two steps forward, 3 steps back?

Sometimes that’s the way of things, ain’t it? I finished sleeve number one on M’s Stripes! cardigan, but the entire time I was knitting it, I had a sinking feeling about the bottom hem on the body:

See how it’s pulling in at the bottom? It’s not supposed to. The corrugated rib at the bottom is pulling in even more than I anticipated, and there’s also some weirdness at the tubular bind-off, which has a larger effective gauge than the rib.

It’s even more obvious in this photo of the opening at the front (I’ll be adding a button band):

And you can get a better sense for the gauge compression that happens in the corrugated rib but not the standard rib/tubular bind-off in this photo, I think:

And yet, the sleeve cuff seems to be working out quite lovely:

Why the difference? I think it’s a few things: for one, the cuff is in the round, which doesn’t provide as much opportunity for weird “flipping”. The other thing that I think is affected by it being in the round is my corrugated rib gauge in general – I strongly suspect that I knit that particular sort of rib tighter when knitting back and forth than when knitting in the round on DPNs, so there wasn’t as much compression. But also, there’s the fact that you kind of DO want a sleeve cuff to pull inward, just a bit, whereas that’s less desirable in a bottom hem (I mean, it can be a deliberate design choice, but it isn’t, here).

So, I’m going to rip back to just before the vikkel braid and reknit. Here’s my plan:

1. On the final row before the braid, increase MORE than I did last time. I had used the increase ratio that I’ve used in babyStripes!, both those are different yarns at different gauges on different needle sizes, and clearly I need to increase a bit more here. I increased after every 7 stitches before (turning 7 stitches into 8) but I think what I actually need is to alternate increasing after every 5 stitches and increasing after every 6 stitches (turning 11 stitches into 13)

2. Use a larger needle for the vikkel braid and the corrugated rib, before switching back to the “normal” needle size for the regular rib/tubular bind-off.

Wish me luck!

another sweater for M

Man, poor Skógafjall keeps falling by the wayside (I’ve got the body and most of a sleeve already knit, at least) while I knit sweaters for smaller people. I just finished one knit for my daughter, and already there’s another one on the needles (it was literally a matter of hours between finishing her red Cobbler and casting on for this):

Yep, it’s a Stripes! cardigan. M picked the colors herself from yarn that I had in my stash: Cascade Eco+ in Summer Sky Heather, and Noro Kureyon in color #95. I’m loving how they look together!

I can’t get enough of the texture created by doing the contrast color stripes in garter stitch in the yoke. So great!

I’ve already finished the yoke, and am knitting the body down first, before knitting the sleeves. I really enjoy making these top-down – not only do I get more of a say over what color is closest to the face this way, but I can also let her try it on as I go, and it makes the way I add the pockets possible.

One of these days, I want to go back to my own top-down Stripes! cardigan. I realized kind of late in the game (like, after knitting the entire body and part of a sleeve) that the proportions just weren’t working great on it, the yoke wasn’t fitting all that well (too baggy, but awkwardly so) and I didn’t like the bind-off I used on the bottom hem either, so I really need to rip it back pretty much to the very beginning. That’s a bummer, but I’m always going to vote for “rip and reknit” over “finish a sweater I won’t actually wear”. And I’ve gotten better at doing top-down yoke math (it’s just the inverse of bottom-up yoke math, but somehow that confounded me initially!) and figuring out the best spots for short rows for my body, so the next go at it should be better.

things i make for maddy: a RED vest! (plus a design brain-dump)

I mentioned in a previous post that I was not going to be buying any yarn for myself for the forseeable future, but would make an exception for yarn for my daughter, especially RED yarn, which I had none of in my stash. I’m not a fan of red, but it’s M’s favorite color, and she’s such an appreciative knitwear recipient that I can’t say no to her requests! Here’s the red item she wanted most:

It’s a bigger version of her “Cobbler” Vest, so named because it was inspired by Jared Flood’s Cobblestone sweater. The yarn is Malabrigo Rios in Ravely Red, which I can attest is VERY VERY red – so red that it’s actually hard to get the camera to focus!

