schemeing vees...

While planning out my sleeveless top, my main concern is getting that vee neck shortrowed on every other row – it won’t work otherwise. In other words, the width of the neck is going to be dependant on the depth of the vee – you have to decrease at least one stitch on every other row (the basic rule of shortrowing), and the best way to figure it is to work backward, from the shoulder down the number of rows you need for the number of stitches, times two.
It dawns on me that my Thunder Bay Poncho has a vee neck that I could practise this technique on! I knew there was a reason I was putting it on hold! ha! is that an intentional pun or what? ;)

Now, you know I’m gonna cheat my way through this project! No swatching – I have plenty of those to choose from as well as schematics and written patterns. The most recent one I think was a black tank that I did to go with a black lace remake that I did - OMG, getting a little yada, yada, yada! there, sorry!
What I should say is I did a black tank top to go with that lacy cardigan from way back  https://knitwords.blogspot.com/2011/07/cross-knitting.html and it is one of my go-to wearables, the black twinset, I mean, so I’m basically just going to remake that, without the lace motif, but change the colours and the neckline. More on this later!
Oh and if anyone wants that skin print stitch pattern, I’m offering it up free of charge! just email me (knitwords@shaw.ca) – it’s a DAK file, so you’ll need to have DAK…
Other coping mechanisms for this social distancing thing – I love to cook and bake but have been avoiding that hobby for some time due to dieting but I’m back to bread and muffin making – giving them away to anyone who’s maybe a bit deprived and needs a little cheering up!
My latest ‘new-to-me’ book author - Linwood Barclay – totally loving his easy-read suspense style. Keeps you guessing to the end! They haven’t closed my local library yet!

more sleeve issues..

What happens when you don’t swatch? I have the same yarn and it’s my pattern - using the same machine...what can go wrong? Why did I get a ginormous sleeve? So, okay, let’s analyze this. The original yarn was 2.2 Softball cotton and the pattern ‘Opposite Attraction’ was in No 39 KNITWORDS Winter 2006 - the garment is a favourite of mine and I’ve worn the original continuously over the past several years, washing and drying it often. I had a cone of poppy red on my shelf that I’ve been meaning to use and pulled it out yesterday - looked over the pattern, checked my original notes and figured I was ready to go.

Took my own advice and made a sleeve to start - got it finished and think, wow, it looks huge, but the pattern does say that this yarn will shrink a lot and it recommends machine wash and dry, but whoa, this is a really BIG sleeve...since I have no deadlines anymore, I say what the hey? and toss the huge sleeve in the washer/dryer - gosh, it’s still humongous!!! The original called for 29 sts and 50 rows to the 10 cm square and from my ‘cheating at swatches’ yarn marks, this one measures 27 sts and 38 rows after the machine-wash and dry.

I look a little more - the only other time I used this yarn was in the same issue - a tunic top called ‘Hip’ - same tension on this one says the gauge for stockinette is 31 sts and 45 rows - that was a big difference, but this is more...

I check the two yarns again, side by side - it was described as 100% cotton with nylon binder - in the photo, you can see the nylon thread coming off the end of the beige yarn and notice how crinkly the beige one is compared to the red yarn - I think this is the answer...

funny, it’s a discontinued yarn...maybe that says something...anyway, gotta use it up now - second sleeve knit from cheat-swatch numbers...

cross-knitting

The perfect black cardigan! the ultimate in knitting, right up there with that LBD thing. My LSA in black is pretty perfect (Sep 6/09 - what's happening) - I love the yarn - wool crepe deluxe from Silk City Fibers in 002, jet black - and the style, but you can never have too many of a good thing, so, my quest for the ubiquitous black cardigan persists and now that I have the perfect black yarn...

In the past, I avoided knitting with black - when making something for a pattern and publication, there is no point in using black because the detail does not show up in photos. So, I knit in other colours simply for the need for detail in photography. The thing about a black garment - you want it to stay black and, many yarns, especially with a cotton content, will become charcoal or

gray-ish, no matter how careful you launder them.

