelina jacket? I'm thinking of turning the Ribby
Cardi into a Ribby Sweater mostly so I don't have to deal with the
zipper bit. But I don't know if this means I won't be able to fit it
over my large head. Has anyone knit the Cardi as a sweater?
The Drapey Shoulder Sweater might be put on hold for a little bit longer.
Filed Under: Projects
Monday, February 21, 2005
The other day I was poking around the garden picking up random litter that had blown in our yard and had my first sign of Spring: tips of daffodils and tulips pushing their way just past the surface. Huzzah! Spring is coming...Or is it? Snowing cats and dogs now, again.
sweater front all soft and dreamy in the sun
I'm still working on the SWDR. It's dragging because after a few rows, my hands turn to concrete on fire. I finished the front. The neckshaping scares me. I never quite understand the directions. For this pattern I think they gave right-side directions for knitting from the edge to the neck edge/center, even though the right side should have been from the neck edge/center to edge. So I flipped the pattern directions mirrorwise and it seemed to turn out ok. No holes, purls and knits where they should be. The next thing that I'm not looking forward to is seaming the sleeves. Ooo. Spooky.
Filed Under: Rebecca 28 | SWDR
Friday, February 18, 2005
I thank God for this Friday in particular over all other Fridays because
- I just found out the office is closed on Monday.
-
There are 3 NetFlix movies in the queue:
Season 2 of Coupling (original British version, not flaccid American remake)
Vanity Fair and
Eternal Sunshine of the Blah blah blah
-
The office is closed on Monday.
-
The office is closed on Monday.
-
The office is closed. On Monday.
I see a finished sweater in my future.
The price of the Kobe steaks last night were a good 10% higher than
last time. I'm not surprised. How many barrels of oil does it take
process a 10oz steak, and then fly it over from Japan all the way to
the East coast? However much, the kobe was worth it, it's worth
aaaaaall of it.
Filed Under: Life
Thursday, February 17, 2005
To properly celebrate D's coming into this world, we will eat steak. We will be all kinds of irresponsible while we do it. I don't know if you're allowed to bitch about SUVs out of one side if your mouth, and then eat steak with the other. But I'll do it anyways, because there are always exceptions aren't there, especially when talking about a marblized, beer-mashed, succulent Kobe steak.
So today on the way to work I walked by a Porsche SUV idling in the parking lot. I resisted the urge to smear ripe feces all over it, which I had at the ready for just this occasion.
Filed Under: Life
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
I haven't knitted in the past couple of days. Busy at work, trying to get to bed sooner in order to conquer the whole 'early to bed, early to rise' battle. Anyway this past weekend I started the SWDG (sweater with diagonal ribs) from Rebecca 28, using Lion Brand Kool Wool and finished the back.
 Back of SWDG. The color is actually more moss than camel.
Love the diag ribbing, and the yarn-overs near the edge. I changed the placement of the double decreases, during mid-knitting, by just a stitch on each side. Plus I think that's how it looks in the photo. The pattern was knitting up something differerent. Also with such chunky yarn like the Kool Wool, and with the previous two rows also containing decreases right below, the original placement of the double dec looked really messy, all big and bumpy .
The Kool Wool is knitting up soft, spongy, and very springy. Boing boing.
Filed Under: Rebecca 28 | SWDR
Monday, February 14, 2005
Happy Valentines Day
Filed Under: Cats
Sunday, February 13, 2005
Yum.
Filed Under: Cats
Friday, February 11, 2005
My attention span is being held together by nonstick Teflon. I just came
across pattern books from Adrienne Vittadini and everything in there is
be-yoooo-tiful. Beautiful. Such as:
From AV Fall 2003 and 2004.
I'm squashing the burning burning desire to buy materials for these
patterns Right Now as I have more than enough to do...but gaah. All the
squirrels in my head are howling.
Filed Under: Projects
Thursday, February 10, 2005
These just came in, and now my yarn-buying spree is complete. All
projects in the project queue have their respective yarns, and I should
be all set, if not for the rest of the year, then at least til May. In
theory. Hold me!
Peruvian wool for the Ribby Cardy.
Purchased from elann.com
Peruvian Quechua for Angelina.
Made from alpaca and tencel. Oo la tencel, what the hell is tencel!
Purchased from elann.com.
