The up side of living in Minnesota...

...is that you can knit a sweater in April and still get to wear it. As I look out my window at the snow, I'm toasty in my sweater. HA to you, spring!

Having finished an actual sweater and worn it and and having quite liked wearing it, I am all gung ho to knit another. I have been looking for a pattern to use ten balls of blue bamboo that I have had in my stash for a few years. Right now I am considering a couple dress patterns. Is that crazy? I mean, a dress couldn't be any more intense than some of those monster shawls I've knit, right? Right?

Bamboo Dress Swatch

I'm trying to be rational. I like quick results, so a top or short cardigan would seem like good ideas. But it seems silly to use up only half the blue bamboo on a little ol' t-shirt when I could have a blue bamboo sundress. I've flipped through all my magazines, and thumbed through my pattern files, but darn it if a bamboo dress doesn't seem just the thing. Some serious swatching is required, though - if knitting a sweater that doesn't fit is sad, knitting a dress that doesn't fit would be devastating.

As the bamboo dilemma percolates, I realize I have next to nothing to work on. The Leaves Dancing shawl, which is moving quickly but I'm not even halfway done. I need to swatch for the ribbed baby jacket that I am so in love with. I'll knit it up in Cotton Ease, so that will be a satisfying knit - quick and squooshy. I finished two facecloths with donated vintage cotton, I'll do one more than gift the girls at work.

Frogged Pea Pod

I picked up the "Pea Pod" baby sweater I started possibly ten years ago, because my sister happened to see it and thought it was cute. It had been completely finished (except for buttons) for a while, but the shoulders were stiff and bulky. I'd taken the sleeves off about fives years ago, intending to fix the problem. I wasn't sure what to do, so I just stuck it in a corner to let it think about how disappointing it was. I picked it up the sweater last night, with no idea of which size I had been knitting, or what needles I had used, but thinking I had a nearly-finished baby sweater on my hands. I kitchnered the shoulders and picked up stitches for a sleeve. After an inch and a half, I realized my sleeve was great - it was the rest of the sweater that had problems. I started it as a new knitter, when gauge was more important than the resulting fabric. The resulting little armor jacket was not salvageable. I frogged it all. I still love the yarn - a 75% cotton, 25% wool blend - so maybe I'll try it again.

I also frogged a little scarf project that my MIL gave me yarn for. The gauge was off, and I knew it. I wasn't going to enjoy working on it. The yarn is awesome, so I'll cast on again with bigger needles and avoid the black mohair madness syndrome.

Back to Leaves Dancing

With my Corona sweater done, it was time to look over the UFOs in my Ravelry projects list. It was a surprisingly short list, and not just because I sometimes randomly cast on and don't start a project page.

Leaves Dancing has been in limbo since January - so long I had forgotten where I left off! Since the pattern is in German, and I had scratched down only rough notes about the different symbols, it was hard to figure out where I was on the charts. It was tricky remembering what I had been doing for the edge stitches... and for the decreases!

I carefully frogged back a couple rows after realizing I couldn't find my place on the chart because I had made a mistake and my stitch count was off. With a fresh start, though, things have been moving smoothly. The pattern is easy to read, and progresses pretty quickly.

I'll be doing several repeats of the second chart, because my yarn is very fine, and I want a nice big shawl. I have lots o' yarn, so I'll just keep going until I can't stand it anymore.

The other UFO in my projects list is actually an un-started object. I've tried several time to work the first charts of the 2011 KALendar, but my yarn and needles just won't cooperate, and I end up with a wonky bunch of loops that resembles nothing.

I have other projects in mind, including a summer sweater knit from my stashed blue bamboo, and another baby project or two, but right now I just have a couple washcloths from my favorite pattern in the works.

Success

It's done!

I have a lovely, warm sweater. I haven't blocked it, of course, because blocking is boring and things take a long time to dry. I will go do so this afternoon, though, because it deserves it.

Corona is a great sweater. It's super toasty and surpisingly thick and heavy. I guess I've been wearing only lightweight sweaters for a while, because I feel like a polar bear in this.

Still, it fits. I finished it. I'm happy.

Oh, yeah - THIS is why

I hate knitting things that don't fit.

I have now frogged the sweater body of my test knit 1.75 times. The first time, my gauge lied and the sweater was huge. I frogged the whole thing and restarted with smaller needles. I just frogged to the ribbing yesterday because I hadn't read the directions carefully, and only did 6 repeats of the waistline ribbing... instead of 12.

Sigh.

