WIP Wednesday: Worsted Weight Hats on Big Needles are So Gratifying

Hi all,

Insert that part where I apologise for falling off the blogosphere for a while. I just needed to get through August. I now have a sudden explosion of free time (which is AMAZING), so the only trick to posting more now will be actually remembering to do it (not as easy as it seems).

Quick update...I finished the Daenerys shawl I had been working on and I've worn it a few times and everyone LOVES it (I'm knitting one for a friend, so you'll get to see the progress on that one coming up starting next week). I also spent the Olympics dyeing some cashmere in one of my favourite new colourways and then designing my first ever actual design project (minus intarsia hats) to go with it. I'm trying to figure out how to chart the pattern now and hopefully it will get published soon. I have no idea how to go about finding test knitters, so it might go up untested, which I don't want to do, but I don't exactly have connections who want to test knit a thing. Jonas would do it, but it's a bit above his level (it's not hard, but he's never done cables before). It's fingerless mitts inspired by my new favourite fandom (The Raven Cycle). Let me know if you think you might want to test knit for me!

I also dyed some yarn for Kaity of the Knerd Girl Knits podcast so she could design some colourwork mittens. I'll be sure to share any updates on that with you here as well.

Finally, if you want to win a skein of my yarn (the new colourway I mentioned above!) or you just want a 10% discount to my shop, visit my good friend Mrs. Shoo at the Cultivate and Create podcast, listen to her episodes (you can just listen to the most recent one if you want, but I recommend a back listen. There are only 20 episodes and they all tend to be about 15-30 minutes, so it's manageable), and enter the contest she's got going on.

Okay.... quick general updates out of the way, let's talk WIP.

Random number generator landed on some Gale Woods Farm Finn Wool (worsted weight, spun from sheep raised at Gale Woods Farm right here in Minnesota) in a sort of natural tan colour with a grey undertone. It's a lovely, sheepy, rustic yarn, so I wanted to knit something lovely and rustic and classic, but also warm. I only had 232 yds (212 metres), so it wasn't going to be a big something. At first I thought cowl, but I ended up finding a lovely cabled hat pattern instead.

It actually took me longer to swatch for the hat than it did to actually knit the hat, I think. I just couldn't get the gauge right (it still isn't) and also make a fabric I liked. The pattern is a 38 or 42 stitch repeat, so it wasn't like I could fudge the stitch count overmuch. Thankfully, I ended up in a situation where I had the right gauge so I could only do 2 pattern repeats instead of 3 (it probably won't look balanced when it's on, but I guess I'll deal with that when I get there). I also knew it was going to take a weird amount of my yarn. Sure enough, I knit most of it (putting in extra ribbing so I could fold it over and still make the hat long enough while being able to start the decreases in the place called for by the pattern) and then ended up switching to the second ball just before the crown decreases, which would have left me with an awkward amount of yarn (which I hate). It only took me about 2 days of knitting to finish the hat, but the decreases aren't charted, so you're sort of left on your own to figure out how to maintain the cable pattern while decreasing, and I definitely did it wrong. That, combined with not wanting an awkward amount of yarn left, made me rip it back. I also dropped down a needle size since (as usual) the hat was too long for my tiny head. 

So I've basically already knit this once, but I'm reknitting it with smaller needles and I've not added any lengthening to the ribbing. Hopefully the crown decreases will go better this time and the hat will fit right. It's still a fun, quick knit; the cable pattern is really intuitive; and the yarn is lovely and rustic and has a delightful hand to it. I can't wait to wear it once winter starts, since I think it will be fantastically warm.

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 Pattern: Irish Moss Toque by Alexandra Charlotte Defoe

Yarn: Gale Woods Farm 100% Finn Wool

WIP Wednesday: Losing at Yarn Chicken

Had all gone well, tonight's post wouldn't be about WIPs because I would have a finished object by now. But...

The Daenerys shawl is still on the needles (and looks like it will be for a little while longer). I followed the suggested number of pattern repeats, trying to judge how much I needed for the end, and I guessed incorrectly so now I'm in what feels like a seemingly endless cycle of tinking back about 32 super long rows of lace knitting. I hear you all telling me to just put in a lifeline and rip it back, and I will answer your cries with a resounding I attempted to do this, but I'm not good enough at reading lace knitting so I can't figure out exactly which stitches/row to get the lifeline worked in. So. Instead of risking dropping stitches or putting the lifeline in crooked, I have resigned myself to a lifetime of tinking back.

Here is the shawl at the point I realised I was going to run out of yarn.

​​SMXL

 

Because the edging requires you to be at the end of a pattern repeat, I actually have to rip out the 12 rows of edging and then the 21 rows of my final pattern repeat, which means in this photo I have to essentially rip back to just before I start the dark purple stripe on this Kauni. It's a lot of rows (and stitches), but hopefully it will go quickly and knitting the edging won't take too long. I remain optimistic that you all at least won't see it in the WIPs post next Wednesday.

