Sunday Knitting

We had about ten minutes of warm sunshine yesterday, which perfectly coincided photographing my finished Geodesic Cardigan.

This would have been extremely unpleasant in the 30-degree weather we had been having.

One of my concerns while knitting was that the hem remained flipped up, but I'm happy to see that it seems to be behaving after blocking.

I was also afraid of how the tucks would turn out, because judging from other projects on Ravelry, the results vary widely. Mine aren't perfectly straight or uniform by any means, but they don't stick out awkwardly either.

The color is lovely, isn't it? I hope I can wear it at least a few times before it completely disintegrates, which is exactly what I fear will happen since this yarn is of such poor quality. It was trouble from the start, and then a couple of times while I was knitting, the strand just came apart in my hands. That was pretty unnerving.

Come to think of it, this entire project was fraught with peril. Aside from the yarn troubles, the pattern was very confusing and required simultaneously counting several different things. For someone who enjoys a stiff Manhattan while knitting, that's just asking for trouble. But I didn't make any major mistakes. Nor did I run out of yarn, as I feared through the entire project. There's even a small ball left. (Which I may end up using to fix holes when the yarn begins to disintegrate.)

So, my spring cardigan is done. Do you hear that, spring? That means you can arrive now!

Sunday Knitting

It doesn't look like much right now, but my Geodesic Cardigan is going very well.

Last weekend I devoted myself wholly to finishing up the back and both fronts and attaching them together. I did this all while listening to Tampa, and I fear that book and this cardigan will be forever intertwined.

During the week I knit the sleeve caps and awaited a time when I could sit down and devote myself to seaming them in. I don't hate seaming pieces together the way some knitters do, but I always dread sewing in sleeves because the shape of the sleeve cap is so rarely similar to the shape of the armhole. Happily, these fit together quite nicely.

The seams aren't perfect, but nobody should be close enough to my armpit to notice. They're really not bad.

These sleeves are unusually constructed. I had to use the invisible provisional cast-on, then knit upwards to shape the caps, before casting-off and sewing in the sleeve caps. Now, I pick up the provisional stitches and knit the length of the sleeve. This will actually work quite well because not only is the most difficult part out of the way, but I don't know if I have enough yarn to make the sleeves as long as they're supposed to be. Knitting down from the shoulders is the best direction to go in that situation.

So that is all that's left: knitting the sleeves, and just a few rows of trim around the back neck. I'll start with the neck trim to be sure there's enough yarn, and then see how much sleeve I can get out of the rest. I hope to be done in a couple of weeks, which means the cardigan will be ready in time for the appropriate spring weather in which to wear it!

Sunday Knitting

Full steam ahead on the Geodesic Cardigan! About a week ago I got this crazy idea that this cardigan would look really nice at a party I'm going to a week from now. And it would, but that's not going to happen. Nevertheless, I'm putting a lot into this project right now.

I finished the waist shaping just as I was starting the tucks - which you can see above - and then the neckline shaping began and just a few rows later I had to start the armholes. What this means is that I've had to keep track of several things all at once. The tucks are a series of 18-row repeats, and while the last 8 rows are plain stockinette you still have to count them. The waist shaping meant an increase every 12 rows, which thankfully finished just before I had to begin the neckline shaping. That involves decreases every 4 rows.

I've been using a row counter to keep track of where I am on the shaping and every time I do another increase or decrease I make a mark on the pattern and start the counter again. With the tucks, it's more complicated. There are short-rows, so sometimes I'm doing a few rows on the left tuck and then moving over to the right tuck and doing a few rows there, so I'm frequently at a different spot of the 18-row repeat on the left and the right. I know that sounds confusing, and it is. It makes more sense when you're doing it, but it means I have to keep track of them separately. So I have two small post-it notes on the pattern where I mark off the rows of the repeat I'm on: one post-it for the left side and one for the right side.

