And the Winner Is...

...little rolled collar! Wait. That's a cowl. Well, yeah. See, even though the vote was clearly on the side of the little rolled hem, I decided, I'm the knitter, I'm the wearer, so I'm going to make what I want!


And I love it. :)


Not that it wouldn't have looked great with the little rolled collar--it would have been adorable. But I planned it as a cowl and I really wanted a cowl, so...


Right now it is blocking on Bertha (my typical blocking method, because it gives the fabric a realistic stretch). It seems to have grown about 3 inches in length, which is what I had planned, so it should fit perfectly, but I'll have to wait until it is dry to be sure. (That's why there are still yarn ends hanging loose. Experience has taught me it is much easier to pick out the bind off if you haven't already woven in the ends prior to blocking. Once I'm sure the length is right, I'll weave in the ends.)

Modeled shots to follow.

Escape From Sleeve Island

In all the years I've been knitting sweaters--and I've knitted a lot of sweaters--I've only found one way off Sleeve Island, and that's full speed ahead.

The first sleeve of Francis Again took me three weeks to finish. Now, I'll admit I was distracted by other things, like Mosaic Madness, but still, three weeks is an unreasonable length of time for a single sleeve. So yesterday, when I finally bound off the first sleeve, I immediately cast on the second and decided to knit until it was done.

As you can see, it's done! (I know the sleeves look really short--it's deliberate. This yarn is going to grow like a teenager in the summertime when it hits water, so I knitted everything short in anticipation of wet blocking.)

I've been looking forward to casting on the lovely, large cowl neck, but when I tried this on, my husband took one look and insisted I not put on a collar at all, or if I had to have one, just a minimal little rolling edge collar. Now, I really want the cowl, but he made me agree to ask the blog for its opinion first.

So what say you, Blog?

Large, floppy cowl?

Or little, rolled edge?

We await your decision.

Proof of Knitting

I told you I had indeed been knitting, and here is the proof:

This is my latest version of Francis Revisited. It's a simple, top down, raglan, cowl neck. Mine does not actually follow the pattern; just the idea. My Flame D'Amore was also based on this pattern, and it's one of my favorite and most-worn sweaters.

I've had this great Cascade Eco Alpaca Duo in my stash for quite a while. I got it in a Rav destash for a great price and I've been wanting to use it for a long time. It's 100% alpaca and extremely soft and warm--probably the softest yarn I've ever felt. Since alpaca stretches and drapes like crazy, and since I knew this yarn would likely stripe, I wanted a very simple pattern in plain stockinette that would look good even if it stretched out. Francis seemed to fit the bill.

This version is truer to the original than my first, including the moss stitch hem. It's a bit floppy, but I suspect it will be fine after washing, when the rest of the sweater grows to match.

And I'm going to give this one a larger cowl than my first as well, since I've found my favorite sweaters these days have cowl necks. I have always avoided them, because my mother hates them, but I bought a few last year to wear with suits and quickly realized they suit my lanky shape really well.

This sweater has progressed rather slowly, as I've been distracted by other things, including Mosaic Madness:

As you can see, I'm up to 12 of 20 octagons. I have yet to start the connecting squares, both because they look boring and because I don't understand the pattern for them. How is it possible not to understand the directions for a four-inch square? I don't know, either, but I still don't understand them.

Well, that was fun...

I don't know whether those of you outside of southern California heard, but we had a huge power outage here yesterday--pretty much all of southern California, western Arizona, and northern Mexico abruptly went dark yesterday afternoon. Nothing like a complete loss of power to make you realize how dependent you are on electricity. No internet, no tv, no radio, no phone. No gas, either, since the pumps rely on electricity. No air conditioning, no refrigerator, no microwave...I could go on all day. The traffic signals all went out--right before rush hour--which was a nightmare. And my washer and dryer stopped mid-cycle. I suppose it would be paranoid of me to think the whole thing was just a cosmic smackdown directed at me because I was gloating about getting my dryer fixed an hour earlier and was celebrating by doing laundry.

Wouldn't it?

Mosaic Update

I'm having trouble getting the colors to come out right, but you get the idea. Nothing like some bulky crochet for instant gratification!

Multiplying Mosaics

So. Much. Fun!

I love watching the different patterns emerge. I'm mostly following the pattern, except when I don't feel like it. As you can see, I'm up to six octagons. I think I've almost figured out how to do them now. Crochet is not really my forte, so some of these are a little...off. I'm sure it won't matter once they're all sewn together--or at least, that's my theory. If prior experience is any indicator, I won't have long to worry about it until it is confiscated by one of my family members and spirited away.

I am knitting, too. I have the body and most of one sleeve done on my current top-down raglan. But since it is plain stockinette, and beige to boot, it's not all that exciting to look at. And since it's heavy alpaca, I'm not willing to risk heat stroke to model an in-progress shot for you. I shouldn't complain; while the rest of the country has been melting all summer, it's been mid-70s and perfect here all season. This is only day 2 of our heat wave, and it's supposed to taper off later today. What can I say? I'm a weather wimp. I am counting on the heat to dry my laundry, though, since the dryer is still dead and the repair guy isn't coming until tomorrow. I'm hoping he can fix it on the spot. Send good appliance juju!

Murphy's Law?

I don't think law school covered the particular section of Murphy's Law that reads: "If you put all the sofa slipcovers in the wash, and it's pouring ass down rain outside, the dryer will die."

FYI.