In an added bonus, I STILL love this colourway. This shawl is going to make me really happy when it's done, so all the tinking is TOTALLY worth it!

Pattern: Daenerys by Valerie Johnson

Yarn: Kauni wool 8/2 Effektgarn in the colourway EI

WIP Wednesday: Miraculous Sweater Recovery

Lots of progress made on my Ada sweater this week, although there should have been even more progress than I managed since I ended up having to rip back about 9" of knitting on the back for seemingly inexplicable reasons. 

Before I started knitting, I faithfully knitted a gauge swatch like the learned knitter that I've become. And I'm not talking about a 1"x1" like some people do or even your standard 4"x4" swatch. No, I cast on enough gauge stitches that the swatch should have been 8"x8". And it was, at least in terms of row gauge. In terms of stitch gauge, instead of 5.5 stitches/inch I got 3.75 stitches/inch. My row gauge, however, was spot on, so instead of dropping down needle sizes (which would have meant I had to use a smaller needle on the seed stitch edging than my kit actually has,  I just decided to recalculate the stitch gauge. Now, this is probably where you're thinking, of course it went wrong, but let me defend myself and say that as far as I can tell, nothing is wrong with the width of the sweater pieces!!!! However, a brief tangent for a small complaint.

I really dislike it when designers have you calculate the gauge in pattern. I understand that this makes it easier on the designer, but sometimes it's really hard to accurately measure your gauge when you have to count k2tog/ssk and yarnovers. I've never written a pattern myself, but it seems to me like you could just figure out your gauge in pattern and then knit a stockinette section onto the end of your pattern gauge swatch, figure out the difference, and report the gauge in stockinette. A LOT of people who publish patterns give stockinette gauge for patterned pieces, so it can't be impossible. This was a book put out by an actual yarn company to showcase this particular yarn and this is THE SECOND SWEATER I've knit from the book where my row gauge was spot on and my stitch gauge was more than a little bit off. The first sweater only sort of fits correctly because of this, and I really hope I don't end up having the same problem with this one. They are also both from the same designer, so I don't know if it's an issue with the pattern company or an issue with the designer, but either way I don't like it and I think they could do better. Tangent over. 

Back to the story. Remember that I said my row gauge was spot on. Also note that I am an almost scarily consistent knitter when it comes to my gauge. So. I followed the instructions and (using my 30 rows/4" gauge AND marking every 30th row so I could be sure to keep track), I knit until the piece measured 17" from cast on edge (128 rows). Now, this is where it becomes my fault for not measuring, but like I said, I knit a really big swatch, my gauge was consistent, and I knew my blocked gauge and my unblocked gauge were very different. So. From there I cast off the (recalculated) number of stitches for the sleeves and then proceeded to knit the 8" from the start of the armhole. Then I held up the sweater and thought "this looks really long". So I measured and it was 2" too long (without being blocked, where it would get even longer). This problem was not with the part above the armhole cast off. It was somehow the part below. I measured my gauge at 4 different points and got the correct gauge on all of them. But it was 2" too long. I still have no idea how or why, but on Monday morning before work I took the back of my sweater from this:
 

​SML

 back to about 2 repeats before where you see the arm decreases (I thought I had a photo of this, but apparently I don't). Which is this much yarn:

​​SML

This brings us to today. Where I have somehow managed to make a miraculous recovery in just two days. Now, granted, I'm watching a not insignificant amount of football, but whenever I watch Copa America I knit on my Bomb Pop socks, so I'm not working on the sweater then. And when I have the matches on during the day I am just listening to them while I work. And by the time we're wrapped up with dinner it's 6:30 ish and I've been doing some other crafting so I haven't knit for more than 2 -3 hours a night (which is more than when I was in school, but not really that much overall). So apparently once you get going on this thing, even though it's beginning to feel like a bit of a slog, as all lace/cable patterns seem to for me, it's basically flying off the needles.

Here it is as of now:

​​SML

That's right. I've finished the back and gotten 4" into the front. IDK. It's one of those knitting time warp, timey-wimey situations, I think.

Reminders:

Pattern is Ada by Amy Christoffers from the Berocco Fiora Pattern Book

Yarn is Berocco Fiora in the Augusta colourway

I highly doubt that you'll be seeing this on Friday (though I will be taking a 4.5 hour car trip, so I guess anything's possible since this is a wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey sort of sweater) although (if I remember to take photos) you will hopefully see my"done" (more later) Big Damn Heroes shawl. It's been done for a while, I just haven't taken pictures because it has an issue that I think needs fixing and I was holding out for better blocking. But it's certainly done enough that I can make myself take a photo and talk about it. I'll be out of town on Friday, though, so if I don't remember to take the photos before I leave, that post will be delayed yet again (and I might as well just wait until I fix the issue with the shawl at that point).

Hopefully more later!