Ravelry Project Page
Pattern: from my head, but hopefully will be published sooner rather than later
Yarn: Malabrigo Rios in “Ravelry Red”, just a touch over 2 skeins
Needles: Size 7
Time to Knit: 11 days (some of which I was injured and not able to knit)

I’m so delighted with how it turned out – it fits her perfectly! (I don’t know why I’m always so surprised about this, given that I measure and do math and whatnot, but still it’s always a delight!)

As you can see, the bottom hem is split at the sides, and the back extends lower than the front does. The front actually gets folded up to create a kangaroo pocket, thanks to i-cord:

Here’s the whole thing, not obscured by my daughter’s hair/hands/etc:

As I mentioned above, I’m really hoping to publish a pattern for this design. What I’d really like, though, is to put out a collection of “Parent-Child” knits, because I’ve actually knit quite a few things in both me-versions and M-versions, and when I counted them up yesterday, there are something like 8 different designs, most of which I’ve already knit a test version of for me and/or M, that I could put in that collection. My problem, though, is that I’ve not actually published a single pattern since 2011 (observant readers will note that as as the year M was born, which is not a coincidence!) so I don’t really know or remember how to take a design from my brain to publication, and I *certainly* don’t know how to do that with a whole collection of them! There’s also the time factor – I can knit and design a fair amount in the summer, but once the school year starts and I’m teaching full time, that kind of goes out the window.

Basically, here’s my list:
1. Cobbler Vest (which also could have a long-sleeved variant)
2. Garter Rib Cardigan (which also could have a pullover variant and needs a better name)
3. Stripes! Cardigan, top-down (this one could go all the way down to baby sizes)
4. Bohus Yoke Pullover (needs a better name; I’d base the colorwork of the grown-up version on what I did on M’s sweater because I like it better than my original one!)
5. Top-Down Set-In Sleeved Striped Pocket Pullover (*definitely* would need a better name! Also still torn on whether to do adult version in sport weight or worsted, though I suppose if I do variants on other patterns, why not both?)
6. Curvilinear Hat + Mittens (this pattern is virtually ready to go; it also would pair really nicely with the Cobbler pattern, I think)
7. Sullivan (adult version already published through BT’s Wool People but I retain rights to it; I have ideas both for a sport-weight kids’ version AND a worsted-weight tunic with a kangaroo pocket)
8. Vahtralehed (I’ve already published the adult version; my thought for kids’ version is to do maybe one with a single maple leaf at the back and top-down set-in sleeves, in sport weight?)
9. I also have a design that I’ve never had a chance to knit up that involves roositud and nupps.

So looking at it, I have things that involve garter stitch or garter rib (1, 2, 6), I have things that involve yokes (1, 3, 4, 8, 9), I have things that involve top-down knitting (1, 3, 5, 6), I have things that involve Estonian techniques like nupps and roositud and vikkel braids (3, 7, 8, 9) but these are all intersecting sets. I also notice that all but the last 3 are potentially unisex patterns, which I think is super cool. I’m open to any and all advice about how to make these things a reality!

the rainbow connection

A different (and much tinier) yoked sweater snuck onto my needles while I was visiting my family – Skógafjall was just too big and unwieldy to pack. I finished it this morning, and it will soon be making its way to Alaska for a friend’s baby:

Yep, it’s another babyStripes! I’ve lost count of how many of these I’ve knit for various babies and toddlers…this might be the 5th one? One of these days I really am going to write up a pattern for it, for real.

I know infants don’t actually need pockets, but they’re just so cute! And I love all of the little details in this sweater – the garter ridges in the yoke and the pockets, and the vikkel braids and corrugated ribbing at the neckline, bottom hem, and sleeve cuffs.

