And I WROTE the damn thing

Back in 2007, I wrote a blog post about a sweater that I put together based on one that a TV character was wearing.  In case you missed it, here's the link.  I ended up making 2 sweaters using the natural white Fisherman's Brand Wool from Lion Brand.  I love the pattern and, in fact, I wore one of them on Sunday when I was shoveling snow and never felt a bit of cold.  I love it.

Last year I bought a beautiful Valley Yarns burgundy wool for a project that I later decided not to make.  I thought it would be perfect for a new jumper and I knew just which pattern I wanted to use - the pretty man sweater.

One thing to keep in mind that this is a pattern that I wrote and have made twice.  That will be important later.

I downloaded the pattern and made an adjustment right away.  The fisherman's rib, or brioche stitch, is a very stretchy stitch.  It's effectively a double knit stitch and has a huge amount of give to it.  In my pattern, I didn't use any sort of rib on it but then I had issues with the cast on being too rigid.  This time I decided to start with a provisional cast on that will allow the garment to stretch to its heart's content before I go back and add whatever I'm going to add for the bottom edge.  That should give it a better edge.

All's good, I got it started and knit to the armhole shaping.  This particular pattern has raglan sleeves outlined by a simple cable.  As I started this shaping THE FIRST TIME, I goofed and decided to add the decreases on the wrong side since I was doing the cables on the right side.  It wasn't until I'd got through the 3rd cable crossing (18 rows in) that I realized that doing the decrease on the wrong side was the wrong thing.  All the nice stitches was on the inside with the decreases.  The outside didn't look terrible but it wasn't right.  So I ripped it out to the beginning of the cabling.  Not a terribly easy thing with this stitch but I did it because it was the right thing to do.

OK.  Got it ripped out and back on the needles and started off again.  I got to the 5th (30 rows in0 cable twist when I realized it wasn't shaping right.  It has narrowed too quickly and I was running out of stitches.  This happened last night when I had sat down to knit 2 simple rows before I went to bed.  It was late.  I realized I hadn't paid attention to the pattern.  I got cocky and didn't look at the pattern.
So I pulled it up and, sure enough, I was supposed to decrease every 4th row, not every 2nd row. Even I know that will make a difference. My question is, how could I have not known this?  How did I not even look at the pattern?  I wrote the damn thing!

Ask me what I did this weekend

Remember I was working on spinning some mohair and was wondering if it would work to ply it with the turquoise merino? Well, here are the results:

I love the way the solid colored merino toned down and grounded the colors of the mohair. I've got a couple more ounces of the mohair to spin and I'm waiting for more merino to come so I can finish. This skein turned out what I would call heavy lace weight, makeing about 320 yards (72 grams) so doing the rest of it should give me about 600 yards. Now it's just a matter of figuring out what the pretty yarn wants to be!

I had to do some traveling last week for my job. Actually, I should say I got to travel because it was the perfect opportunity to do some exploring. Of course, any trip requires the project search. I couldn't figure out what I wanted to take with me because I didn't really have a good project going to take. So I quickly grabbed this black wool that my friend Cindy gave me and the leftover yarn from some recent socks and started to experiment with it. I've been wanting to do some other projects using the Brioche stitch in preparation for our Heritage Knitting Retreat next June. I thought it would be cool to have the electric colors of the sock yarn against the black. The gauntlet is reminiscent of what you might have seen in the latter half of the 19th century.

The second thing I grabbed was some Fortissima Socka in white and the pattern for "Evening Stockings for a Young Lady to Knit." It's a sock pattern in the Nov/Dec 2009 Piecework Magazine, adapted by Nancy Bush from a Weldon's pattern. As you can see, it's a long sock and the lacy pattern is so lacy and so easy, you wouldn't believe. The shaping for the leg is done along the back of the leg so you have a seam running up the back and the pretty lace everywhere else. I know this looks like a sock to fit a child but that's only because it's not blocked yet and I have pretty small feet anyway.

I thought I would make this with the white yarn because it's the only sock yarn I had 3 skeins of (bought it for something else that I ended up not making) and I wanted to be sure I had enough. The thought was to make them with the white and then dye them but I like them so much that I've decided to keep them as is. I would definitely recommend these for sock lovers. Easy with a huge payoff!

Reveling in the past

This will be quite a long post so if you're seated comfortably, we'll begin...