I might have to inflict some hard self-discpline in order to rest my
hands and my eyes but not my pathetically out-of-shape bod. Need to get
moving. Somehow I pulled a shoulder muscle from sneezing. Who's ever
heard of having to warm up before sneezing?
I'm going to turn into one of those crabs with the one goofy extra
large claw
while the rest of my useless body slowly atrophies.
Filed Under: Projects | Yarn Stash
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Lately the postman has been doubling as Santa Claus.
Merino chunky is for the Sweater with Diagonal Ribs Sweater with Cables, from Rebecca 28.
Purchased yarn from yarn.com.
Kool Wool is for the Sweater with Cables Sweater with Diagonal Ribs, from Rebecca 28 also (they need to come up with prettier names). It's the same gauge as GGH Savanna Aspen, the yarn called for in this pattern, and it's also made from 50% merino wool and 50% acrylic. But unlike Aspen it's unexpensive, by decent yarn standards anyway. I have this thing with buying yarn for a sweater that will cost over $80 in total, especially if it's made from synthetic materials. I've realized that no one knits for economic propriety, but I still have my limits. If I can purchase a lovely cabled cashmere sweater at Anthropologie or bluefly.com for just over $100, then you're insane if you think I'm going to make that sweater on my own with 10 hanks of cashmere at $30 per unit. I don't like knitting that much.
I'm sorry. I just caught myself in an unscheduled rant. Anyway there's just one more package coming in and that'll be all the purchases for the rest of the...year? Season? Month? Week?
(oops I got my yarns/pattern combo all confused)
Filed Under: Yarn Stash
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
I just received the pattern for the Angelina Vintage Jacket in the mail, read through it, and now I won't be able to sleep at night. It's done in one piece from the back, up to the neck, then down both sides of the sleeves at the same time, and then down the front.
What.
But look! It's so preeeeetty.
Tomorrow I'm starting one of the Rebecca sweaters in tandem with the Drapey Shoulder one. I'm getting bored with all the 3x3 ribbing.
Look who's been keeping me company while I've been knitting. I could eat those paws.
Filed Under: Angelina | Cats
Monday, February 07, 2005
Superbowl Sunday at Paul & Leah's house outside of Boston, far enough outside the city that it was practically the wilderness to me. They had a fire going, comfy cushions and pillows strewn everywhere, tons of clam chowder, chili and desserts, I sat myself in the rocking chair and knitted throughout the entire game, more feverishly so in the last 5 minutes. I can get extremely worked up about a sport I care so little about. Remember Smarty Jones's quest for the Triple Crown? I hadn't even heard of that stupid horse until two days before the event, but it didn't stop me from weeping bitter bitter tears when it was all over.
from Phildar's Tendance Automne 04/05
I've completed the back and started the front for this little sweater. Feeling leery about it. We'll see. The drapey collar is supposed to be as long as the sweater body from bottom to armpit, around 16 inches. That seems nuts. I just realized that this sweater isn't coat-friendly since the collar acts like a mini-poncho. What have I done? It's too late to stop.
Below is a pic of one of the back/front pieces. One of these days it will miraculously morph into something wearable but for now, the ribbing is pulling the width in so much it looks like a dishtowel. A soft, absorbant dishtowel.
for a giraffe
Filed Under: Phildar
Monday, February 07, 2005
 
I just completed my first sweater. Me, girl with the attention span and the motivation of your average earthworm, has completed a completely wearable piece of clothing when not so long ago the whole concept of knitting seemed too bizarre to grasp. Think about it. Take a pair of pointy-ended chopsticks and a longish piece of yarn, do some manual gymnastics and you have cloth. Someone had to sit and DELIBERATELY, CONSCIOUSLY come up with the whole concept of casting on, knitting, purling, shaping, etc. etc. Why? How?
first sweater observations
- So satisfying.
- Not nearly as difficult as I thought it would be. Even though there were some moments of total befuddlement.
- It took longer to seam than to knit. It took longer to weave in the loose ends than to seam.
- On that note, I unknowingly picked the best pattern to use as my first sweater. It uses raglan sleeves, which does not involve arithmetic puzzles before seaming. Raglan sleeves have the same number of stitches on the sides, from armhole to neck, as it sides of the front and back panels, from armhole to neck. Just seam and go.
if i were to make this sweater again, i would...
- decrease the gauge even more by using smaller needles. Size 6? Still a tad too drapey.
