FO: Autumn Leaves

This is one I've blogged about ad nauseum. It is a long, sad story of love gone wrong. Way back in November, I started this with great enthusiasm for both yarn and pattern. Alas, before I was even done with the knitting, I began to suspect that the yarn was not a good match for the pattern. Once again, I was seduced by a variegated yarn that was beautiful in the skein, but knitted up was...not.

I finished it anyway, was dismayed at its ugliness, and buried it in the closet. A few months later, I decided to give it another shot by overdyeing it. This worked pretty well, toning down the more acidic tones and blending the colors together without completely obscuring them. But I still didn't much care for the shape. A few weeks later, I finally got around to buying some buttons for it, and sewed them on. And you know...I sort of like it!

The Details:

Pattern: Turpan Cardigan by Deborah Newton

Size: Smallest, and modified to fit more closely.

Yarn: Handpaintedyarn.com bulky merino in the Noviembre colorway. About 7 skeins?

Needles: Knit Picks Options circs in size 9

Mods: Quite a few. Longer, narrower, different stitch pattern for the body and sleeves (that Trinity stitch is a b*tch and sucks up yarn).

I still don't know whether this is cute or looks like a dumpy housecoat, but I've worn it once and got two compliments (from people who didn't have to), so I think it's probably okay. What do you think?

FO: Amanda

You know you've fallen down on the blogging when you can't remember when you finished the FO you're trying to blog about. Fortunately, I have this one in my projects on Ravelry. It turns out I finished back around Christmas time. This is Amanda (Rav link):

The Details:

Pattern: Amanda by Lisa Lloyd, from A Fine Fleece. I love, love, love this pattern! I modified it by making it longer (of course) and by adding waist shaping.

Size: small (which isn't--the designs in this book are huge!)

Yarn: Sigh. Andean Alpaca Regal in Mallard Heather, 10 skeins. I love this yarn. Soft, gorgeous, drapey--and grows like a teenage boy. This sweater is at least three inches longer in the body than it started and the sleeves are even too long for me. It's really warm and cozy, but the pattern would definitely benefit from a springier yarn with more body. Entirely my fault; I may eventually make another of these in a stickier wool. For now, I wear this as a short robe.

Needles: Knit Picks Options circs, size 8.

I blogged about this here, here, and here, if you want more details.

Sophie seems to like alpaca.

FO: Wisteria

Next up in the FO Parade is Wisteria:

The Details:

Pattern: Wisteria by Kate Gilbert from The Twist Collective. I love this pattern. I had a few problems with it, mostly from misreading the pattern (which I still hold was not entirely my fault). Mostly, though, I was able to knit from the pattern. I did lengthen the body and sleeves, and used front and back darts instead of side decreases for shaping. I also did an extra repeat of the collar pattern to make a higher collar--mine's more of a mock turtleneck than a high crewneck.

Size: 37"-ish

Yarn: My handspun, from Ashland Bay roving, 70/30 merino/tussah silk in the Autumn colorway.

Needles: Knit Picks Options circs (natch!), size 6

Thoughts: This project holds a special place in my heart. It's not the best sweater I've ever made, and it's not my first handspun sweater, but it is the first sweater for which I have attempted to deliberately spin yarn. I've blogged about this process several times, although I realize I barely mentioned the knitting part at all. (That's because I knitted this sweater during our Tahoe vacation, and I couldn't blog.) The yarn turned out maybe just a bit heavier than it should have been, but I was able to get gauge by knitting just a little tighter than I would have liked. This worked in my favor, actually, since the yarn grew more on blocking than I anticipated, and would certainly have grown more had I not knitted it rather firmly.

I haven't actually worn this yet; the weather hasn't been cool enough for such a warm, heavy pullover. But I am looking forward to finally putting it to use...next winter.

FO: Aran Cardigan

I've owed this one its own post for a while now. I just haven't been able to get decent pictures. Which is odd, considering I've barely taken it off for a week. But here it is now, The Aran Cardigan!

Although I still want to put on-seam pockets in this one, I've bowed to the reality of my own lack of motivation and accepted that I need an interim solution if I want to wear this any time in the near future. So I crocheted the pocket openings closed from the inside for the time being. The seam is virtually invisible from the outside, and if I ever become sufficiently motivated to work out the zippered pockets, it's just one quick tug to reopen the seam.

The Details:

Pattern: #20 Cable/Rib Cardigan (Rav link) by Gayle Bunn (mostly) from the Holiday 2004 Vogue Knitting. Mine is several inches longer in body and sleeves and has a zipper instead of toggles. I also redesigned the sleeves to pick up and knit in the round with a short row shoulder, and made mine a bit narrower. I omitted the four pockets on the front and will probably eventually add on-seam zippered pockets instead.

Size: I followed the directions for the 38", but ended up with more of a 34-36".

Yarn: Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool in Natural Brown. 2.75 (huge) skeins.

Needles: Knit Picks Options circs, sizes 5 and 6.

Thoughts: This was one of the most labor-intensive sweaters I've ever done. And I love the results. This is the sort of sweater you wear daily for years and years. The wool is a bit scratchy and very sturdy, and although the pictures would have you believe it is grey, it is actually a warm, dark brown. The 3x3 ribbing did get tedious, especially on the endless sleeves, which, ironically, turned out to be two inches too long after blocking, and I had to pick out the bind off rows and shorten them. They're still long, but in a good way.

FO: Mossy

I love to knit. Obviously. I love to blog. Equally obvious, I'm sure. I don't love to model my finished knits. Periodically, I discover that I have an unreasonable number of finished-but-unblogged knits just waiting their chance to be noticed. So this week I am celebrating my recent projects with an FO Parade.

