Stripes! is now available!

Thanks to the fantastic efforts of my test-knitters and the friends who helped me edit the pattern, Stripes! is finally available as a Ravelry download. You can also visit its Pattern Page here on this blog.

I am so excited to be able to offer this pattern/tutorial! I decided not to make it free, which was something I agonized over a bit. But in the end, if I believe that creative people deserve to be compensated fairly for their work (which I do), then it makes no sense for me to not accept compensation myself. To alleviate my discomfort with charging for the pattern, I have decided to donate 20% of the proceeds to Heifer International to help support their efforts towards sustainability and the alleviation of hunger and poverty around the world. Heifer International is one of my very favorite charitable organizations, and I’m happy to use pattern sales to increase my charitable donation budget.

I hope those of you who have been eagerly awaiting this pattern will be delighted with the final result!

 

le Tour de Gansey, part trois: Stages 1-3

My apologies for the delay in coverage of le Tour de Gansey, part trois! Thanks to my disorganization, coverage of the early stages is going to be quite limited, but I’ll try to keep things on track from here on out. Today, by the way, was the first day that I could knit while watching the Tour de France; I’ve been away on vacation, and then busy with meetings and errands from the time I got home, so it was quite nice to be able to relax for a little while, letting Phil and Paul (and Bob and Craig, the latter of whom I rather dislike) get me back into the spirit of le Tour!

Stage One: The Cast-On

There are no photos from this stage, because I am a silly person and did not think to take any. However, if you’re curious what the cast-on looks like, you can always see last year’s coverage, since I used the same Channel Island cast-on that I used in last year’s gansey. I just can’t get enough of that sturdy, picot-like edge on a band of garter stitch.

Stage Two: The Welt and Join

Again, no photos. My apologies! Like the previous stage, it was very similar to last year’s Stage Two, the only difference being in the manner in which the welts were overlapped. This year, I’m doing something slightly different with my side stitches, so when I overlapped my welts, I did so in a way that created a tiny 2-stitch cable, which runs up each side of the gansey. You’ll see that in the next stage!

Stage Three: Pattern Motifs and Seam Stitches

Unlike the two previous Tour de Ganseys, this year’s gansey has full-body patterning. As such, the pattern motifs started just after the welts were joined. Our photo-coverage begins with a shot of the “seam stitches”, which in this gansey consist of a baby cable with a purl stitch on either side. This is then surrounded with some chevrons, and a garter divider:

The waist-shaping (coming up in Stage Four!) will be done on the outside of that garter divider, placing the shaping a few inches away from the seam stitches. Waist shaping is not a standard feature on a traditional gansey, but since this gansey is intended to be a more fitted, modernized gansey, you can expect to see a few not-so-traditional touches here and there!

The pattern motifs are ones I specifically designed to evoke aspects of the tour. The central panel is a slightly-altered version of the mountain-peaks motif I designed for last year’s gansey (evoking my beloved mountain stages). It is surrounded by vertical panels of pine-trees (evoking the glorious landscapes they travel though), which are themselves flanked by flags (evoking the finish line), which are flanked by zig-zags (evoking the switchbacks of the mountain stages), which are flanked by the aforementioned chevrons at the waist (evoking tire tracks). It will be easier to see these body motifs as the gansey grows, so expect to see more of them in later stages. For now, here’s a photo in which you can see the central mountain peak motif, surrounded by pine trees:

Next up, Stage Four: Waist Shaping. Stay tuned!

 

back from MN

I am back from Minnesota now, and totally exhausted. We had such a great time up there, hiking and walking around town and just generally relaxing with my parents. (And, in my case, reading lots of papers for my comprehensive exam). I didn’t do a whole lot of knitting on the trip, but the Seraphim shawl is noticeably bigger:

I knit on Seraphim on the plane going to MN, at an outdoor concert while we were there, and on the plane on the way home. That last bit was when I did my “time trial” for the Tour de France knitalong, and counted how many stitches I could knit in an hour. Turns out, when I’m knitting fairly plain stockinette, that number is: 2082 sts/hour. Not bad! It’d be even faster if I were knitting in the round…I’m not a particularly slow purler, but I’m slower doing purl stitches than knit stitches.

