Big Sister

March to the finish

Inspired by a recent post by Brainylady and the number of WIPs and Zzzzz’s I have in my Ravelry project notebook, I am going to try to do some finishing this month. I am thinking of it as spring cleaning. Some of it will be finishing projects, some of it will be meeting milestones. On my list:

(1) Lush & Lacy (Back done, right front done, left front almost done, sleeves and assembly to go.)
(2) Carolyn 1 (Needs seaming and borders.)
(3) Carolyn inspired (Needs buttons and a few ends weaved in.)
(4) Machine knit striped vest (Needs ends woven in, seaming, and borders.)
(5) Big Snugs (One snug knit, but not assembled. One to go.)
(6) The sleeves of Dad’s sweater (Zero.)
(7) 10 more squares of Babette (I have knit crocheted 25 of the two-row squares. Want to knit crochet 10 four-row squares.)

I have started a thread on Ravelry about this if you want to join me. This is cross-posted from there.

Josephine

Josie from above
Originally uploaded by Big Sister.

Earlier this summer Jenny knit Molly Ringwald and I got a bad case of sweater envy. On an excursion to Imagiknit, I saw that they had Silky Wool on sale. I bought enough to make Miss Molly, swatched it, discussed it with Jenny, then suddenly without warning I saw Alison's Josephine and all my attention turned in another direction.

I had 5 skeins of Artfibers Chai burning a hole in my stash for over two years. This poor lot of grey-green-blue silk had several intended lives. I had purchased it to make some version of Jane Ellison's Butterfly (although I now can't imagine that I would have had nearly enough, as I have about 5 grams left). Eventually it was going to become Annie Modesitt's Corset Tank Top. I swatched for both of these projects and the Chai just never spoke to the pattern. This time, this time it was yarn + pattern love at first swatch.

Specs
Pattern: Josephine by Deborah Newton, Interweave Knits Summer 2007
Yarn: Artfibers Chai, 5 skeins
Needles: US 4s
Modifications: Many

• Most notably the type of yarn. Instead of a smooth cotton, I used a slubby silk.
• I made more decreases in order to get the top closer to my bust size. I reduced 4 stitches on row one of each repeat for repeats 2-4. I also decreased as written and did a few more decreases on the last few rounds.
• I am knit it in the round
• My row gauge was tighter than the pattern so I needed to add some short rows to the sleeves to make them long enough to qualify as sleeves.
  
• I reduced the bust to have negative ease to account for silk eventually stretching. For the same reason I also shorted the armholes.                                            

I am happier than I look in that photo. I love this top!

WIP vs. UFO: Action vs. form

Jenny and I have been thinking about UFOs a lot lately, we even took a little poll over at Stash and Burn a few weeks back. One of the things that I thought was interesting is the differing ideas about what was a UFO vs. WIP. I think ultimately, this is knitter's choice. In my case, WIPs are the items I have worked on in the last few weeks. UFOs, on the other hand, have not been picked up in at least a month although most of them haven't been touched in much longer than that. So given that philosophy my list looks like this:

 

WIPs
Beach top in Araucania Patagonia
Carolyns

UFOs (in order of likelihood of finishing)
Dad's Cardigan
Random Stripe Vest
Orangina
Remake of Simply Marilyn
Hippy Crunchy
Armwarmers

Frogged
Dulaan sweater (wasn't working out, back to stash)
Cleo (irreparable, being sewn into bath mitts)

July Sweater

July Sweater
Originally uploaded by Big Sister.

A co-worker of mine, who was incredibly helpful to me last semester, is having a baby girl in July. I like this co-worker, and like I said, she really helped me out, but she is one of those people who says her daughter will never wear pink. She wants neutral for her baby. For these purposes that was fine because I have quite a bit of Pakucho, which only comes in neutral, but come on, people, pink is not the devil. It is OK for girls to wear pink from time to time because face it, for the most part, at some point, they will demand it. You can try to keep them away from the Disney Princesses, but somehow it seeps it. Maybe the best course of action is to act non-chalant around pink and when the time comes girls won't go too wild with the pink.

The specs
Pattern: Elizabeth Zimmerman's February Sweater from the Knitter's Almanac
Yarn: Pakucho Organic Cotton, Chocolate, 3+ skeins
Needles: Addi 6

As soon as these starting popping up everywhere, I knew I would have to make one. Because it is EZ, there are a lot of knitter's choice options here. I love that about EZ and I wouldn't want it any other way. However, it does mean a little more work for the knitter, in this case, me. Because she wrote in a very conversational way, it is very easy to miss things in the instructions like "switch to pattern." I was at nearly 4 inches of garter  stitch (which did seem odd, but I was going with it) before I caught that little gem, so there was a bit of ripping back after having ripped back twice previously (forgot to increase, forgot a button hole). But once I got past the frogging, it was smooth sailing.