I'm back from vacation and have barely been able to catch my breath. That means I've got a lot of catching up to do here. I mentioned in a previous post about going to the Texas First Ladies exhibit at TWU. I got some pictures but my camera batteries went dead so I only got a few. Have a look:

And one of the fun things about hanging out with my Mom, is I have time to do some experimenting. Several years ago I made a sweater using Lion Brand's Fisherman's Wool and the Fisherman's Rib stitch which is also known under quite a few other names including Brioche stitch. We've found it all through 19th century patterns. I learned to do the stitch originally through an old Vogue Knitting magazine in an Elizabeth Zimmerman article. The way EZ taught it was to cast on an odd number of stitches, knit 1, then knit into the stitch below the next stitch. You repeat those to the end and then knit 1. On the opposite side you knit 2 then knit below and knit 1, repeating the last 2 until the end of the row. Once you get into the rhythm with it, it's quite fun to do. You just have to be really patient and aware of what you're doing for the first 8 or 10 rows until the pattern starts to emerge. After that, the previous row will give you clues about where you are.

As we've been researching, however, the most common instructions are to knit 1, put the yarn forward and slip the next stitch purlwise, bring the yarn to the back (really it's just a yarn over) and then knit 1, repeating the last 2 to the end. Generally they would tell you to cast on an even number of stitches and just do the same thing on both sides. With this version, you know immediately where you are and it's much, much easier if you make a mistake to go back.

One of the things I've been wanting to try out is doing it in 2 colors. I came across a great website devoted to the brioche stitch. She had very clear instructions on how to work with more than 1 color so I got some white wool and some green wool and cast on. I liked the pattern so much I just kept going until I had quite a decent length scarf. But I still had some green left (and lots of white) so I decided I would try to figure out how to do this in the round and make me a matching hat. Once I realized I just had to knit the white rounds and purl the green rounds, it worked like a dream! Have a look at this:

And totally reversible:

I cast on 20 stitches for the scarf and 80 for the hat on size 5 needles if you want to try it. One thing to keep in mind is for the scarf, you need to use either double pointed needles or circular needles.

Yarn store report: On my way back I stopped in Springfield, MO, at one of the friendliest yarn shops I've found and got some lovely fiber. If you're ever through Springfield, stop by Simply Fibers and have a look. Very cute, very friendly, and a very nice selection.

And FINALLY, I started a new project. I'll let the picture say it all for now except to say the middle part sits in the middle of the table and the six pond scenes are placemats. I'm doing it in the size 50 thread I used for the Starburst cloth.

(edited to fix the First Lady pictures)

A Bit Unusual

It’s a bit unusual but I’ve decided I like it. It’s terribly comfortable and I think this Malabrigo yarn will work much better in this sort of garment than in a sweater. It’s such a loosely spun single ply that it pills all over the place with the wear of a sweater. This design was based on a pattern I saw in a Godey’s Ladies Book for a young boy’s Body Warmer. The picture showed it wrapped around the child under a jacket or worn under other clothes (I’ll try to find the original picture and scan it in for you to see). It intrigued me so I used a stitch pattern that I saw in quite a few other patterns. I’ve used it before, particularly in the ‘pretty man sweater’ or fisherman’s sweater (whichever, both work for me). In these 19th century patterns it’s called brioche stitch and I’ve seen it mentioned under that name and under the name, fisherman’s stitch. I learned the stitch from an Elizabeth Zimmerman article in an old Vogue Knitting magazine. There’s even this web page dedicated to the stitch and it’s variations, if you’re interested.

The way I learned to do it is to K1, knit in the stitch below the next stitch, and repeat across. The way the Godey’s Ladies Book describes it is:

Stitch Brioche, thread forward, slip 1, knit 2 together, the same backwards and forwards. (It might be better said to bring the thread to the front, slip 1 stitch, bring the thread to the back so that there are 2 stitches laying together, then knit the next 2 stitches)

Either way, you get the same pattern. And it’s a pattern you have to be a little patient with because you won’t really see it until you’ve worked 5-6 rows, at least. I also think that if you were going to use it in the round, you would need to use the version from Godey’s. And it makes things much easier if you work it over an odd number of stitches.

I finished my newest Fiber Trends felted clogs (sorry, I called them slippers before – I stand corrected) and had enough yarn left over that I made a pair of felted mittlets (my own pattern). You probably can’t see it in the picture but I did a little bit of textured stitching that just gives it a little somethin’ somethin’ up close. They fit great. All I did was cast on 36 stitches, did several rows of garter, knit plain for a while, increased for the thumb (until I had 18 stitches between the markers), knit a few rows plain, decreased the 18 thumb stitches, knit plain for a while and ended with several rows of garter. Oh, yeah, and I threw in the textured rows just for kicks.

I love these Fiber Trend felted clogs. I made my first pair 6 years ago and finally decided after they started falling apart that it might be time to make a new pair. And they only take a couple of hours to make. Bonus!

Now I have matching slippers and mittlets. Could come in useful this winter, right?