Actual coverage of my Tour de Gansey, part trois should start tomorrow, as long as I can find the energy to take some pictures and write up a post or two! Stay tuned!

 

a beautiful evening.

It’s the 4th of July. The first day of the Tour de France. But my gansey yarn and needles are at home, and while I did cheat slightly, and cast on before I left, I didn’t take any pictures of that process. So, coverage of le Tour de Gansey, part trois will have to wait until later, once I’m home. I’ll be sure to catch y’all up, no worries. But for now, I just want to share a photo of the beautiful evening we’re having here in Winona. So that’s that.

 

babyStripes! has begun

I couldn’t resist the pull of corrugated ribbing on tiny needles:

So I cast on for babyStripes! last week. I decided to knit the bottom band flat, and then join to knit the body in the round, which means I’ll be steeking, down the road. The only problem? I don’t have a size 1 16-inch circular needle, and I’m not keen on cramming that many stitches onto my dpns. I was hoping to bring this with me up to Minnesota, which is where I’m headed tomorrow, to visit my parents. But alas, I won’t have time to find a small-circumference circular needle before then. But thankfully, I still have that angora Seraphim shawl on the needles, with no progress having been made on it since our last trip, so that should make the perfect travel knitting.

Speaking of stripey things, there are now two finished Stripes! other than my own out there in the world, thanks to my awesome test knitters. There are a few updates to make to the pattern, based on their feedback, but it won’t be long before I can release the pattern for real!

 

the quilt.

I’ve mentioned here a few times that I was knitting Chawne’s sweater in exchange for a quilt. I figure her gorgeous quilt deserves a little bit of attention here on my blog, now that it’s here.

It came on Friday, and despite temperatures of 88 degrees, I couldn’t resist taking it outside to get some photos. When you get a quilt this awesome, you forget about things like the heat:

(I promise, I am actually wearing shorts in that picture, under the quilt. I just have absurdly long legs to go with my absurdly long arms.) One of the blues in the quilt (there are 15 different shades of blue!) matches my glasses perfectly:

I absolutely adore the quilt, and am so glad that C and I were able to do such a wonderful swap. The quilt is already well-loved by both the human and feline residents of this household:

Stimpy thinks it is his

But I make him share

Thanks so much, C!

 

Garter Whimsy, all finished

C’s sweater has finally dried after its blocking, and has had all of the cat-hairs lovingly picked off it before being wrapped in tissue paper to be put in the mail tomorrow. Despite all that, given the degree to which every surface of our house, our clothing, and even the inside of our car is covered in cat hair, the odds of it arriving to C allergen-free are pretty much zero.

Ravelry Project Page
Pattern: my own, tentatively called “Garter Whimsy”, designed especially for C, in exchange for a quilt.
Yarn: Cascade 220, in "Aporto". 6 skeins. (Maybe a little more? I lost track, but it was definitely less than 7).
Needles: size 8 Denise Circulars and Knitpicks dpns.
Time to knit: May 27 – June 21st

And now, some detail shots:

I will never tire of garter rib

Seamless set-in sleeve

V-neck, in garter rib, picked up from a sl1, p1 edge

I am immensely proud of this sweater, and am so grateful to C for giving me a reason to design it! I do plan to write up a pattern for this design, including a variety of options for cuff and neckline finishes (such as the ones I did in my “Swatch” for this sweater). I don’t know when I’ll actually get around to it, though, given how much I have on my plate right now both knitting-wise and otherwise. Before the end of the year, that much is for sure.

 

it’s (almost) gansey time!

I’ve got another swatch for y’all. This time, for something that is not striped:

What you see there is Schoeller Stahl Morea, a sport-weight yarn, on size 3 needles, which gives me a gauge of 7 sts./inch. This is the yarn I’m planning to use to knit my modernized version of a gansey, with waist-shaping and set-in short sleeves, during this year’s Tour de France. Because what says “French cycling race” better than a traditional British fisherman’s garment? Nothing, that’s what I say! You can see the beginnings of my (not very good) sketching underneath the swatch. I’m still thinking through exactly which designs I want in my gansey, but I’m quite eager to get started. I’ll do my best to hold off until July 4th to actually cast on, but I’m not sure I can manage the wait. I’m looking forward to le Tour de Gansey, part trois!