I made two small modifications, one intentional and the other not so much. The first was to knit the sleeves in the round, that I meant to do. The other was to reduce the number of buttonholes. I misread (surprise!) the instructions and made the first two buttonholes too close together, so instead of ripping back for that I decided to have four close together buttonholes, as opposed to an astronomical number of close together buttons. Speaking of buttons, I got these at Imagiknit after considering several green buttons. The red just popped.

The Pakucho worked very nicely for this sweater. The yarn has a nice crispness that highlights the stitch pattern. I washed it cold and got a little shrinking, but not much. I had foolishly thought I could knit this with two skeins (~178 yards), so thankfully Jenny convinced me to use the color I had three skeins of. Even then I had to go back and frog some swatches and pieces from the Corset Pullover that I hadn't used. I would say having three hundred yards of your chosen yarn on hand is a good idea.

It's an adorable sweater that is easy and quick to knit. I would definitely knit it again!

Carolyn, the modified

carosleeve
Originally uploaded by Big Sister.

When the Spring Knitty came out I instantly fell in love with Carolyn. I even had the yarn in my stash to knit it! Like I always do, I started to modify the pattern in my head. I could knit it in one piece. I could change the stitch count for the right amount of ease. I could knit it on the machine! And so I did, but that story and version is not ready for publication. And it is not for me. It is not for me because I became completely obsessed with making Carolyn in dark brown and light celadon for me. I went to my LYS, gift certificate in hand and found nothing. So I paid a little visit to Elann and got some Peruvian Highland Wool to make one for myself. Finally, yesterday, after borrowing Jenny's machine for about six weeks I finally cast on and knit a sleeve. I could have a new sweater by next week!

UFO update

Jenny threw down the gauntlet on the podcast (coming on Tuesday!) for knitters to list their UFOs, which prompted me to revisit the list I made last year. Out of the original 21 I have finished 12, ripped two, and only added one. This brings my total to eight! Wow! What a difference from that stifling number.

Tops/Sweaters
Grace (Started 5/04; finished 9/04/06)
Corset Pullover (Started 5/06; finished 11/06)
Sunrise Circle Jacket (Started 4/06; finished 4/07)
Cleo (6/03)
Orangina (5/05)
Tsuki sweater (Started 7/05; ripped 9/20/06)
BPT (Spring 06) This sweater has been relegated to the frog pile. The yarn is now destined to become Wicked.
Dad's Cardigan (Started 1/07)

Baby items
IK Baby Kimono (Started 6/04; finished 9/06/06)
Sibling offspring knitted gift (Started 7/06; finished 9/29/06)
Dulaan sweater (5/06)

Accessories
Basketweave scarf (Started 9/05; finished 01/29/07)
Kitty hat (Started 12/04; finished 10/07/06)
Sophie bag (Started 5/04; finished 10/10/06)

Socks
Armsocks (10/03)
Jaywalkers (4/06; finished 11/06)
Hippy Crunchy socks (8/06)

Machine projects
Random stripe vest (8/06)
Random stripe blanket (8/06; done 2/28/07)
Somewhat ribby cardi (8/06) This is now another sweater that is more or less finished

Adaptations
Cardiganize Noro Prep (I have been meaning to do this for at least a year) (Done 9/07)
Adapt Simply Marilyn to cardigan (Inspired by a cardi I saw in the September Lucky magazine)

I am not counting the February EZ Sweater because it has never been abandoned (right? that only seems fair).

Gentlemen's Fancy Sock

Gentlemen's Fancy Sock, full & partial
Originally uploaded by Big Sister.

I finished these a long time ago, possibly in March. These were John's Love Day present.

The Specs
Pattern: Adapted from Nancy Bush's adaptation. Instead of the crazy number of stitches in the pattern, I cast on 60.
Yarn: Mountain Colors Barefoot in Brick, one skein
Size: Fits men's feet size 10.5

I loved making these socks. It is a great pattern with enough interest to make them handsome, but easy enough to work in most situations (TV watching, bus commuting, conversation having). As usual the second sock went much faster than the first (what's up with that?). The yarn is a dream--subtle color variations and that gorgeous sheen that comes with mohair.