Now that I've separated for the armholes I'm just working on the back, which is a nice break from the tucks. Still lots of counting though, because I want to know how many rows I'm knitting to achieve the required length. This is more precise than measuring and I want to be sure the front and back come out correctly in relation to each other.

My next project may be something a little more plain and straightforward. I've been eyeing some of the sweaters in the Winter issue of Interweave Knits, which is one of the best issues I've seen from them in a while.

Sunday Knitting

I promised an update on my Geodesic Cardigan ages ago, and then set it aside and haven't touched it since. But I realized you haven't seen it since it was far too many balls of tangled yarn. It looks much nicer now.

I got to a point where I had to knit until it was a certain length, so the last time I touched it I took it off the needles to measure it. I have no idea what I determined, so the next time I pick it up I have to take it back off the needles and measure it again before I can move on. Thus, I have ignored it completely.

So far my biggest concern is the way the bottom turns up. Did I cast on too tight? Will it block out? Will it matter anyhow, if I run out of yarn before I'm done, as I fear I might? So many questions.

I've recently been distracted by other projects, such as another pair of socks, and an odd little cross stitch I started working on after coming across the kit stashed in my sewing table. I'll show you one of those next time I do a Sunday post.

Sunday Knitting

In my excitement at finishing two sweaters in such a short period of time I wanted to cast on for something new immediately. Now that my beloved Windsor Button is gone and purchasing yarn isn't quite so instant, this means working with what I have on hand already. Ages ago I queued the Geodesic Cardigan from Knitscene, bought the yarn, and put it with the magazine into a ziplock bag to await casting on. A year or so later, the time came. One evening at around 8pm, after a relaxing glass of wine, I grabbed my swift and ball winder and pulled out the hanks of yarn to wind them.

Mind you, the state of my house right now is such that I can't wind yarn on my sewing table where I usually do it. My ball winder is kind of like this, which means it needs to clamp onto a table, a very thin table. I forced it onto the edge of my kitchen table, and optimistically put the first hank of yarn on the swift. Soon, this is what I had.

Don't be distracted by the brilliant color. Look more closely. 

First, the stupid ball winder came off the edge of the table, which really was too thick. I had to hold it awkwardly in one hand while turning the handle with the other. Usually, this would work ok, and I'd just have to occasionally stop winding to straighten out the yarn or remove it from the swift arm where it is caught. But this isn't usual yarn. Malabrigo Lace is clearly the work of Satan and was wound into this hank by his evil minions.

There were eight ends, which was extremely confusing. They weren't even knots, as you sometimes find, just ends. This made it a little easier though, when it came so impossibly tangled that I couldn't undo it, hence the ball winder sitting uselessly aside with its partial ball while I began winding by hand with another end I found. I couldn't even take the partial ball off the ball winder and continue with it because the yarn feeds through that small eye and I'd have to undo the whole ball to feed it back through, which would be pointless. 

Occasionally, a ball of yarn will be a tad tangled. You put the hank on the swift and it seems one piece is looped around strangely, so you need to make a minor and obvious adjustment. This one, though, defied all explanation. As I began winding by hand, I regularly had to feed the whole ball through a weird tangle in order to continue. Sometimes the yarn inexplicably looped back and started coming off in the opposite direction. 

At 10:30pm - two and a half hours after I started - I finally finished up the fourth ball (and there should never be a fourth ball) of the hank, bits of bright blue lint coating my kitchen table, and me mad with exhaustion. I couldn't allow myself to even think about the second hank.

A few days later I was recovered enough from my trauma to tackle the second hank. When I put it on the swift, I examined it thoroughly. It turns out that a couple of feet of one end was woven in and around the the rest of the yarn, guaranteeing misery if you had the misfortune of beginning with the other end. Luckily, the second hank went much more smoothly and resulted only in one ball.

I felt rather betrayed by this yarn after my positive experience with the Whisper Cardigan. Malabrigo Lace, you are a fickle bitch and cannot be trusted.