I've knit one sleeve 2.5 times, because I had one done when I went down a needle size on the body of the sweater, but after restarting with the smaller needles, my colorwork looked too tight after so I frogged to the cuff and started again.

I'm hoping this is the last knit of each part of the sweater. I know there are yoke issues ahead, but at least I will have something sweaterish when I get there!

In happier news, Northampton is awesome yarn. Despite the frogging, there is no pilling or untwisting or other bad behavior. It's still sproingy and luscious.

Is it wrong of me to hope that the 30 degree weather hangs on a bit longer here, so I can wear this (potentially) beautiful sweater?

Completely unrelated, here are pictures of Jayne, who doesn't care if her sweaters fit or not.

Jayne loves knitted things. Unfortunately, she does not limit her love to wearing knitting things. She also eats them. She nibbled both of the Sandman's beer mitts; I was able to darn one but the other one is beyond my skills - she ate right through the wishbone cable on the back of the hand.

This weekend, she completely destroyed one of my colorwork mitts. Completely destroyed it. I can't blame her - she is a puppy, and I knew she liked those mitts. My fault. I bought her a new hard plastic chewy thing to distract her.

Back to the body of my sweater. 14" of stockinette... again.

Sigh.

Test Knitting

I signed up a couple weeks ago to test knit a sweater, which is crazy. I have only completed two adult sweaters in my 13 years of knitting. I have completed a handful of baby and toddler sweaters, almost as many dog sweaters, but I don't really do people sweaters. At this moment, I think I have 3 unfinished sweaters stashed in various closets in my house.

It's not that I can't knit big projects. I have several monster shawls under my belt, and I jump into those with abandon.

I'm not afraid of making mistakes. I frogged 1200 yards of laceweight because I ran out of yarn with fewer than 5 rows to go; I reknit an entire sock because my gauge was better on the second sock. I'm ok with starting over, I'm fine with lots of knitting.

I have tons of sweater patterns in my pattern stash, so it's not that I find sweaters unappealing, and since I live in Minnesota, so it's not like I don't need sweaters.

So why no sweaters? Maybe it's the cost. I am cheapcheapcheap. While I have lots of single skeins for quickie projects, I don't buy yarn in quantities. I can't go to my stash and find several choices for a sweater.

I ordered yarn for this sweater, even got an extra ball just to be safe. It's lovely smooshy yarn in a color that makes my mouth water and will look great on me.

I've had gauge problems, and had to start over after knitting 6" of body and one sleeve. I could probably go down one more needle size (gauge swatches lie), but I'm afraid if I frog again I will ruin the yarn.

When I signed up to test knit, I knew I would have to actually finish the sweater. It's like a little trick I pulled on myself.

I hope it works.

Um... yeah.

I stopped posting for a bit. Quite a bit. As in, I forget how many things I've knit and how many dogs I've fostered. Lots of the former, a few of the latter.

The big news? I'm knitting baby things for my niece, due July 5. Knitting baby things is awesome. And addictive. A whole sweater is just a few hours! I even did a blanket, but that was a bit of a chore, even in my favorite Little Arrowhead pattern. It's fun adding little details to projects, such as the Wee Leaf set, pictured here. I added wee leaves to the straps of Mary Jane booties instead of knitting socks. Ack, the cuteness!

The next big news? Foster failure! We (a term I must use loosely, as my boys didn't have a lot of choice) adopted Jayne, a chihuahua-terrier mix. She's a dainty little devil, who cleverly hid her Jack Russell-ness until I had completely fallen for her. (No, there is nothing wrong with Jack Russells, I just prefer to believe I am smarter than my dog, and Russells really challenge that belief.)

Anyway, Jaynie is a sweet girl. We've had to put up with teenage puppy tricks that we had forgotten - the interminable chewing, for example. She has devoured more rolls of toilet paper than all of the pups who've ever lived in our bathroom. I praised her last week because she only shredded a roll halfway, instead of making confetti out of the whole roll. She may be growing up!

Jayne is the happy recipient of two sweaters. She is such a girl, she loves 'em! At only ten pounds, she's a good size to knit for, too. Poor Harley, at 30 pounds, never gets sweaters!

I've spent a lot of time updating my Ravelry page with photos, so instead of going into details about the past, I'm going to start fresh!

My current project is a test knit, the Corona Sweater. It's a basic knit from the bottom up, in the round, close-fitting sweater with just a titch of color work and some cabled ribbing. So far, so good. I'm using Valley Yarns Northampton, and really loving this yarn. It's super cushy and the color has lots of depth.

September Sockdown socks!