I also love the rainbow colors! Of course you could knit it with any two colors you wanted, but I’ve always used rainbow self-striping yarn as the contrast colors and it’s just PERFECT for little babies – bright and happy and gender-neutral, which is part of why I knit one for my own child:

I’ve always loved rainbows; when asked for my “favorite color” I have a hard time giving a single answer. I’ve got a pretty good reputation at work for my colorful outfits (why wouldn’t you want to wear bright colors during the dreary winter months?), and I’m basically not capable of wearing “neutrals” without some pop of bright color somewhere – if I’m wearing mostly black/grey, I’ll accessorize with bright green or turquoise or hot pink, and even when I *had* to wear all black, back when I played in orchestras, I’d make sure I had on bright colored undergarments, just for me :)

I also love what the rainbow represents, in terms of inclusiveness and specifically, its connection to the LGBTQ+ community. Last weekend, my family marched with our UU church in our local Pride parade. It was my daughter’s 4th time marching with us, and it just makes me so happy to know that she’ll grow up knowing that love is love and seeing such a broad spectrum of humanity as the valuable people that they are. And though I could absolutely pass for “straight” given that I’m happily married to a dude, I’m actually bi (as you might’ve guessed from that kitty button, which unfortunately fell off somewhere along the march) and I feel that it’s very important for me not to skate by on “straight privilege” and be out there fighting for EVERYONE to be treated with respect and dignity. And for patriarchy-trampling :)

There’s another meaningful connection that rainbows have, though, and that’s the reason for THIS particular babyStripes! sweater. If you have people in your life who have experienced babyloss (as those who’ve known me for awhile know that I do), then you likely know that surviving babies that come after those losses are sometimes called “rainbow babies”. This sweater is for a rainbow baby, and I hope it keeps her warm through an Alaska winter!

another lopi sweater? yes!

Just as soon as I’d finished up my Fiddlehead Yoke cardigan, I cast on for another sweater using Lettlopi:

It’s Skógafjall! The second I saw the pattern, I was smitten – I’ve been daydreaming of a sweater with trees around the yoke for ages, something that would capture a foggy day in the pines, and here someone else had already done all the work of turning it into a pattern!

I already had the light green and grey and a couple skeins of the darker pine green (I’d considered it as a possible color for the Fiddlehead Yoke, but it didn’t look right to me), so only needed a few more skeins to make it happen. Yes, I broke my “no adding to stash” rule, but I really do intend to stick to stash for the foreseeable future. Really really. The only exception I’ll make is to buy red yarn to make something for M, because kiddo LOVES red and I…do not (and thus have none stashed).

Anyway, I’ve already knit the body, because stockinette-in-the-round is perfect mindless knitting, which is right up my alley in early summer when I’m still in decompression-mode following the end of Spring semester teaching.

I absolutely love the dark pine green color…it matches my eyes!

I’ve already started sleeve #1, but as speedy a knitter as I am, I’m still not sure I’ll be able to finish the sweater before we take off to visit my family in Wisconsin next week, and I think I’ll need to focus on smaller projects (I’m planning a sweater for a friend’s baby-to-be, and at least one Willow Cowl) while I’m traveling just for space considerations. But in any case, another finished lopapeysa isn’t that far off…and I’ve got the yarn to knit at least one more, because I have a kit for Gamaldags (in the light grey/bright colors version), which I plan to cardiganize. But I have yarn and ideas for a few others sweaters, too, so we’ll see what’s next!

what i did: afterthought underarm gusset

I mentioned in my post about the Fiddlehead Yoke cardigan that I’d added a wee gusset to the underarm instead of simply grafting the live stitches together:

Check out my sweet armpit!
Ha!

So, here’s what I did. You know how when you graft underarm stitches together, you usually want to pick up an extra stitch in each “corner” so as to not have holes? Well, to make the gusset, I did something slightly different with those extra stitches. I started by putting one set (I think it was “bottom”/body set, but it truly doesn’t matter) of live stitches on a needle, and joining yarn to knit.

