Sunday Knitting - Coraline

Yesterday I got dressed up all in jeans and wool and went out into the 85 degree day to get pictures of my long-awaited (by me anyhow) Coraline cardigan.

The back

And a close up of the smocking and buttons.

Some quick stats:

The pattern is Coraline by Ysolda Teague
The yarn is Queensland Collection Rustic Wool DK
I used needles sized 3 and 4
I started in late September, which made this an 8-month project for no good reason.

In addition to coming up with beautiful designs, Ysolda is a very meticulous writer of patterns. Not only does she provide the largest range of sizes of any designer I know of, but her patterns are very clear and detailed. Although she has been published in magazines from Knitty to Interweave Knits, she primarily sells her patterns directly and manages to cobble together a living from knitting. All this to say, this was a nice pattern!

I liked the yarn as well. It's so hard to find DK weight yarns that don't break the bank and this was fairly pricy if I remember clearly, but it was worth it for the color alone. After blocking, this sweater is every bit as soft and drapey as I had hoped. One of the balls was a bit defective as it had several knots - technically you can return it when that's the case, but who's going to rip out all that work? Luckily, out of the 11 balls of yarn I bought, the others were all fine. (I actually have 3 partial balls left, probably equal to about 2 full balls.)

My gauge was a bit off, despite swatching before I started and getting correct gauge (but we all know how swatches lie) so I was bit worried because the smocking requires accurate row gauge. However, the stars aligned and it came out perfectly.

The only part I'm not happy with is the button loops, but you can't see them (thank goodness.) I have a vague plan to redo them, but knowing myself as I do it seems unlikely to actually happen. This is ok because they're not visible. These are the instructions, if you're curious. I used 2 plies of yarn as thread but I think it was a little too slippery and moved around and looks very messy. If I were to do it over, I'd try to find matching embroidery thread.

The only thing I changed was to use fewer buttons, just because mine are larger than she used on the original. I felt lucky to find buttons in that color, never mind finding the exact size I wanted. I did something a little different on the hem as well, unintentionally, but that was so long ago now that I don't even remember what. I remember being concerned about it, but it looks fine now.

All in all, a success! I look forward to wearing it a lot next fall and winter.

Sunday Knitting

I've reached the smocking portion of my Coraline cardigan.

To create a smocking pattern, basically you slip two stitches that are several stitches away from each other, wrap the yarn around those two stitches, then knit all the stitches in their original order. It's tricky to get the wraps to all be the same length. You can clearly see that I've failed at this. However, if you are close enough to notice this while I'm wearing it, you are too close for my comfort.

The weird ridge where the smocking area meets the rest of the body is (hopefully) because I put in a life line. I wasn't feeling confident about my smocking skills. I may take it out, but then again I'm concerned about my row gauge being a little off so maybe I'll still have to rip back. I'm very unsure of everything at this point, but the good news is that the weather won't be appropriate for this sweater for several months now, so there's no hurry.

Here's a rather messy view of Coraline in its entirety. Almost there! And almost out of yarn!

Sunday Knitting

I've just completed the second sleeve of my Coraline Cardigan.

Right now it just looks like a lumpy mess with various colored waste yarn hanging off it, like some sort of wool-based Frankenstein, but I assure you that someday it will be beautiful. I keep telling myself this although my gauge is off and I only have two full balls of yarn left. I also made a poor decision way back at the hem which I am now beginning to regret.

But! It's purple!

Now I need to connect all those pieces and knit the smocked yoke. I've never knitting smocking before, but I'm sure it will be easy. Just like I'm sure I'll have enough yarn and I'm sure the sweater will fit.

The spring weather may be making me delusional, but I'm enjoying this happy state of mind so I won't trouble myself with details like math and gauge and yardage.

Sunday Knitting

I feel a little silly that it took me about 75 rows to realize something very basic about the construction of my sweater. I knew that it has an i-cold edging, and I was curious as to how to attach i-cord to the edge of something. I skimmed through the pattern to find that part and couldn't but figured I'd see it later when I got to that part.