Looking at past patterns I would have liked to have in black - I’m on a lace kick right now and the cover garment of No 20, Spring 2002 - wow! my notes say I made that one on Nov 22/01...Anyway, that garment was knit in a mauve shade of sable crepe and I was doing a plus-sized series, so that particular ‘Lacy Twin’ was made for someone else. I did re-knit it at the time, in the black sable crepe in my size and loved it the first time I wore it. The love affair was short-lived...the thing about acrylic, that one did stay black, but it also became fuzzy...and fuzzier and was soon relegated to the back of my closet - not sure why I even kept it (probably to remind myself never to use that again!).

So here I am, today, knitting a black lace piece on the standard gauge electronic and then changing it up with a stockinette piece on the LK150 - really what I should be concentrating on - my next project for Knit’nStyle... the yarn is ‘Boboli’ from Berroco, so colourful!

Yarn Anxiety

Geezer Chic from No 50 was one of my favourite garments - I loved the shape, style and drape (and the name), but the yarn certainly didn’t stand up to any wear at all, even though it was quite expensive. I’ve kept wearing it, sort of privately, because I still like it - I wore it for my road trip to Indiana last week and it’s so comfy, but I finally realized that I do need to retire it. I had it on the other morning when I answered the door - it was early but not that early! The woman took one look and apologized for waking me up - heck, no make-up yet, but I didn’t think I looked that bad ! Then it dawned on me - she saw my ratty sweater and figured it was a bathrobe or something! Okay, I get the point!
The original was made with a 2/18 wool/silk blend used doubled - most of it is stockinette - so that’s pretty easy, but what really set it off was the bands - full needle rib for the hemline that added just the right weight to hold the stockinette fabric down and add swing to the A-line shape and the front band - a wee bit tricky, knit circular, with great vertical buttonholes - I have to say, the instructions are excellent!!
So, what to substitute?? I decided to go with a burgundy 2 ply cotton, Brittany by Yeoman Yarns - I had just used that yarn for Simple-icity and seeing as it was stockinette, double stranded, figured it was okay to shortcut the swatching process. (With the same stitch count, but more rows to the cotton because of shrinkage, 46 rows as opposed to 38 on the wool/silk, so adding the extra rows will require more yarn.) These cones have been on my shelf for some time - they are the older version of 350g/3000m cones which I always thought to be adequate. The newer put-up is 450g/3850m cones - the original stuff was pretty big cones with tons of yardage - the point is, I didn’t want to be wasting yarn on swatches if it wasn’t necessary.
I made a sleeve and weighted it - 74g. Okay, the back was 196g. It could be close, so no pockets - that will save a bit. All 5 pieces done, just the band left - I did need to make a swatch and wash and dry for the shrinkage factor and I have 40g left on each cone. It’s really hard to tell, but before I got this far, I was consoling myself that the new ‘geezer’ wouldn’t look bad with a black band. I've already taken those killer black leather old man buttons off the original to re-purpose them on this one and make it impossible for me to continue wearing the grey one...if it turns out, I'll wear it in Raleigh!

In-betweens...sometime last week...

I usually take this time to do a little ‘practise’ and lately, I like to do a remake of my favourite garment from the last issue, sort of to get myself back in the knitting groove and just take it easy - for me, it’s almost like cheating, not having to think too much and just taking a ‘done’ pattern (not even making a swatch) and tossing it off, so to speak. Yeah, right!! So my pattern of choice is ‘Me-Cozy’ a lace pullover hoodie in alpaca. The one in the magazine that you’ll see soon is gray and I really loved it, but it looks much better on Lindsay than me. I had the same yarn in a denimy blue so I’m making it in the next size up - I must’ve been dreaming to think I’d fit that one!!
Okay, casting on is a snap - gave you some tips about that already -
see ‘Wasted...not!’ And I’m cruising along, knitting lace. I glance down and notice that I have some strange but nice, vertical lines - not the pattern that I’d planned! Ooops! forgot to unlock the pattern and it’s repeating the same row - but it is pretty! So, okay, let’s go with this. I knit a total of 10 rows the same and then release the pattern. Works for me!! I'll call it a deliberate mistake - I love oxymorons - it’s only a mistake if you don’t know what you did - if you can repeat it, it’s a design feature!! How do you think I came up with so many new trims?
Now, I know this will be my favourite go-to garment for the next couple of weeks!! I just love it!!