Speaking of ganseys, thanks to a tip from Sarah, I now have a beautiful colorcard to play with:

It’s from here. They are revitalizing gansey yarns with a whole bunch of gorgeous colors, and I am now seriously tempted to order a cone or two, now that I’ve gotten to see it first-hand. I’m envisioning not just ganseys, but also colorwork yokes (of course!). We’ll just see.

 

an ending and a beginning

I finished C’s sweater earlier today:

I have to admit, it’s a little nervewracking, knitting a sweater for another knitter…I found myself worrying about my finishing skills in a way I never have before. The sweater still needs to be blocked, to relax the stitches a little bit, but other than that, it is finished. I’m a tiny bit nervous about the fit, since C and I are very different sizes, but I am trying to trust in the power of math, which I think C would appreciate, given that she’s a math professor!

It’s always a little bit sad, when I finish a project. I mean, it’s great to finish something, and to have turned hours of knitting into a wearable thing, but there’s this feeling of, “what now?” that creeps in when that project isn’t on the needles anymore. Thankfully, I’m pretty good at filling the hole that one project leaves in my heart…with another project:

So, I swatched for babyStripes!

What you see there was knit on size 1 needles, which gave me the feel I like, at a gauge of 9 sts/in. The corrugated ribbing is even more impossibly charming in micro-size, I think. Since babyStripes! is going to be a cardigan (pullovers + small babies seems like a bad idea to me), now I’m trying to decide between knitting in the round, and steeking, or knitting flat from front edge to front edge. Either way, stitches will be picked up for a corrugated-rib buttonband in the end. There are pluses and minuses to both, but more than anything I am worried about steeking with superwash yarns. What to do, what to do?

 

coming attractions

C’s sweater is coming along quite nicely; I nearly finished the second sleeve during a long meeting yesterday. Before anyone worries that I was being horribly rude, this is a meeting in which most of the other members are pecking away at their laptops throughout. I can knit by touch, so I think I was actually more engaged during the meeting than most of them!

Stripes!, the pattern, is also coming along nicely. I’ve gotten some very good feedback from my lovely test-knitting volunteers, and am hopeful that I’ll be able to release the pattern, for real, pretty soon. Speaking of Stripes!, this arrived in my mailbox yesterday (well, the Noro didn’t…I already had that!):

It’s Louet Gems Fingering weight, in “Linen Grey”. You can expect to see a babyStripes! at some point this summer; I’m working out the numbers and thinking through the design (for one thing, it will be a cardigan rather than a pullover), and might make this the small project I carry around in my backpack.

(baby)Stripes! aside, my “Year of Yokes” seems to have fallen by the wayside, but I promise, there will be more yokeage later this year! It’s just that I’ve been sidetracked with ideas for knits that are not yoked sweaters (who knew?), and with projects being knit either for or with others (which are also not yoked). My queue on Ravelry has gotten hugely disorganized at this point, and there’s not a great way for me to queue an idea for a design, so here’s a more organized version of my plans for the summer, sweater-knitting-wise:

1. A Cardigan for Arwen, but hugely modified because I don’t like the construction of the original. A friend asked me to knit along with her on this project last year (or maybe even earlier than that?), and we’ve both been so busy that it never happened…but it’s happening now! Or rather, it’s happening as soon as I finish knitting C’s sweater (for which there will be a pattern written up, eventually).

2. A self-designed, modernized, short-sleeved gansey. I plan on knitting this one during the Tour de France, since I’ve got a little tradition going of running a Tour de Gansey at the same time. If it turns out well, I might write this one up, too. No promises, though!

3. Vivian, for my friend Kris. I fell in love with the pattern as soon as I saw it, but thought it might look silly on me, since I’m not particularly hourglassy. At all. But Kris is, and she’s also totally sweater-worthy, so I’m excited to knit one up for her! I’d like to finish it before it gets chilly.

