Did you get any ‘Bounce’ from Sue at BT Yarns? - it was in her last mailer (www.btyarns.com, search word - bounce). It is 75 cotton, 25 poly, approx 2000 ypp, each cone is about 1.25 lb. I got a cone of plumberry because it looked like the colour to go with a printed fabric I recently purchased. It’s a perfect match! Now, in Sue’s information, she said at T8, stockinette, it gave a gauge of 29 sts and 53 rows to 10 cm. That’s kinda weird and led me to think it would be stretchy and the machine wash & dry would ‘shrink’ it up quite a bit. So, I clicked on my Knitwords index to see if there was a match to the gauge and sure enough, I found close matches in stockinette with Denim Bouclé and Balada Stretch, which both took up considerably with washing and drying. Also close was some one-row-tucks in 4 ply wool!!
Okay, next question, how far is this yarn gonna go! My cone was 1.2 lb, so
I had 2250 yds approx, but what does that mean? In comparing yarns, yardage and gauge I figured it would be comparable to the yardage of 4 ply wool and that amount would be enough for a plain, long sleeve cardigan.
So, I made my swatch. I used T9, so it wouldn’t be too stiff when washed - I still wanted a bit of drape and also yarn will go farther knit at a looser tension. Before washing, my swatch measured 28 sts and 38 rows to 10 cm. After washing and drying in the dryer - oh, who am I trying to kid? I was in a hurry and used the hair blower - it measured 29 sts and 46 rows to 10 cm. I love the shape of ‘Caped Wrapper’ from No 43 (see blogs below, ‘remake of caped wrapper’, ‘cheating at swatches’ and ‘recreational knitting’) but I thought I’d try it plain stockinette without the large collar - that would really be pushing the limit of where 2250 yds would take me.
I made the back first - this yarn knits like a dream - quick, easy, down and dirty! I love it! I weighed the back and it was almost 180g, so I knew it might be a bit tricky. I do like the crossover front and that will take a bit extra, as much as the back again, but I’ll go for 3/4 sleeves that I can turn back a cuff to elbow length, to save a bit. I quickly knit the 2 sleeves, threw them on the scale and I was at 300g. Knit both the fronts and promptly forgot thriftiness in my pleasure at getting all 5 pieces knit in 3 hrs!! I shut things down for the evening, not even looking at the remaining cone, on the floor.
This morning I wanted to knit the bands and get it finished, again forgetting my yardage dilemma. I knit the first front band, using double rib, just like in my original pattern, attached it to the left front and on my last joining row, the tail of the end of the cone came dangling into view...fudge!!!
Oh well, I still had my swatch. I unravelled -or is it ravelled? what is the difference? - well, to be brutally honest, I unpicked the last row, threaded up the tail and knit directly off the swatch! I made narrow stockinette bands for each front edge and the back neck, attached them and I still have half my swatch!! Aces!! Link it together, wash and dry, perfect!!
Oh, one other tip, I put everything together, except to set in the sleeves and I laundered it like that, then put the sleeves in. On a stretchy yarn, I’ve found that doing it this way makes a much better fit of the sleeve into the armhole.
BTW, plumberry is sold out, but the other colours are quite nice...
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