Ruthless Knitting

Gather ’round for a tale of knitting gone awry.

It all started more than a year ago, when my good friend Rebecca sent me an e-mail link to a garment at an online shop known for its beautiful knitwear, along with the question, "We could knit this, couldn’t we?" The garment in question was a pullover sweater with very short sleeves, a deep U-neck, and a full skirt. The zoomed-in views available on the website revealed that the bodice was knit side-to-side in stockinette with purled rows every inch or so, while the skirt portion seemed to have been picked up from the bodice and knit straight downward. "Sure," I told Rebecca, "we could totally knit that." But we didn’t — at least, not right away.

The top stayed in the back of my mind for a year or so, until last month I got a cold and wanted to work on something that involved larger yarn, interesting construction, and plain knitting. I pulled out some yarn from Gryphon that had been in my stash for a while and set to work on a knockoff of the top Rebecca had introduced me to.

The bodice portion went quite well, all things considered. I worked a tubular cast-on to create what would be the edge of the right sleeve, made a 1×1 rib edging, increased for a few inches to the full sleeve length and width, and then did a provisional cast on for the front and back stitches on either side of the sleeve. I worked straight for four inches or so, bound off the stitches for the right side of the neck, worked just the front to the far side of the neck, went back and worked the back across to match, cast stitches back on for the left side of the neck, rejoined and knit for another four inches, put all but the left sleeve stitches on holders, made the left sleeve to match the right, and worked a tubular bind-off. (Whew! Did you follow that?) I grafted both sides together and seamed under the arms, made a strip of 1×1 ribbing for the neckline and sewed it in, and sat back to admire my handiwork.

So far, so good. The only problem was that I was clearly going to run out of yarn.

Now, I knew when I started this top that I didn’t have enough yarn, but I sort of hoped that I miraculously would have enough, somehow. The yarn I used has 280 yards per skein, and I had two skeins. Last time I used the yarn, I was amazed how far 280 yards would go, so I crossed my fingers that it would do the trick. But the bodice itself used up about two-thirds of the yarn, so there was simply no way I would be able to knit the skirt-like portion with what remained.

I could have ripped the whole thing out at this point, and maybe I should have. But I knew that if I did, I would never reknit the top, and it would probably be a very long time before I reused the yarn. Also, I had a cold, and I didn’t want to have to think too hard about anything. So I just pressed on, and when I ran out of orange yarn after about four inches, I changed to some blue yarn of the same type.

When I ran out of blue yarn at about eight inches, the skirt part still wasn’t long enough, but I had a plan, so I changed to yellow yarn of the same type and continued. Finally, when I was almost out of yellow yarn, I worked a few rows of ribbing and bound off.

At this point, the top looked like something a clown might wear. Individually, the orange, blue, and yellow yarns were lovely, but together, they were frightful. I had a plan, though: I had already decided to dye the whole thing black. So that is what I did. Then I blocked it, dried it, and tried it on. 

The result was rather disappointing. So disappointing, in fact, that I wasn’t able to bring myself to look at the top again or write about it for a few days, and then I drafted this post and avoided taking pictures of myself in the top for ten days, leaving me unable to complete the post. Then I took the pictures and left the draft post unfinished for another week or so. Clearly, I just haven’t been ready to think about it.

After all that stalling, here, at last, are the pictures. They are not terribly good pictures, but they are as good as they’re going to get.

The sad truth is that the skirt is too wide, resulting in more gathering than I would like. That would not be so bad, except the way that the neckline pulls in and the bust pushes out makes the front of the skirt ride quite a bit higher than the back of the skirt, and I don’t like the result. It would almost make a cute maternity top, except that even if that had been my intention, the height discrepancy between the front and the back would be a problem.

What I need to do, I suppose, is rip the skirt back and reknit it with smaller needles. (I don’t think I need fewer stitches, I just need to stick with size 9 needles instead of increasing up to size 11). What I’m not so sure about is the high front / low back issue — I could use short rows to remedy that, but I dread the very idea of having to work out the math. Perhaps short rows won’t be necessary if the skirt itself is not so dang voluminous. I don’t know. What do you think?

At the moment, the project has been sitting in my sweater chest, and I’m pretty content to leave it there.

