WIP: Cardigan & Romper for New Grandson

November 15, 2009| Lindy| 0 Comment | 10:29 am

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Okay — I swatched some more on this cardigan project. Earlier I had posted about Things Learned from a Swatch. Well, I continued to be dissatisfied with my color selections — I really just do not like that light aqua color for this sweater. So, I went back to my LYS and bought up all the teal color they had — which is the color I really wanted for the main color on the cardigan. The problem is that there isn’t enough of this color to do both a cardigan and a romper to match.

So, standing in front of the yarn bin at the store, I decided that I’d try using a combination of the teal, the red AND a darker blue. There was enough of the darker blue in one dye lot to do the romper and there was 1 ball of another dye lot left. Since I only need 1 ball of the darker color to do the alternating 3 color pattern in the cardigan, I bought this ball as well because the color variation is not that different between the two dye lots and since it will be mixed in with the other colors, it should work out okay.

Swatch_Cardigan3 Here’s my swatch with the new color scheme added. The darker blue color definitely shows up better than the lighter blue against the teal color that I want for the main color. I have started knitting the romper in the darker blue and I think I’m going to really like the coordinated outfit that will result. This project is a bit challenging because I am knitting on size 0 and size 1 needles to get the right guage. Lots and lots of small stitches…

First pair of SFS Socks Finished!First pair of SFS Socks Finished!

Yesterday, I finished my first pair of regulation socks for Socks for Soldiers, including weaving in the ends.

These are very long socks! I now have them washed and they are currently drying in the dryer. I need to run to the store and pick up a few extra “goodies” to put in the package and write my letter to the soldier who will receive the socks. Then, I should be ready to package everything up and send it off to Sarge at SFS.

Here’s a picture of the finished socks:
SFS_Finished2_103109

FO: Multnomah Shawlette in Crazy ZauberballFO: Multnomah Shawlette in Crazy Zauberball

I took a little knitting detour last week and knit up the Multnomah Shawl in Zauberball Crazy yarn. Colorway is Fliederduft, which is loosely translated as “lilacs”. I had allocated this yarn to a pair of socks as part of the “10 in 2010” projects at the beginning of this year. However, after looking through many examples of socks knit with Zauberball Crazy in the Ravelry projects, I decided that I really didn’t want to knit this yarn into a pair socks. So — I switched to a shawl and ended up doing the Multnomah pattern by Kate Flagg.

The shawl was done in garter stitch until I had 265 stitches and then I started the feather and fan pattern and did 9 repeats. This pattern is a fairly quick knit. I was able to finish it up in a week and that was even with needing to frog back a couple of rows in order to have enough yarn to bind off.

Final size of the shawl — it’s actually a shawlette — was 15.5 inches by 58 inches.

I am pleased with the result. It’s an nice size for a decorative scarf/shawlette and I think the striping of the yarn is shown off to better affect than it would be in a pair of socks.

Zauberball Crazy is a self-striping, marled yarn. Which means that it stripes, but because the two plies of the yarn may be different colors, you get a somewhat “tweedy” appearance in many of the stripes. It’s a unique yarn. It is a fingering weight, superwash wool and nylon yarn and the fabric is soft and drapes nicely after blocking. I did find that the yarn had a tendency to split occasionally and there were spots where a tuft of yarn from one of the plies would stick out — these were easily removed. I might be tempted to try another colorway — but not certain what project I would use it for.

The Multnomah Shawl pattern is a very popular pattern on Ravelry and there many knitters who have made larger shawls, so when I knit this pattern again I plan to knit a larger one. The pattern is free and available for download from Ravelry (must be Ravelry member) or on Kate Flagg’s website.

I have finally figured out how to share information from my Ravelry project pages, so I am linking to this project details on my “Z Crazy” Multnomah Page.

January and HatsJanuary and Hats

January in Nebraska is usually cold, snowy and gray. This year was no exception. We have had several 5 inch snowfalls, sometimes with freezing drizzle accompanying, temperatures well below freezing and our usual gusty winds — which makes for wind chills in the sub-zero category. So, it seemed like a good time to knit up some nice warm hats. I have knit two and am about half-way done with a third. February is continuing with the snow and cold temperatures — so I will have no trouble finishing this third hat.

First up is the “Three Color Hat ala EZ”:

This hat was knit using Patons Classic Wool yarn, which is a worsted weight yarn. This yarn is nice and soft and knits up well. The main color is Plum Heather (Colorway 77307). Color 2 was Aran (Colorway 00202) and Color 3 was Jade Heather (Colorway 77208). I used size US 6 and US 8 circular needles and my gauge was 5 spi using the larger needles.

I knit this hat according to the instructions given in Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knitting Workshop. Her instructions are for a yarn with a gauge of 4 spi, so I adjusted the number of stitches from 72 to 90 to start. The first color pattern is one suggested in the book, the second is one I made up as I went. I knit the hat to a length of 6 inches before I started decreasing. It is probably too long, but I’m happy with the end result: A one of a kind, warm wool hat that fits nicely over my ears and keeps me warm!

Next Post: Trinity Stitch Slouchy Hat.

Reference: Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knitting Workshop