At the same time, I thought it really strange that the instructions say to slip the first 3 stitches of each row. I mean, wouldn't that make the edge totally pull in and be all rounded?

Yeah. I am little slow.

Look at my pretty i-cord edging! I didn't even know I was making it!

Next I begin the sleeves, which I'm not looking forward to at all. (If only I were a vest girl!) Then the sleeves get knit together with the yoke, which is where the fun smocking pattern comes in. Lots to look forward to in this project, but mostly I'm getting antsy to wear it.

Coraline has begun

I've swatched for the Coraline cardigan before, but couldn't get gauge, and with this pattern you need to get row gauge as well as stitch gauge. Moreover, the pattern calls for DK weight yarn which, for reasons that remain mysterious to me, is more expensive than other yarn weights. Consequently I haven't been doing much experimenting. But. Recently I found this lovely purple yarn - Queensland Collection Rustic Wool DK - and I think it is perfect.

Coraline is knit from the bottom up with a folden hem. I have made a folded hem before on my first and second versions of the Hourglass Sweater (sorry for the Ravelry links, this was pre-blog!) but Ysolda's design is a little bit different.

The basic idea of a folded hem is that you cast on provisionally, knit a bunch of rows, knit a bunch more rows, fold it in half, then take off your waste yarn and knit the provisional stitches together with your live stitches. Then just keep knitting.

With the hourglass sweater, there was a purl row which I think the pattern referred to as a "turning row" between the front rows and the back rows (if that makes sense). This clearly defined the fold. On Coraline there is no turning row, and also the pattern says to slip the first THREE stitches of every row. I've never seen such a thing before. Of course I forgot to do this on my first 15 rows and did not want to rip it all out because these are some long damn rows. I'm sure it will be fine. (Just as I'm sure those are famous last words.)

Here's a picture of the back - I've gone just a few rows beyond where the hem is attached. See how neat it looks where the hem attaches?

Now that I've finished the hem, I have to knit 95 rows in plain stockinette. Easy peasy. This means that I have to either a) find a good show to watch, b) find some good podcasts to listen to, or c) finally figure out how to read and knit at the same time, from the comfort of the papasan chair where I have been recently living.

Tonight I am watching Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, a desire inspired by recently reading this book. I wonder how many rows I will get done?

Surprise Knitting, Part 2

Months ago, I bought the pattern for the Coraline cardigan, but had difficult finding affordable yarn. DK weight Alpaca doesn't come cheap. Ultimately I bought KnitPicks Merino Style. I swatched, washed and blocked the swatches, didn't take any notes, and then lost both swatches. Earlier this week I swatched again and determined the yarn and pattern just weren't a good match. Knit loose enough to achieve the drape I wanted, the gauge was too far off. I should have gotten some alpaca.

But I had all this lovely purple yarn wanting to be a cardigan! So I search Ravelry for cardigans made with this yarn (really, what would I do without Ravelry?) and found Stefanie Japel's Puff-Sleeved Feminine Cardigan from her book Fitted Knits. I've already made 3 sweaters from this book but haven't picked it up in a while and had almost forgotten about this sweet little cardigan. It is short-sleeved too, so I may actually finish this during a time of year in which it will be appropriate to wear.

I've made great headway so far, despite spending hours knitting yesterday afternoon only to spend the entire evening undoing what I had done.


I do have some concerns. The gauge swatch changed after washing and blocking, but as we all know, swatches lie. Additionally, a stockinette swatch will stretch more than a sweater than is mostly stockinette but also has raglan increases. I have found through experience that raglan seams don’t stretch especially well.

This is related to my other concern, which is that the shoulder and arm fit will be too tight, as happens with most patterns. I will be doing some measuring and looking at instructions for a larger size – it may be a simple adjustment.

But what of Coraline? I still want to make that sweater as well, but may need to pony up for an actual Alpaca blend yarn. Since I only need so many purple cardigans, I am thinking of gray for Coraline which I believe was my original plan for that sweater.

Meanwhile, it's nice to have a sweater on the needles again! I suspect this sweater will go quickly, so if all goes according to plan I should have frequent updates.