Between the knitting and the pattern-writing, that probably pretty much does it for the summer, since I’m also in the process of studying for my comprehensive exams, and trying to get some studies up and running. Busy, busy.

 

a second sleeve

First, thanks so much for all of your input on my last post! The comments section there has lots of good ideas for wooly, workhorse-style DK-weight yarns. A couple more that I’ve found since posting: Québécoise and Canadian Regal, both of which I’d like to try at some point.

Now, back to business. I haven’t posted an update about my progress on C’s sweater in awhile, so I figured it was time. Last week, I finished the body of the sweater:

The body is identical to the one I knit on my prototype “Swatch”, with the exception of using a tubular cast-on (and being over a foot bigger around). I just really love the waist-shaping on the outside of garter rib, and am eager to see how it works on someone who is not me.

The sleeves are where things have deviated from my “Swatch”. Instead of the garter eyelet business on my cuffs, C requested garter rib. I obliged, and added my own little touch:

See how the ribbing angles up in the center of the sleeve? I love that little detail, and I think (I hope!) that C does, too. As you can see, I’ve already finished one sleeve, and am already a good way through the second, having knit 7 of the 18 increases I will knit in order to get from the cuff circumference to the upper arm circumference.

Then it will be time to see if the notes I took while knitting the “Swatch”, on creating seamless set-in sleeves at the same time as a non-steeked V-neck, were good enough to help me do the same thing on a larger sweater. I’ve got my fingers crossed that I can make it work.

 

just wondering.

Because I know we all like pictures.

Because these are the sorts of things I wonder about, when I have a splitting sinus headache and feel like someone is driving an icepick under my right eye:

What’s a good DK-weight wool yarn? Is there a DK-weight yarn that’s sort of the “Cascade 220″ of DK yarns? You know, basic, sturdy, good color range, all that? I ask because I realized the other day that I have almost no DK-weight yarn in my stash (I’ve got lots of worsted, and a fair amount of sport-weight, pretty much), and I couldn’t think of what a good basic DK yarn would be. (Not that I need to add to my stash or anything). I’ve knit with Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool, and love it, but it’s not really what I’d call sturdy. And I know there are the various Rowan DK-weight yarns, but they’re not exactly in my budget, unless they’re on clearance. Am I missing something obvious?

 

Finally Finished Object: Ishbel

I finally got around to blocking Ishbel yesterday, so now she can have her official FO post. (Because, you know, a project isn’t finished until it’s gotten its blocking and had its picture taken).

And of course, the vital statistics:

Ravelry Project Page
Pattern: Ishbel, by Ysolda Teague
Size: Large Stockinette, Small Lace
Yarn: Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool, exactly 2 skeins
Needles: Size 7 Knitpicks Harmony circulars
Time to Knit: April 18-May 16 2009

I’m not keeping this one. It’s for my grandmother, who admired my Icarus when I was down visiting this Spring. I don’t think she reads my blog (but if so: Hi Grandma! Sorry for ruining your surprise!), so I’m posting this before I send it off. I hope she likes it!

As those of you who already knit this know, one major difference between Ishbel and a lot of other triangular shawls is that the decreases are worked such that the width grows much more quickly than the length of the shawl. My armspan is quite long for my height (I’m 5′3, my armspan is something like 5′8 or 5′9), and it’s even wider than that…and yet, the bottom point of the shawl is not too low. It’s a clever design, but that’s hardly surprising, considering the designer!

Here you can get a peek at the shawl pin I’m sending along with the package. It’s from Designs by Romi. I had a different Romi pin when I wore my Icarus while I visited my grandparents, and I figured this turquoise one would be pretty perfect for a shawl headed down to New Mexico. Here’s a closeup:

Isn’t it pretty? I kind of want one for myself, but I will stick with the shawl pin I already have, for now.

Such lovely lace. This was quite an enjoyable knit for me. I love the feel of the Silky Wool, and I think it is a fabulous yarn for this pattern; it took just 2 skeins to make a fairly large shawl! I highly recommend this yarn/pattern combination.

 

lots of updates!