- not shape the waist. The pattern called for waist-shaping (series of decreases around the waist, then increase again towards the armpits), which seamed very comely, when not on self. It ended up making this unsightly bulge under the armpits, where the increases started again. Maybe it was the drape of this yarn (which is different than what the original pattern called for). I'm going to have to walk around with my arms stitched to my sides to flatten the bulge.
- take better care shaping the neckline. Use another bind-off technique on the sloped edges to avoid having it look steppy. The raggedy and uneven edges turned into small holes when I picked up stitches for the collar.
- make the sleeves a little longer.
- make the turtleneck longer, and maybe in a 3x3 rib instead of 2x2 rib.
- keep the length the same
- decrease width of back panel by an inch. The original pattern had the cable going down the back as well -- I thought this would look funny, so I omitted it and did straight Stockinette stitch. It did occur to me that this will make the back wider than the front (cables pull the stitches in), but went ahead and did not adjust. Well, now my sweater is slightly bulging in the back.
- stitch edges in selvedge to make seaming easier. Trying to find the running thread next to the curling end stitch was a pain. The sweater is slightly asymmetrical towards the bottom, and pulling to the left. Grrr.
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DETAILS
Pattern:Simply Marilyn by Debbie Bliss
Yarn: alpaca/wool blend that I got in Taipei. Brand is "Monty." Says it's Made in Paris.
# of Balls: 7.5
Gauge: 20 stitches/4 inches on #7 needles
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TECHNIQUES:
Cable: horseshoe cable
Decreases: ssk, k2tog
Increases: m1
Neck shaping: short rows
Collar: picking up stitches; knitting in the round
Seaming: mattress stitch (invisible vertical on stockinette; invisible horizontal on bound-off edges)
The original calls for 12 sts/4 in, and the smallest size seemed really big. With the yarn I used, I knitted in the pattern's largest size to make an XS sweater.
Knitting in a smaller gauge also fixed the 'problem' of having that gaping neckhole, which heard from other people prevented the sweater from staying on.
You can get the pattern for free here. |
in the queue The best part of finishing a project - other than wearing the project - is starting a new one. The next in the queue is this from Phildar's Tendances Automne 04/05.
I'm substituting the yarn again, but the gauge is the same so I shouldn't have to make any changes.
eeeYAAAAAAAAAAH!
Filed Under: Completed Projects | Marilyn
Monday, February 07, 2005
The 2005 Project Queueueue:
Filed Under: Projects
Monday, February 07, 2005
Some personal details:
- I live with two cats and one husband in Boston.
- Today in a feverish rush to get this application up and running, I ate oxidized guacamole for lunch.
- I knit only with circular needles.
Hello! I've decided to start a blog to blab about the top obsessions currently running my broken little body, and that is knitting, cooking and gardening, and all these domesticate. I do draw the line at collecting vintage napkin rings however.
Since knitting came into my life, cooking and gardening and just about everything else, including work (don't tell boss), have taken a back seat. Oh and did I mention how much of a pain sleeping and working is, as it eats an entire 18 hours or so from the 24 potential hours of knitting per day? Also I really could do without another activity that involves so little moving and so much sitting hunched over. Between work (which I don't want to do) (don't tell boss) and knitting (which I want to do ALL THE TIME), my physique can be best described as rickity.
Well I first learned how to knit in 4th grade. Knitting career then was very short-lived. I had plans to make this colorful block sweater, but then I knitted a total of five incredibly misshapen rows and that was the last time I picked up needles...Fast forward to August 2004 when I visited my parents, spied my mother's basket of knitting, and decided to give it another go.
Mom taught me how to crochet too, and I thought I preferred that over to knitting because it seemed so much faster and easier. I crocheted a band in half-shell motif for practice, as handsomely modeled by Mocha:
Then I went home and crocheted this scarf, as handsomely modeled by Bunny (you'll be seeing a lot more of Bunny and his equally handsome bro Veebs):
He won't admit it, but Bunny loves this scarf.
Then I switched to knitting this green and gray scarf in double seed stitch, using super luxe cashmerino from Debbie Bliss. Handsomely modeled by (and made for) Duck:
A lot more scarves and hats ensued, since knitting scarves is easy and allows you to practice different patterns such as cables and lace:
 
Now I am into sweaters. And buying yarn, especially when I don't need anymore.
So until the snow melts and the danger of spring frost is over, and until I find the time to feed my family a proper home-cooked meal, or I win the lottery, this blog will be all about knitting.
Filed Under:
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