Groovy Re-do

From last week...
I told you my daughter wanted her own version of our cover garment from No 47. I had worn it to Winnipeg in mid-September, the last time we met. I left Thunder Bay on the noon flight - it was lovely and warm, the perfect fall day! I wore ‘Groovy’ with dark wash jeans, my ‘Rocket Dog’ wedge sandals that have the cutest black/red/grey print and my charcoal ‘Namaste’ bag as a carry-on over my shoulder. I thought I was looking quite fine if you know what I mean. Laura did too, because when she saw me, she gave me one of those turnaround-lookovers and then said, ‘I want a top just like that!’ She’s a chemical engineer, works in Northern Alberta, says she’s always cold at work and needs to wear a sweater or jacket all the time, even in the office. She thought this would ‘up’ her game a little too, instead of always being very casual. But - and here’s the thing, there’s always a catch - she wanted the same red - no problem, I had a second cone of the same thing - most of the time I like to have two cones of whatever, just in case - and, she would rather have long sleeves - it was totally cute with the short ones, but for her work situation, long sleeves would be better and she would like the buttons/closure to come down a little lower. Hey, that’s no big deal - I even got the same buttons. We are basically the same size, though she is a bit taller than me (like the rest of the world) and her arms are longer.
Now, you might wonder where I get the time to do stuff like this - everyone is always saying they are just so busy, blah, blah, blah. Well, considering this really would be ‘recreational’ knitting for me, it’s not like I would take an entire day to make it although there are probably 6 to 7 hours worth of work in remaking this. I fit in bits and pieces here and there. Because I didn’t have to do any of the experimenting and swatching that usually goes with creating from scratch, on Wednesday afternoon, while I was hanging around waiting for the printers to call back, I cast on for the back and made the hem, thinking I’d have that ready to start next morning. They still hadn’t called back by the time I had finished, so I turned on the laptop, fired up DAK, downloaded the stitch pattern and began knitting the back, exactly same as my original. Sure enough, 35 minutes later, I was removing the first shoulder when they called and I didn’t mind the wait because I had accomplished something.
Next morning, before heading out to my exercise class at 10 am, I made one front, adding the extra stitches for the overlap at RC070, splitting the distance from the original. When I returned, I made the second front, then went off to do mail, bank and run errands. We had an extremely gorgeous day - it got up to about 18C/64F by 3 pm and I couldn’t resist getting in one more cycle for the year.
I had planned to make the long sleeves using the tuck pattern, recharting the sleeve to be a closer fit overall, thinking it would be warmer, but discarded that idea when I realized it might look too bulky. To have a bit of tuck in the sleeve, I made a cuff of 21 rows with the tuck pattern (same as the bottom of the original) which would only be a slight flare at the wrist and made the rest of it in reverse stockinette. Both the sleeves and collar were made yesterday, between exercise class, updating the subscription list, other office work and handing out Hallowe’en treats. Today all that needed to be done was finishing the front edges, seaming sides and underarm, and stitching down the neckband facing - easy, peasy!
Oh, I love the long sleeves!!! It’s too cold here now to wear the original as an outdoor thing... Do I give it to her now or save it for Christmas???she probably forgot all about it - I could wear it, except, I purposely made sure the sleeves would be too long for me...