Fiber Wars

So, my copy of Feminine Knits last friday. I was so excited that I couldn't resist swatching for a new project. I've wanted to make the lace bolero from the book for ages, except I couldn't read the original Finnish in which it was written. That, and I wanted to make the lace circle jacket, but I just couldn't work up the courage. Now that I have my hot little hands on a copy, I can't help starting even though I have something like a dozen projects in process. And that just counts knitting...

I started out with DMC's Senso Wool Cotton, a yarn that used to be uber cheap at Hobby Lobby. I use the past tense, because I haven't been able to find it at a local store in ages. I started with the ribbing on tiny needles (US 1.5 or 2.5 mm) just to see how it would look. Despite the intimidatingly tiny needles, it looked like a nice even knit. Then I switched to the larger needles for the lace pattern, which is really, really easy. It's a 4 row, 6 st pattern repeat. After all the crazy charts I've been keeping track of, it's almost as mindless as ribbing. Almost.

Except for the cotton fiber. Wool Cotton is 30% wool and 70% cotton, with hardly any elasticity. I got through about 10 rows of the lace pattern, all the while struggling with the sk2p stitches. I substituted for the centered decrease version, which I liked the look of. Finer needle points wouldn't have helped reduce the difficulty of manipulating the stitches. Though they would have made pushing around the stitches easier, the sheer inelasticity of the cotton was what drove me to try another fiber. I was cursing by row 10 of the lace, trying to get my needle to go through 3 stitches. I'd rather slit my wrists than try a knupp with this yarn.

So, I pulled out some other stash, the lovely buckingham yarn which I used to make the Giselle sweater. I had a ball and half left over, so a few months ago, I bought a second ball of the yarn just so I'd have enough to do a sizeable project. Now I do! The yarn is delicious and very flexible about gauge. It's 80% alpaca and 20% silk, so it's ridiculously warm and has elegant drape. I started swatching with it, and oh! I forgot how much I like this yarn! I'm definitely going to be making the bolero out of it. The alpaca has just enough stretch and memory that I can get the stitches around easily on bamboo needles. I'm just sorry I left the swatch at home, I want to knock it out today.

Not to say that I don't like the wool cotton. It's going to get relegated to crochet, where I can more easily deal with the unforgiving nature of cotton. I'm thinking the cheveron lace cardigan because I can't have enough sweaters. I get cold at 75 degrees Fahrenheit. I'm not kidding. So summer AC often leaves me shivering with numb extremities. What can I say, I'm a tropical bird.

It's just interesting to me since I seem to be developing distinct fiber crafting preferences. Cotton for crochet because it literally feels hard to knit with. Silk seems to be following the same lines, but we'll see how the next two silk projects fare. I ordered enough really cheap silk yarn from Ebay to make a dress or sweater. I'm excited, it should start arriving any day now! It's on its way from India and it's been about 10 business days, so it should be here. Plus, there's the silk roving in my stash just waiting for me to start spinning it. I haven't dared spin with it yet just because I don't feel my spinning skills are up to it. We'll see.

Giselle a go-go

Soooo, I'm nearing the end of the Giselle sweater. The sleeves are done. The bottom extension is done. The top, with all its modifications, is done. I should detail those mods, it was pretty intense. Other than that, I didn't deviate from the pattern.

Well, except maybe for the sleeve flares. I'm thinking of skipping one of the short row flares, because the flare is working out wonderfully. I don't particularly need the long endpoint in the center of the sweater, seeing how prone I am to trailing sweater sleeves everywhere.

Speaking of other unnecessary steps, I blocked the top and bottom half. Whee! Even after all the intense mods of decrease every 2nd row (essentially, every knit row), for 26 rows, the damn thing was still too big. Oh, yeah, I also stopped increasing at the neckline, umm... around row 20-something? Maybe row 22. I think. Anyways, I got it all bound off and it was STILL too large. I was 36 sts short of what the pattern called for, and I refused to frog back AGAIN.

Instead, I shrank it. :D The blocking may have been unnecessary, but it gave me the opportunity to semi-shrink the sweater. Bless ravelry and all their members. The two pieces got hand washed separately in the sink. First wash was warm water with detergent, followed by a cool water rinse, and then a warm water rinse with fabric softener. I must say, the fabric bloomed beautifully - AND shrank wonderfully! I was careful not to agitate the sleeves, which fit me perfectly. Go figure, right? But I agitated the center part of the sweater, shrinking down the neckline and bottom hem. From the amount of bloom from the yarn, I get the feeling that I almost started felting it. Thankfully, the yarn forgave me for putting it through so much stress. The loose gauge still has tons of wonderful drape. I agitated all of the bottom extension of the sweater, but not nearly as much as the top. It survived the process with little to show for it, but it fits well. We'll find out when I start piecing it together.