Row 1: Knit across those stitches, picking up an extra stitch from the corner at the end of the row.
Row 2: Turn the work, slip the first stitch, and purl across, picking up an extra stitch from the corner at the end of the row.
Rows 3 and 4: Turn again, slip the first stitch, and repeat Rows 1 and 2 a second time. Leave the resulting 12 stitches “live”.

I went from having 8 stitches held at the underarm to having 12 of them, and a slight “wedge”-shaped bit of fabric. Then I did Rows 1-4 again on the other set of live underarm stitches, so that I had 2 matching sets of 12 live stitches, and I kitchenered THOSE stitches together. The result was a little “bubble” of stitches that looks slightly odd when the sweater lies flat, but tucks away beautifully when the sweater is worn, giving me the ability to lift my arm up high without a lot of pulling!

I thank my former obsession with ganseys for giving me the idea of a gusset, though on a gansey the gusset is definitely worked as part of the pattern, not as an afterthought. For Fiddlehead Yoke, if I had knit the yoke just a bit looser, so that the underarm join was a bit below my actual armpit, I wouldn’t have needed the gusset at all…but I wanted a very close-fitting sleeve opening and a close-fitting yoke, and realized after the fact that if I simply joined the live stitches at the underarm, my sleeve opening would simply be TOO snug. This let me “fix” it without undoing the whole yoke, and I got a sweater fit that I’m super duper happy with. I don’t know if this would be a useful trick for anyone but me…I have kind of freakishly broad shoulders but thin arms, and I’m also flat-chested but with a really big ribcage (compared to the rest of my petite frame), so getting proportions to work for me in a way that results in a well-fitted sweater is always an adventure.

it’s a cardigan!!

Hooray! I steeked my Fiddlehead Yoke cardigan this morning! Before steeking, I picked up and knit the button bands, because I felt more comfortable doing that with the sweater intact than with it cut open. You can kind of see the garter stitch button bands folded out to the sides as I’m preparing to cut in this photo:

I didn’t crochet the steek or even put in a line of stitches with the sewing machine ahead of time, because Lopi is sticky yarn, and since I’d picked up and knit the button bands already, I felt like it would be secure enough. Here’s the first snip!

Look how neatly the stitches came apart…Lopi is great!

I actually found steeking to be incredibly satisfying. Snip snip snip!

The final snip was the most satisfying of all!!

The cut steek lies nice and flat – I may end up covering with with a ribbon, but I don’t see a true need to do that, so I’ll only do it if I find ribbon that I think would be super pretty on the inside.

Here, you can see the little “gusset” I added at the armpits, instead of simply grafting them together – it gave me a little bit more range of motion around the arm. (If the yoke were slightly looser/deeper, I probably wouldn’t have needed them, but they work great and let me have a very close, modern fit around the yoke):

I am seriously so happy with this sweater! It still needs to have buttons sewn on, and I’ll get to that at some point (but hey, now that it’s warm outside, it’s hardly urgent that my new cardigan have buttons!).

A few folks have asked if I’ll write this up as a pattern and to that my answer is a firm “I don’t know!” For one thing, it’s pretty heavily inspired by someone else’s pattern (Adrian Bazilia’s “Fiddlehead Mittens“) though obviously I changed the charts to make them wedge-shaped so they aren’t actually the same. But beyond that, the chart is 31 stitches wide at the base, and that’s…kinda wide, as far as a repeating yoke pattern goes. I’m sure I could figure out a way to make the math work for multiple sizes (I figured out how to make Vahtralehed work, and that’s an even wider motif!), but I’m not sure I have the mental energy for it right now. I’ve kind of forgotten how to be a designer…but I may want to dip my toes back in the water with something simpler first (like the hat/mitten set that seriously probably just needs to be tech edited). We’ll see!