Skein vs. Swatch
There hasn’t been much knitting around here lately. Actually, that’s not strictly true. There *has* been a lot of actual knitting, but not much by way of finished stuff to show for it. One sock has been knit, frogged, knit, frogged, knit and frogged for the third time in the last three weeks. Once for size, once because I got bored with the pattern, and once because I made a stupid mistake and was so incensed with myself that the sock practically unraveled itself in the hope that it would calm me down. (Which it did.)
So I brought out this lovely skein of laceweight/light fingering merino called Lanita that I bought many years ago to make a shawl. I looked online for some shawl patterns, but like Huan-hua said recently, there is some serious lace shawl overload on Ravelry. My eyes begin to swim at all the prettiness and intricacy, and after a point I can never really sort one out from the other and decide what to make. So I looked at the Featherweight cardigan, which thousands of people have made, and which seems to be quite a lovely option for laceweight yarn. I seem to have enough for a cardigan in this yarn.
I swatched it and I have gauge (6 spi on size 4), but am not sure whether I like the way the colours translate from skein to swatch, and am having a hard time visualizing the variegated colours on a larger piece of fabric, and determining if I will like them. I love this bamboo forest type mix of colours, but they seem to shift quite rapidly in the swatch, something I hadn’t anticipated when I saw the skein itself. I’m not saying I don’t like it; there are a lot of people who’ve made it with gorgeous variegated yarn. I’m just not absolutely sure this one works for this pattern.
Also, while I do like the idea of this featherweight cardigan, am I setting myself up for long-term misery with laceweight stockinette? It’s not laceweight on size 6, say, when knitting the thin yarn on the thick needle can be murder on the fingers (to say nothing of temperament!). But size 4 might still be doable, plus this yarn falls just between laceweight and fingering.
Decisions, decisions!
My first thought on seeing the swatch was “camouflage”. The colors are lovely, but maybe it would work better in a textured stitch pattern.
I like it but I don’t think you can tell how it will look sweater-size. Maybe if you…knit another much wider swatch to see how the repeats look over longer runs. It will make something lovely, whatever you choose.
In my opinion, this yarn doesn’t suit the stockinette cardigan. Try swatching for another cardigan with lace? A shawl will be just great, though. Am I making it harder for you?
The skein itself and the 3rd textured picture doesn’t show the short bursts of variagation in this colorway. But the flat stockinette swatch does. The Featherweight is miles of St st, so maybe do what the others have suggested and try a cardigan with texture or lace. Since you have a sweater’s worth of yarn, a shawl would probably end up with a ton of leftovers but not enough to knit a garment with. On the other hand, the colors could totally grow on you! Not literally, you know what I mean:)
I can’t wait for you to come! I am abt to start a new project – need some yarn advice.