Ruthless Knitting Archive

Since returning from Vermont, in addition to completing the Nine-to-Five Socks and making the XOXO Baby Socks, I’ve also finished up a couple old projects that have been lying around making me feel guilty.

First, I managed to reseam and weave in all the ends on the turtle sweater (explanatory backstory is here and here), and on Tuesday I returned it to its rightful owner, Gwendolyn. You may recall that the hood opening was too small for her, causing much consternation when her mother tried to dress her in the sweater. I solved this problem by (1) taking the sweater apart; (2) ripping out about 10 rows of the back, increasing a whole bunch of stitches evenly across the back so that it had as many stitches as the hood does at the back, and knitting up the remaining rows; (3) grafting the hood and the back together; and (4) grafting the shoulders together. Now it’s quite stretchy. As you can see, Gwendolyn looks adorable in it (though a tad concerned — I was babysitting her, and this is the look that means, “You are okay, but you are clearly not my mother”).

There are still some things about the sweater that I don’t like, but it’s better than it was. Should you ever wish to knit a copycat sweater, I posted the chart for the chart on my Designs page.

Next up, I finally got around to putting an edging on the hairpin lace afghan that may or may not have been knit by my grandmother. (Original posts about this project — from March, yikes! — are here and here.) To do this, I purchased some turquoise yarn in a similar color to the turquoise in the blanket, double crocheted across the unfinished edge, single crocheted back across, and then picked up a stitch through every crocheted stitch and knit several rows of garter stitch before binding off. The edges look much better now, though still not perfect. I did my best.

The blanket’s edge originally looked like this:

And now it looks like this:

Good enough, I think. I’m sending this off to my brother James today.

Having cleared up every last item of Duty Knitting except for my second Red Herring sock (to be cast on soon), I’ve been plugging away on the second sleeve of Frances and trying to get my Florence pattern written up. Busy as a bee, I am.

Also, Presents!

I got some excellent packages in the mail last week. First, I received two skeins of Undertow from Gryphon in the color “Cramp.” These were my prize for sort of winning her bodice design contest. I say “sort of” because I was the only entrant, and I didn’t exactly follow the rules. Still, a bodice will come of it, and I got some pretty yarn:

Now I just need to figure out to do with these. I haven’t formulated a plan yet. (The cardigan pattern and Undertow yarn are both for sale in Gryphon’s Etsy shop.)

Gryphon also sent a skein of Traveller, one of her hand-dyed sock yarns, for me to use in doing swatches for the bodice. I made a swatch using four different needles, and I had to show you a picture because this yarn is just so pretty. It’s soft and squooshy, too. I highly recommend it.

Then, on Saturday, I got my prize package in the mail from winning Mel’s contest. She sent a skein of Three Waters Farm fingering-weight yarn in the color lilac, as well as a great lavender rosemary goat’s milk soap from the same farm. I was thrilled to get these, both because I love to try local, sustainable products and because they remind me of the Piedmont of North Carolina, where I used to live. Thanks, Mel!