I had a cold earlier this week, and I wanted to work on something fairly simple, so I pulled some orange yarn from Gryphon out of storage and started making a top that ought to be good for the transition to spring, should the transition to spring ever arrive.

The project is certainly keeping me entertained. Can you figure out how I knit what I have so far?

I’ve used a bit more than half of my yarn already, so it’s an open question how much length I’m going to be able to eke out of what remains. It should be fun figuring it out.

Pattern: Dress is my own pattern; Peep is Bluebird by Berrocco.
Size: Dress is 22" at the chest, sized to fit an 18-month-old.
Yarn: Blue Sky Alpacas Worsted Hand Dyes (50 percent wool, 50 percent alpaca; 100 yds per 100 g skein), petal and chocolate 
Yardage: About 280 yds
Source: Jimmy Beans Wool  
Needles: US 9-10.5 (5.5-6.5mm) double-pointed and circular needles
Gauge: 16 stitches = 4" in Stockinette stitch
Notes: For a project that I made up as I went along, I think this dress turned out very cute. I won the Blue Sky Alpacas yarn that I used to make it from Jimmy Beans Wool in their design contest, but until a few weeks ago I was unable to figure out what to do with it. I had three skeins of brown and one of pink, which were packaged together in a kit to make knee socks. I’m not really a knee socks kind of gal, but there was too much yarn to make just an accessory and too little for an adult garment. Earlier this month, I got to thinking of baby dresses, and I came up with this design for a sweet and simple yoked dress with short sleeves.

The dress was knit from the top down. The construction is pretty simple: I just figured out how many stitches I wanted at the armhole divide (equal to the desired body circumference at the chest plus both sleeves at their full width), decided how wide the head opening ought to be, and worked out how many increase rounds I needed to do, beginning with a round of K2, m1 and moving to K3, m1, then K4, m1, and so forth. I added one additional round of brown between each subsequent pink stripe to give the stripes a graduated effect. To make the skirt widen gradually, I added two stitches at each side seam every fourth or fifth round, and I also changed to larger needles twice as I worked my way down.

The Peep was a last-minute impulse knit — I saw Grace’s cute birds over at Kathryn Ivy yesterday and thought I’d whip up one of my own in the leftover pink yarn to give to the dress’s recipient, who I saw later in the day. This was a very quick and fairly simple pattern, though I ran into some trouble with the finishing directions. I was having a heck of a time getting it to look right until I realized that I had misunderstood which part of the little pink blob I had knit was supposed to be the head. The toddler who I turned it over to seemed to like it, if her carrying it around and waving it up and down is any indication.

Pattern: My own
Size: 34" bust, 42" at bottom hem, 18" total length, 7.5" sleeves
Yarn: Habu Wool Roving A-81 1/6 (100 percent undyed wool; 186 yds per oz)
Yardage: About 2,000 yards, held double
Sources: KPixie; Purl Soho 
Needles: US 5 (3.75 mm) and US 6 (4.00 mm) Knit Picks Harmony circular needles
Gauge: 26 sts and 40 rows = 4″ in stockinette
Notes: The buttons came first on this project, and the pattern followed. This direction of development is fitting for the first finished sweater in the new Button Collection. My father created these glass buttons for me as a Christmas gift, and I came up with the design in the hope of showcasing them properly. I was going for a garment with a plain, clean look to it, vaguely Japanese-influenced, but not boring. I think I hit the mark.

The Kinari cardigan was knit from the top down and hemmed along the button bands and collar at the finishing stage. I did run into a few problems en route. The most significant one was the result of a combination of yarn trouble and planning miscalculations. I initially bought 8.5 ounces of Habu Wool Roving from KPixie, but once I cast on I realized it wouldn’t be enough. I found what seemed to be the same yarn for sale on Purl’s website, so I snapped it up. Unfortunately, it was not the same thickness. I wonder if what I got (which, oddly, lacked any label) was actually Wool Roving A-80 1/3 rather than Wool Roving A-81 1/6. The latter is supposed to be exactly twice as thick as the former, which seems to fit the case, as one strand of the yarn that Purl sent ended up being a perfect substitute for two strands of the yarn from KPixie.

