The Ink sweater is coming along rather quickly, especially on the 10.5 needles. I've finished the front and back, and am now about 1/3 of the way through the first sleeve. Sadly, grey stockinette stitch is about the least interesting thing I can think of to photograph let alone look at (we'll overlook the fact that I still can't find my camera cable, shall we?), so no photos yet.
In other crafting news, I'm in the middle of fiddling about with a length of fabric that I accidentally washed incorrectly. Normally, all the fabric I use for historical recreation gets a thorough hot wash/cold rinse in the machine to make sure that it does all the shrinking it's going to do right away, and so I don't get surprised with accidental doll clothing later on. So I received this lovely linen/wool blend fabric, the result of a group auction spearheaded by some LiveJournal friends, and absentmindedly tossed the whole thing into the washer.
Well, dear readers, that certainly is not the recommended prewash method for that particular blended fabric. While the two washes I gave it did remove the sizing/finish and thus the rather odd, strong plastic smell, the yardage shrank about 40%. Whoops.
This gives me some license to play with it, since I didn't quite have a purpose for it in mind when I purchased it. So I did a burn test (point of interest: something plastic melted off the fabric) and a bleach test (yup, bleach eats wool but not linen). In the process of the bleach test I discovered that once the wool was gone, the linen stretched back out to its original width. Oh, now that's interesting.
I mixed up a weak black dye solution and soaked a strip, which resulted in a colour very close to gunmetal. Not what I would like, but in the process I discovered that the material will stretch back to shape when it's soaking wet. It's still slightly fulled, but nothing like the 70s sofa cushion texture it previously had.
Tonight, I picked up a few packets of black dye and a few packets of deep violet dye. I'm going to halve the yardage and dye part black and part violet. Instead of running it through the dryer, I'm going to stretch the fabric and let it hang dry. I'll keep you all posted as events develop.
On a more personal note than is usually found in this blog, I'd just like to remind folks that just because someone has a different opinion than you do and bothers to express it does not mean that person is attacking you, trying to pick a fight, or failing to contribute to your blog. So please, if you have an opinion that's different from mine, or you notice me making a sweeping generalisation or assumption about something, do point it out. I promise I won't yell at you or accuse you of having bad manners.
Tempting is finished.
I ended up spicing in three rows of the chocolate brown wool. It actually looks quite nice with the chocolate brown/aqua decorative ribbon. Pictures forthcoming.
I've now started on the Ink Sweater by Black Dog Knits. So far, it's a fast, easy knit (I'm on the fourth decrease that forms the slightly flared hem). I made some changes to the pattern; this is the first time I've tried altering someone else's pattern, so I'm a bit nervous.
I ordered 10 balls of Knitpicks Wool of the Andes in Mist (medium gray). The pattern calls for Noro Cash Iroha (a silk/lambswool/cashmere/nylon blend), so right away you know the fabric is going to behave a bit differently. I started the knitup on a pair of size 9 steel needles-- the size that gives me the gauge called for in the pattern-- but I really, really did not like the fabric I was getting. There was nothing wrong with it per se; in fact, the gauge makes the double seed stitch selvedge look splendid. But the resulting fabric was stiff and had almost no drape.
What I want most from this sweater is something slightly drapey but warm to wear over a tank top this fall. No drape happening on 9s. So I jumped up to 10s (the size the pattern uses to get gauge). Still no dice. Jumped up to 10.5s, and had a winner. A nice, light fabric that drapes just enough to look fluid, but is still dense enough to be warm.
I suspect this will solve my other concern; namely, that a pattern sized for my 43" bust is not going to "skim" my 45.5" hips, even with a flare. Of course, I may have to order more yarn.
Quel horreur.
Quick PSA: I will probably be playing around with new templates, so bear with me. I am undecided as to whether I would prefer to keep the cheerful beaded template that is cute but a little too. . . pink, or to follow in the footsteps of my more favourite blogs and go for a calm neutral. Zen like. Anyway. Stuff might change.
So close. I was this close to finishing Tempting tonight, and then things went awry.
I've been working from a very limited supply of yarn. About a year ago, I bought eleven balls of Filatura di Crosa Luna yarn in a caramel brown. It was intended for a gift sweater for a person with whom I am no longer in touch, and the 1100 or so yards has been languishing in a bin in the craft closet ever since. Waiting.
For some reason, I thought this would be enough to finish Tempting without any adjustments. Nice caramel brown yarn, nice dark brown grosgrain ribbon with thin blue stripes, cast on to the Addi Turbos (because it's the only circ I have that's long enough, not because I like Addis, because I don't) and away we went. Until I hit the eyelets at the top, it looked like there would be just enough.
I forgot that yarnovers eat up yarn. So I cut the last few rows a bit short (3 instead of 5) and started to bind off. I only got about halfway before I realised that even tying in leftover bits of yarn from the (very tiny amount of) seaming was not going to gain me enough yarn to finish. So I started backing up. The plan was to undo the half-finished bindoff, splice in some chocolate brown Mondial Artica for the last three rows, and then do a crochet edging of the same color at the bottoms of the sleeves. Go ahead. Go back and look at the photo. I'll wait. Got the idea? Okay then.
Anyone who has ever used a nice, fluffy, soft yarn on a pair of Addi Turbos can probably predict what happened next. A cat jumped, I jumped, and 15 stitches slid off those blasted slick needles and ran like the devil. Right back down to the yarnover row. No matter how I cursed and bargained and picked at it with my crochet hook, the ladders kept getting worse.
So I ripped it. Down past the yarnover row. Down about a quarter inch below it, in fact. I place the yarnover row there, and gave up for the evening. Now I'm eating chocolate.
Blasted Addi Turbos. Time to invest in some more powder-coated Inox circulars.
