Adventures of a Desi Knitter

Hope everyone has been having a good holiday season! These past two weeks have been crazy busy, way busier than my normal semester is. Between a busload of guests, two birthdays, a wedding anniversary and a major holiday, I am grateful for all the red wine and sugar to have come my way. I have hardly had any time to sit and knit, but you know how it is - a row here, a row there, and suddenly, you have a finished creation, just in time to wrap up a year’s knitting. Here’s the “Back-to-School Vest”:

I am not into the whole speed knitting thing, but this one was super-quick even for me. Took the total of five-six days’ knitting time. Apart from some clever but simple shaping, it is mindless, productive knitting. To say nothing of the fact that it took less than $25 to make.

Project Specs:

Pattern: “Back-to-School Vest” from Stefanie Japel’s “Fitted Knits”, size 39 inches
Needles: Size 7 bamboo
Gauge: 19 st to 4 inches in waffle stitch
Yarn: Cascade 220

Seriously, Cascade 220 is wonderful. This shade is a silvery-grey heather flecked with maroon, and matched exactly the kind of colour I was looking for to wear with the dark shirts I have. It took just under 3 skeins.

Notes: For all the loveliness of the yarn and pattern, I am, quite honestly, not as taken with the FO as I should be. It fits okay, but tends to ride up a bit. The next size up (41″) would have made it too baggy, though. I’m hoping that a decent blocking, or just plain wear should settle it down a bit. But for all its shapeliness and darts, this empire waist thing places a bit too much emphasis where it perhaps ought not to, and I don’t know if I care for the roundish neckline. Also, I made it mainly to wear to teach and be comfortable in the slightly cold classrooms. But when I wore it yesterday, I found myself doing what devoted Star Trekkers would recognize as the famous “Picard Pull” or the “Picard Manoeuvre”: straightening one’s uniform every few seconds like the hot and gorgeous Capt. Jean-luc Picard does on the Starship Enterprise. It’s okay when resisting the Borg, but I imagine in class it will annoy me to hell. Am not sure yet if I’ll rip or wear it a bit more and see. But it is very comfy and warm. Incidentally, if you make the vest, do be sure to check the errata for the pattern.

Ah well. I will leave you some mist, redwoods, and sunlight. Enjoy the rest of the holidays, dear readers, and see y’all in the new year!

Tags: Uncategorized by desiknitter
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Or, a post in four parts.

First, thanks so much to everyone who commented and emailed, for all your sympathy and suggestions about my seamless alpaca debacle! I retreated from the sweater and resisted burning it in the grate. A large relative’s visit is looming on the weekend, and I might just do the lofty thing and give it away. It still is rather gorgeous looking, for all its misshapenness, but I think I’ll feel happier knowing it will keep *someone* warm, even if it isn’t the originally intended recipient. So instead, I knit on my Cobblestone for a bit, adding some waist shaping (can you spot my full-fashioned decreases?)

Second, after achieving this high-minded closure, I regrouped my ego and nerves, and went to various LYSs in search of the perfect (read affordable - have you seen the friggin’ prices on some of these????) wool/alpaca blend. I fantasised about buying ten skeins, knitting the swatch on the bus back and voila, hey presto, being done by Christmas. Alas, only one store in our area carries Berroco Ultra Alpaca (Thanks to all who recommended it!), and they had only three skeins of the one shade the spouse liked. I did try Nashua Creative Focus Worsted, but it was too scratchy around his neck, not ideal for a turtleneck. But when I realised my pullover-in-two-week fantasy was going the way of my dramatic-weightloss-in-two-weeks fantasy, I decided to wait and order it at leisure. (Talking of weight loss, my last post with those two words got pingbacks from strange sites - those that trawl blog posts for such popular key phrases, I guess. I’m probably getting a lot of disappointed visitors who expect to find diets but see alpaca yarn instead.)

Third, this epiphany was followed by another: the last thing I wanted to do was measure gauge and fret about size (talking of key phrases, ahem). Final papers were soon to arrive. Why not go for something relaxing and simpler? So I did. I knit him a pair of felted clogs with Cascade 220. He’s happy with them, even though they’re - you guessed it - a bit too large! I’m going to give them one more spin in the hot washer the next time I do laundry.

And finally, fourth:

This aran is knit with the same yarn as the Cobblestone above: a light worsted merino called La Paz, handpainted by Laura Macagno-Shang of Textiles a Mano. The sweater is five years old, and was my first major aran project after learning how to read charts and patterns. I picked up a Vogue Knitting pattern and sort of went with it, changing an ugly shawl collar to the V. It was great for my knitting confidence overall and I’ve worn it a lot.