Which irritates me not a little bit. The pattern says that there's no seaming, however, the crochet trim version has seams! Yeah, the pretty crochet connects the sleeve flares to the sleeves, and attaches the bottom extension to the top. But they're still seams. No matter how decorative they are, they're still seams, with accompanying annoying ends to weave in.

I am happy to report that the bristol buckingham yarn spit splices remarkably well. It is a touch splitty when used at a loose gauge.

Shrinking Giselle

No, not the supermodel.

So, I finished the top bit of the Giselle sweater and it's still big. I'm 6 stitches short of the count, which is fine. I'm glad that I started the neckline much higher than the pattern recommended, it's perfect right where it is. The back seems a little big, but we'll see what happens when I put it together.

I still can't make my mind up on the color, however. It's a strange, fey sort of color, appearing red in one light and brown in another. It reminds me a lot of foxes, particularly the stories about the kitsune. Like the fox-wives of the old tales, the color changes with its background and light. I tried on the top half, and it's almost burgundy against my brown skin. However, it gets quite brown against my red satin bag. It's red in sunlight, brown in yellow light, and so strange. I'm learning to like it, but I'm never sure what to think of it. I don't think I will dye it.

I will say the yarn feels marvelous. It tends to split a little bit, when knitted at a loose gauge. I can't wait till I wash it, and have the yarn bloom. I do wonder about shrinking it before I piece it. I think that might be the best thing to do, since it's just a tiny bit big, even with how much I've changed it, which isn't much. The funny part is that I've made the smallest size of the pattern. And I even made a gauge swatch! C'est la vie.

Sigh. I ripped it. Well, just back to the 4th row underneath the arm. Now I'm doing a decrease under the arm every 2nd row. Somewhere along the line, I'm going to stop with the neckline increases, but I'm not sure where yet. It hurt to undo four inches of knitting though.

EUREKA!

I finally get to start on the Giselle Sweater! I'm sooooo excited about it. I've made a gauge swatch that appears to be dead on. The gauge didn't change at all when I washed it, but the yarn did fluff up nicely. So when I knit with the yarn originally, it looked a little thin for the needles I was using. Bless alpaca for blooming when washed.

I'm so excited about this sweater, though. It'll be sheer delight just working with Plymouth's new yarn. It's an alpaca silk blend that I just adore petting. It feels wonderfully smooth when it knits up.

On other happy notes, I've finished 3 other projects. Which sounds impressive, but they weren't all knitted in 24 hours. I just had some ends to weave in on a sweater shrug, and a sleeve to finish on a baby sweater. But it's nice to get hem all done so my projects are cleared out a little.

Are we there yet?

I've got the same antsy feeling that a 5 year old has after being in the car for more than 10 minutes. I'm so nearly done with the poet's sweater that I can taste it. And it's driving me crazy.

So I picked up 139 stitches or so. I didn't realize there's a doubling row on the ruffle. So now it's 278 stitches. And then there's a row after that where you make a stitch in between the knit stitches of the k2,p1 ribbing. So now it's 300+ stitches. It's a very fluffy ruffle and it's dead boring and it takes forever to finish a row. I have all these other projects that are just begging me to finish them, and I can't get to them yet because this project obsesses my mind.

Gah!

Wheee! Giselle!

So, as a reward for miraculously pulling off a B in physics (I don't know how I did it, I blame the curve) I'm going to get the supplies to start Giselle.

I just found this fabulous yarn store, the Knitter's Mercantile. I swear I had a yarngasm there. Of the yarn stores in Columbus, I'm hard pressed to think of one that has a wider variety of yarn. The first time around, I just let the variety of yarns sink in while i tried to decide on what yarn to use.

Oh, and if you haven't figured it out by now, this is going to be a knitting blog.

Current projects:

• baby sweater for a shower - my supervisor's wife is having a baby.


• Serrano for me, I'm in no rush to finish it. I figure a slow pace will keep my sanity intact.


• Kureyon Carry-along- it's all knitted and felted, I just haven't had time to line it.


• Icarus Shawl - for the bf's mother for christmas.


• the Superior Ruffled Collar Pullover from www.tahkistacycharles.com

I've modded the sweater, which reminds me of the once popular poet's blouse. I'm going to try knitting it in the round on drastically smaller needles to save on yarn, since the small size listed in the pattern will be ridiculously large on me