Just because, here's a close-up that I like:



Jenny and I were talking about knitting encouragement the other day and I realized I rarely if ever publish WIP photos anymore. So in effort to keep my knitting mojo working I am going to start publishing more in progress photos. I think it will help me better see my own progress and allow me to share the process. To that end, I present the current state of the EZ February Sweater I am knitting for a co-worker's in utero daughter in Pakucho:



This is about a week's worth of progress. I had to frog the yoke back three (or was it four times?). I love EZ, but have a difficult time with her patterns since they are written so conversationally that it is easy to miss something like "change to pattern." Oops. I'm on track now so hopefully a few more bus rides and I will be done.

12: Sunrise Circle

Mom in her Sunrise Circle
Originally uploaded by Big Sister.

I started Sunrise Circle last year over my spring break. Rather quickly I had the first sleeve/front done, then I put it aside. A few months later I picked up and started the second sleeve/front. I finished fairly quickly. Then sometime in the late fall I started working on the back. That piece was also done with some speed. Then holiday knitting cropped up and Sunrise Circle was set aside yet again.

When Jackie finished her SRC, I was again inspired and started seaming. I vowed in January to spend 15 minutes a day seaming so that I would be finished in no time. Alas, that promise did not keep. I finished sewing down the last hem over my spring break this year, the day before mom showed up to help me with a household project (more on that another time).

Even though this sweater took 12 months for me to finish, please do not construe that to mean that I did not enjoy knitting it. It was a rather exciting knit. The construction is genius--you knit the sleeve to the raglan and then make carefully placed increases and decreases to create the raglan AND the front. The only reason I might say that this is a difficult pattern is because you have to read each pattern line once you get to the raglan/front section and you have to do a lot of counting. Despite the time I took with it, when I worked on it everything went pretty quickly.

The specs
Pattern: Sunrise Circle (pdf), Kate Gilbert an IK extra Spring 06
Yarn: Peace Fleece, Shaba Green, 5 skeins and maybe a smidge more
Gauge: As usual my gauge was off from the called for 18.5 st/28 rows over 4". I think the stitch gauge was on, but the row gauge was off--26 rows over 4".
Needles: Addi, US 6s

Modifications: Normally, the problem in row gauge would be easy to adjust for, however for this pattern row gauge determined the width of the fronts. To adjust I used the numbers for the 41" up until I finished the raglan and then switched to the directions for the 37." This resulted in a sweater that met directly in the middle instead of overlapping, which I think looked really cute. Also, I didn't add a closure, but mom said that she had some ideas using a silk flower and creating a pin closure.

I loved this pattern and am really thinking about making one for myself. I might even use Peace Fleece again. I have some in Moldova Burgundy, but I am pining over some Zarya Fog or Kamchatka Seamoss. For now, it's back to the stash.

Knitted Uterus in the NY Times

Actress Jackie Hoffman knit a uterus and it was in the NYT this week. Unfortunately, credit was not given where credit was due. Certainly, Ms. Hoffman used MK Carroll's Womb pattern from Knitty.

Tulips

Tulip detail
Originally uploaded by Big Sister.

Voila! Last weekend, I finished the first of my recently stated knitting goals: Tulips. I have made significant progress on the second item on my list, I have done some on the third item, and nothing has been done with number four. Aah, but this is about the good news!

Specs
Pattern: Tulips by Kat Coyle from the Fall 2006 Knitscene
Yarn: K1C2 Angora Soft (45 Nylon/40 viscose/15 angora), ~7 balls
Size: Small
Modifications: The primary modification to this sweater is that I machine knit the fronts and back of this sweater. I even tried to machine knit the sleeves up to the point where the lace started. I attempted to pick up the stitches, put them on the machine and knit the sleeve onto the work. That was not meant to be, so I frogged back and knit the sleeves by hand.

The other modification was that I did not trim the cardigan opening with icord. Instead I picked up stitches and knit a garter stitch border. Ultimately, I think this worked better with the sweater since the sleeves and bottom were already in garter.

I wore this to work today and received many lovely compliments. I like it, however I am at a loss for what to wear with it except for white. Any ideas about what goes with haloed mossy green?

The yarn turned out to be a winner in the end, but working with it was a little challenging. First of all a few of the balls were so ridden with knots that I would have to frog every couple of rows to get rid of some errant ends. It was also dry and smelled vaguely of cardboard. However, once I overcame the knots and then washed the sweater the fabric turned out beautifullly.