Problem is, I only ever wear the sweater at home, because I don’t care for the aran pattern anymore, and I hate the way the cabled sleeves look puffed; I feel vaguely like an American footballer. While it’s very comfy, it is quite shapeless, the sleeves rather long, it’s too bulky under the arms and the finishing would now make me blush. It’s a shame, because I love the yarn, which has begun pilling only now, after years of heavy wear, and the subtle brown shades.

See the hole right at the waist in the central panel? That was what got me thinking - what if I were to unravel and reknit the yarn into a more fitting and interesting pattern? Any suggestions for what might look good in this yarn? A search on Ravelry for cardigans and pullovers is like setting off an avalanche and being drowned in patterns, so any specific suggestions are most welcome. Hope everyone’s holiday knitting is coming along well!

Tags: sweaters, Cartridge Rib Pullover, Socks by desiknitter
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Here is my beautiful seamless hybrid (Zimmerman’s raglan + saddle-shoulder combo) sweater, nearly done. Am a few rows away from casting off the neck. It took fourteen months to make, on and off, with many hiccups and visits to the frog pond along the way, largely due to gauge issues with the alpaca yarn.

Nearly every other round of this sweater is knit twisted, on a size 3 needle. For the yoke, I knit three rounds plain, three twisted, and it made for a pretty variation.

If you have never tried this much twisted stockinette on small needles, I urge you to. You can then join me in contrasting the beauty of the zig-zag, firm fabric this produces with the incredible soreness your left index finger will feel with the constant jabbing of the needle as you twist the stitch. Someone suggested to me on Knittersreview that twisting every alternate round helps keep pure alpaca yarn from stretching too much - it was so difficult to get a decent, firm stockinette fabric with the Elann Pure Alpaca that I went for it. Through all the jabbing and frogging, I visualised a warm, soft, roomy sweater at the end: late, to be sure, but every inch the unique 100% alpaca turtleneck the spouse had requested.

So why the arrghhhhh, you ask? It is because it isn’t just the yarn, but the entire project that has stretched too much already. Just take a look.

The blue fleece sweater on top fits the spouse well. Spilling out from all directions under it is the alpaca sweater, several sizes too large in every dimension but length. It is wildly loose for him, and looks horrible. I realise this is a truly crappy photo, but trust me, it is nothing compared to how it fits him. I didn’t dare show you that picture.

It’s not the gauge, it’s me. I thought he wanted this sweater modelled on a different, older and much roomier one and did the maths all wrong. The arms are at least four inches too long, the body about six inches too roomy and the shoulders way too wide. And before you ask, yes, I did have him try it on after joining the yoke, but other than slightly long sleeves, it seemed okay. At least, I thought that after it was all properly decreased and saddled and necked, it was going to be. I should have realised something was not quite right when the saddle shoulder began puckering at the back:

Actually, this should be a whole rant in itself, because however ill-conceived the overall size, I religiously followed Zimmerman’s percentage system for this pattern. Why my saddle ended up looking like an ugly puffed sleeve instead of the neat lines on all the other hundreds of seamless hybrids on Ravelry is a mystery. But I pressed on regardless, hoping that a good steam block would do the trick. Alas, it has not. The horrible droop of the saddle shoulder just about matches my mood right now, far down in the deepest dumps. I am SO angry and upset about this, because so many things went wrong for what was a really special project. I lost my notes and proper measurements, picked the wrong sweater to measure by, forgot all my plans for it over a really hot summer break, suffered through an awful yarn and stitch combination, and my usual blind hope that it would all work out in the wash really deserted me this time. I can’t even begin to consider frogging the whole thing and starting over - the very idea of doing another twisted knit stitch is making me ill, even for the love of my life. So my options right now are:

1) Set fire to the whole project and watch the natural fibre burn while I sip some strong, gold liquid.

2) Frog to the armholes, reduce sleeve length, figure out a yoke and decrease formula that will ensure a better fit at the shoulders while still keeping the body and sleeves intact.

3) Grit my teeth, finish the project as it is, and give it to a larger relative; heck, it *is* the gifting season after all

4) Take spouse to yarn store, pick a worsted weight alpaca blend (explain pitfalls and stretch-and-gauge trauma of 100% alpaca on size 3 needles along the way) and knit him another seamless hybrid in two weeks.

5) Pray for twenty pounds of instant weight loss by Christmas, because if #2 and #4 are being considered as viable options by then, then this will be trivial to achieve in comparison.

To sum up: Aaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrgghhhhhhhhh! Any suggestions about which option will be easiest and most painless? Is there *any* chance that #2 might work? He so wanted a pure alpaca sweater, but I had the very devil of a time finding a 100% alpaca yarn that would fit my wallet and retain its shape as a large men’s pullover. Any suggestions for worsted blends that don’t cost the earth?

Tags: sweaters, Cartridge Rib Pullover by desiknitter
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