First up is Mossy:

This was a very quick knit; so quick, in fact, that it was done almost before I got to blog about it. The design is my own, but that gorgeous cable is Norah Gaughan's, from Cire Perdue.

The details:

Pattern: My own. Top-down turtleneck raglan with front and back darts for shaping. 2x2 ribbing for collar, cuffs, and bottom.

Size: 36"

Yarn: Debbie Bliss Luxury Donegal Tweed (85% wool, 15% angora). 8.5 balls! (I ordered 12.)

Needles: Size 6 and 7 Knit Picks Options circs.

Thoughts: I love this one! The yarn is wonderful, both soft and tweedy, and the color is a rich yellow-green (deeper than the pictures show). After washing, it became much drapier and grew just enough to fit the way I was hoping it would. My only regret is that it is so late in the season, I probably won't have a chance to wear this before next winter.

One Big Ball 'O Yarn

So I swatched all those yarns I showed you in the last post, hoping to come to a decision about Surface. And I wasn't really happy with any of them. On good advice from many of you, I nixed the variegated right off. The Roma, although it claims to be a dk weight, is really a worsted weight and knits up best around 19 stitches to 4 inches, instead of the 23 stitches to 4 inches called for by Surface. The Cashsoft is a lovely yarn with a beautiful sheen, and is the most likely candidate of the three, but I'm still hesitant about that silvery grey. While I was dithering, I dove back into the stash and found this:

This is one big hank o' yarn. I got this through a Rav destash a few months back for maybe $20. It's a pound of merino/bamboo. The only label is a scrap of paper reading: "Untitled. 60% merino/40% bamboo. 3 ply 1240 yds/lb." There is no yarn weight given, but judging from the yardage per pound and the appearance of the yarn itself, it's around a dk weight. At least it seemed worth swatching.

I learned my lesson about trying to swatch directly from the hank a long time ago. (Ask me about that huge hank of silk incident sometime.) I've heard (from as legitimate a source as the Harlot Herself) that some people do knit directly from the hank. I am not one of them.

So the first order of business was to turn this big hank o' yarn into a big ball 'o yarn. Now, you all know I love my ball winder and swift. But there's no way my ball winder can handle a pound of yarn, and I didn't want to cut this up into smaller balls that I would have to splice together later. I'm guessing the bamboo will make spit splicing difficult and who wants more ends to weave in? No, I decided, this yarn needed hand winding.

But not by me. I don't like hand winding. Fortunately, I have an in-house master winder who graciously accepted the challenge of hand winding this massive hank of yarn. I have no pictures of the procedure, because the master winder threatened to do nasty things with my camera if I took any. He evidently prefers to keep his secret identity just that. Suffice it to say, it was a big job. He wound steadily for an hour and a half. (He also made me rub his shoulders this morning because they had cramped up so much from the experience that they woke him up in the middle of the night.)

And this is the result:

That is one big ball 'o yarn. (Yes, that is the Aran Cardigan I'm wearing. I got tired of waiting for making pockets to sound exciting and crocheted the pocket openings shut so that I could wear it now and still go back later and insert pockets. It worked beautifully, but that's another post.)

Surface-ing

Mossy is done and blocking after a nice bath. Perhaps I will even get around to taking some FOtos and showing it to you. But first things first. I need a new project. Being a mostly monogamous knitter has its pluses and minuses. On the plus side, lots of FOs. On the minus side, when you really, really want to start something new, all you can do is knit faster to finish the project you're working on.

Norah Gaughan's Surface from the Winter 2008 Knitty has been hovering near the top of my queue for a while. Somewhere around the middle of the second sleeve of Mossy, that "must knit!" switch tripped over in my brain, and I zipped through the last bit of sleeve and tossed Mossy in the washtub on my way up to raid the stash closet for candidates for Surface.

I don't have a whole lot of dk weight yarn, because--let's just be honest--I'm not that patient. I'm a big fan of aran weight--maybe worsted, in a pinch. When I work with dk weight, I am usually struck with the same thought I used to have in the middle of the first night on any childhood camping trip: Why am I doing this, again?

Still, I do really like Surface, and it's only got 3/4 sleeves. If you ignore the fact that half of it involves working "purl four together" way, way too often, it's a quick knit, right?

Maybe we should just move on to the yarn choices. Here's what I've got it down to:

These colors are pretty true to life, despite (because of?) my taking them after the sun went down and in the last of the daylight. That variegated green on the top is merino from handpaintedyarn.com (source of Malabrigo). It's a plied yarn, and very soft. The colors are pretty much what you see: mostly greens, with a little grey and goldish. Pretty muted. Moving clockwise, the silvery-grey yarn is Rowan Cashsoft, a merino/microfiber/maybe cashmere blend, which I've never used before. (I actually ordered it by accident, thinking is was Cashcotton.) And in the front, that greyish-green (it's a little more green in person) yarn is Jaeger Roma, which is the same yarn I used for my Gathered Pullover, though not the same color.

I really like all of these yarns, and I think any of them would be a good choice for Surface. This will be my first Spring sweater of the year, hence all the light colors. But I'm having trouble picking one for this sweater. I originally planned to use the handpainted yarn, but I've been burned so many times by variegated yarns that I'm hesitant to try it, especially since I do love this pattern worked in solid colors. The Cashsoft is a nice yarn, but I've never worn light grey and don't know whether it will suit me. The Roma is a great yarn and a decent enough color; I just wonder if it's a little drab.

So there you have it. Any ideas?