I’ve been a busy bee lately. We spent Memorial Day weekend in Ohio, visiting my brother and his wife, as well as my husband’s parents, my husband’s brother and his wife, and my husband’s best friend and his two little kids. Visiting 4 families in a little over 2 days is a bit overwhelming! And I’ve been busy with academic stuff since we got back, too. Getting experiments running, getting my reading list ready for comprehensive exams, that sort of stuff.

But now I’m behind on the blogging. Let’s see. Once we got back from Ohio, I cast on for C’s sweater, and have already made it through the waist shaping:

I used a tubular cast-on for the first time on this sweater, and while it took forever, I don’t think I will ever use another cast-on for ribbing again. It’s fantastic, and totally solves the “cast-on not being as flexible as the ribbing” problem I had with my own version of this sweater.

Our other big project has been our garden. We finally got compost and peat moss and whatnot and were able to put our veggies (and strawberries) in yesterday:

Here’s hoping we can manage to keep these things growing!

Oh, and there’s one more thing that I’ve been working on, too. It’s off with the test-knitters now, to be picked apart and made even better, I hope.

 

A finished “swatch”.

Before we begin, a PSA for y’all:

If it is 82 degrees in your house, and your hands are sweaty, for the love of all that is good, DO NOT attempt to repeatedly rip out bind-offs and reknit portions of your sweater. You know what happens when you mix wool with heat, moisture, and friction, right?

FELT.

I was able to cut off the partially-felted first attempt at a neckband and fix it this morning, with only minimal fuzzing of the edge where stitches were picked up, thankfully, but save yourself the tears and don’t even try it in the first place.

---

And now we return to our regularly scheduled programming. The Swatch has been finished:

Pattern: My own. Tentatively calling it “Garter Whimsy”, an allusion to the name of the quilt Chawne is making me.
Yarn: Cascade 220, in Sapphire Heather. Less than 4 skeins (yes, really!).
Needles: Size 8 Denise Circulars and Harmony dpns.
Time to knit: Exactly 2 weeks (May 8th-May 22nd).

I quite pleased with it, despite all of last night’s frustration with the finishing. And it totally served its purpose; I figured out what worked and what didn’t work, and which measurements I need to ask for, and now feel quite prepared to knit a sweater for C. How about some more pictures?

Garter stitch (and particularly garter rib) is sort of the star of this sweater, even though the bulk of it is knit in stockinette. I did waist-shaping on the outside of a column of garter rib, which worked beautifully…you get the nice look of waist-shaping along with some stretch at the sides for comfort. I realize I’m a scrawny little thing, so maybe I’m wrong in thinking this, but I suspect this would be especially nice if you’re not as scrawny as I am.

(I also like the look of the neckline before I added the garter ridges, as in this photo). This is the detail I used at the wrist; it’s an i-cord cast-on, followed by some garter eyelet. I adore it. C wants more garter rib at the wrist of her sweater, though, and I’m happy to oblige, since I love that, too :)

The back of the sweater, where you can see a bit of the seamless set-in sleeve shaping, which was a modification of the (rather terse) directions given in EZ’s Knitting Workshop. I didn’t want to steek the v-neck (I was worried it would add bulk), so I altered the in-the-round directions to knit from one edge of the V around the back to the other. It was a bit of brain-twister, and of course, I figured out a better way to handle the very tops of the sleeve caps after I’d bound off and woven in the ends, but it’s ok…I’ll do it the better way on C’s sweater!

I’m quite pleased with this sweater! It’s not perfect, but for a sweater that was really meant to be a swatch, it’s pretty darn good. I’m utterly shocked at how little yarn it took: well under 4 skeins! I’m so tempted to pick up 4 more skeins of Cascade 220 in the Webs sale while it’s cheap so that I can knit myself another one of these, since it’s such a nice basic sweater (and we all know how much I love my nice basic sweaters, given the last post!). I’m considering putting together a pattern for this, once I’ve knit C’s. The idea would be to make it a little bit mix-and-match, with instructions for different detailing at the wrist and neck, since C’s is going to have different detailing at the wrist and neck, anyway, and I want to try out a minimalist neckline like the unfinished one I had before the Great Accidental Felting Incident of 2009, too. If you’d be interested in me taking the time to write this one up as a pattern, let me know!