I didn’t figure this out for a good long while, and in the meantime I knit the patterned portion of the body using a strand of each of the two different yarns without going up a needle size, which made a rather stiff fabric. I also continued to increase at the same rate from the armpits to the bottom hem. The outcome was, sadly, both too wide and too stiff. I had made a triangle sweater. I cut it the edging off and tried again with a single strand of the heavier yarn and slightly larger needles, and this attempt worked out much better.

In addition, I had a small problem with the collar, in that I didn’t intend for it to look like it does. What I had sketched was a true boatneck, but I cast on too few stitches for the neckline and then compounded the problem by decreasing rather than increasing stitches on the neckline hem, which made the collar stand up rather than lie down flat. The good news is that I like it just the way it is, so I am considering it a happy accident rather than evidence of how much I have to learn about collars.

I am particularly pleased with the aptness of the button closures, which gave me a bit of a panic when the time came to make them and I realized that I simply had no idea what I was doing and no sewing or embroidery experience to draw on. As I mentioned in my last post, I owe the basic technique to Ysolda, who uses it to beautiful effect in her Coraline sweater (about to be released for sale; link goes to Ravelry), and who provides a great tutorial on her website for free. I modified the technique so that rather than making half-moon button closures, I made lollipop-shaped closures by partially sewing the two sides together at the attachment point. Though the closures were quite twisty when they came off the needles, they settled down when blocked, so that the sweater can now be worn entirely buttoned, entirely unbuttoned, or partially buttoned.

I am thankful, too, to Lorna’s Laces for making a red sock yarn that doesn’t bleed a bit, even in hot water. I tested it. Without Lorna’s, you’d be looking at a sweater with white button closures. I’m glad that you’re not.

In the end, this sweater came out uncannily close to my sketch. When David told me in response to this observation that I seem to be getting better at knitting things exactly how I want them, I said that may be true, but I also got lucky. Whatever the reason, I am proud of how well this design highlights the buttons, how simple it looks, and how striking it is.

Now I just have to find something to wear with it. It’s still far too cold here for elbow-length sleeves and skirts.

————————————–

Other posts about the Kinari cardigan:

• In which I begin
• In which I announce my plans and show off the buttons
• In which I wax eloquent about the uncertainties of knitwear design
• In which I have to reknit the body
• In which I make progress but am still not finished
• In which I show off a button closure

I have (finally!) finished all the knitting on the Kinari cardigan, and this morning I figured out how I want to do the button closures. I extend my deep appreciation to Ysolda, who has posted a very good tutorial with photos on how to make sewn button loops. I modified her instructions to make this hybrid creation.

Now all I have to do is sew down most of the hem, add the six button loops, sew on the buttons, sew down the rest of the hem, and block. The end is near!

After feeling stalled out for a few weeks, I’m making visible progress again on the Kinari cardigan. I’ve finished up the body edging for the second time, and this morning I started the second sleeve. When I tried the partial cardigan on yesterday, it looked much more like my sketch than it had the first time around. I have my fingers crossed that the sailing will be smooth from here.

Meanwhile, David and I took off for Chicago on Friday, where we had a fun time tromping around the city for a few days, visiting the Field Museum, and generally pretending that we don’t have jobs or responsibilities. I kept saying that we were on "vacation," but David tells me that other people call this "the weekend." Hmm.

I checked out Loopy Yarns while we were there, where I bought some Aslan Trends souvenir yarn at 60 percent off. It’s an alpaca/merino blend in lovely shades of blue and orange that I didn’t quite manage to capture with the camera. David will have you know that he was the one who picked out these colors as the best pairing in the sale bin. I have already planned a hat pattern.

Thanks for all the amusing comments on the last post. Your guesses entertained me (and my mother), but alas, you’re all wrong except Rachel, who is right that that is the pig I made in Mrs. Smith’s middle school art class. Rachel knew this because she and I went to middle school together, and she has a ceramic pig of her own. Since Beverly Anne had the closest guess — that I am "making a piggy, cowie, bunny toy" — she wins the prize, which is either two skeins of Lorna’s Laces in Amish or three skeins of Manos Cotton Stria in a bright red (links go to Ravelry; if you haven’t joined yet, you won’t be able to follow them). I have to keep the exact nature of my design under wraps for a while, but I’ll let you know what I’ve been up to just as soon as I’m able.