Ruthless Knitting Archive

Yesterday morning, I finished the front of my Buster sweater. Before breakfast today, I wove in the last of the ends. This is how many ends were involved in the front:

But I’m not sure even that picture is sufficient testament to how messy it was to knit this piece. This is what the front usually looked like when I wasn’t working on it and when the ends were in good order:

All the trouble was totally worth the result, however. This morning, I quickly reknit the top of the back (where it was too long and I’d used the defective yarn) and basted the two pieces together to try it on. I was worried that the ribbing on the bottom would be too tight, that the body would be bigger around than I wanted, and that the 15 inches I knit prior to beginning the armhole shaping would make the sweater too long, so imagine my relief when I discovered that it fits! I practically danced around the house in my pajama pants and slippers, I was so delighted.

This victory was somewhat hard-won, since I had to rip back and reknit about 4 inches of the back and 5 or 6 inches of the front. The problems with the front were the result of my failure to plan–I should have charted the whole front of the sweater from the beginning, but I was too lazy, and I thought I knew what I was going to do with the V-neck shaping. I did not. Ripping out sticky single-ply yarn knit in intarsia is not fun, and I have now officially learned my lesson: when you’re doing a patterned sweater, plan the whole front before knitting it. Got it.

After breakfast, I soaked and blocked both pieces, and now they look like this.

Sleeve Island lies ahead.

In other news, I e-mailed Nashua last weekend to let them know about the defective yarn, and I heard back from their marketing director on Monday morning before business hours even began on the East Coast. She apologized for the problem, located another ball of the same color and lot in the warehouse, and sent it to me by priority mail the same day, all free of charge. Furthermore, she asked if I would return a sample of the defective yarn so their spinner could take a look at it, and she thanked me for letting her know about the defect in the yarn while the project was still active so that Nashua had a chance to rectify the situation. I couldn’t be happier with this outcome or more pleased with the stellar customer service. Nashua is a class act.

P.S. My spring IK just arrived with the mail, so I can look at it over lunch. Whee!

I wanted plain stockinette, and I got it, by golly. Since mid-week, I have read Harry Potter (books five and six — I had fallen behind!) and knit the back of a sweater, which is now finished and blocked, though the armholes are too long. Also, there’s a section near the top where the yarn, a single-ply, became mysteriously thinner, as though half the ply were missing. I knit with it anyway, which, you know, duh. It looks bad, and I’m going to have to rip it out. All told, though, I only have to rip and reknit about four inches. Also, I have to find the band from that ball of yarn so I can alert the Nashua people to its defectiveness.

Meanwhile, having caught up with Harry Potter and declared to David my prediction of what will happen at the end of the final installment, I was ready to begin the front of the sweater, which is far more interesting than the back. I give you the first six inches or so of the sweater I am calling “Buster”:

The Buster sweater is named after the Buster character on the TV show “Arrested Development,” who often wears argyle. On one episode, he wore this wonderful argyle sweater that was patterned only on one side of the front. That was my inspiration for this design, though I’ve come a long way from the original.

The intarsia is going pretty well so far. My technique is more or less my own invention, though I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that it’s a normal one, since it works pretty well. (Note to self: read a book on intarsia sometime.) I try not to be too picky about keeping all the dangly bits on the back in order or fixing the lumpy stitches on the front, since I know that it will all get fixed in time.

Because I know that you are curious, here is the back side. Please note that this is what the strands look like when they are not tangled; they tend to look far worse than this most of the time.

You can see in the picture above that I made a chart, but once I got a few rows in I didn’t need to do more than glance at it occasionally, since the pattern is very predictable. I am hoping to get a few more diamonds done this weekend, but my shoulder is a little achy from all the knitting and I should probably take a break or get something going on smaller needles.