Fair Aisle?

In response to MJ's question, I think the patterning in this purple sweater does count as Fair Aisle, but since I only did it with one color (black) against the main color, I didn't think that counted.

Not only that, but for the yoke I do plan to try more than one color, so I want to be able to claim Full Fair Aisle gloating rights once I actually do it.

I'm not sure I want to do that crazy of a deal - several colors - because you really need to put them on bobbins or whatever to do that and I'm not interested in that.

Do stay tuned, thougg, because the body of the sweater is done - it's 14 inches high as of last night - and I will be starting the sleeves today.

I know, I know - I NEVER do sleeved sweaters. But I kind of want to give this pattern the full try and without sleeves this is just another one of MY sweaters. I want to try this sleeves-and-yoke-on-same-needle deal.

If the sweater is too warm I can always give it away.

What I'm up to now....

I got this great book, KNITTING WITHOUT TEARS, and it's just wonderful. Not only does Mz. Zimmerman Know Her Shit, she's a pleasure to read - salty and sarcastic - not what I was expecting from a knitting book, that's for sure.

Anyway her thing is Entirely Seamless Sweaters, and since that's my deal too I am VERY excited to give one a try. I'm combining some patterning (my first attempt) from her Ski Sweater with the body style of her Seamless Sweater.

You knit the thing in the round to the armpits, then knit the individual sleeves in the round up to the shoulders, then put the armpit stitches on holders and join the whole bastard up to do the yoke/shoulders/neck still in the round.

So far I'm about 10 or 11 inches in so I don't know how the whole thing will go - more as it progresses. In the meantime here's the progression of the pattern:






I'm using Twisted Sister half silk half wool and #7 and #8 needles. Gauge is 5 stitches to the inch for a Zimmerman sweater, and she means it. I used the 7s on the ribbing and the 8s on the body and pattern. I want it to come in a little at the waist so I'm back on the 7s until the armpit. There's no visible difference in the result so I think I will stick with the 7s.

Bottom two inches are K1 P1 rib. It's a really luxurious yarn and I think it will be a great sweater.

Oh and one more thing

Oh and here's the newest sweater. This one is for Young Hank, who is about six months old now. I made this big so he can wear it I hope for a few months:



It's copied from a sweater Mary Heather made (Knit Café) and it's got a very cute boat neck.

Super-easy Recipe:

Front and back are the same - a square of whatever dimension you are after.

The first and last 9 rows are contrasting color in garter stitch, and the body between is main color in stockinette.

The only tricky thing is sewing the neck together but even that's not so bad. Then set the sleeves in - no knitting them on because of the seam at the boat neck - and sew the sides.

I used a 10.5 needle for the rainbow stuff and a size 10 for the blue.

The blue is Manos del Uruguay yarn, and one skein made all but the last 10 rows of the second sleeve, which leads me to contemplate that

1. a smaller sweater (this one is 12 x 12 inches) could be done with only one skein, or

2. if I'd put a stripe or something in the body I could have done the whole thing with the one skein.

Oh well, now I can make a matching hat and probably scarf too - the skein is I think 135 yards.

Let the cabling begin!

Yes, it's been a ridiculously long time since I posted to this blog.

Not that I haven't been knitting though - just not blogging.

At the end of 2004 I promised myself I would get some guts and learn some new stitches, starting with the dreaded CABLING.

I'd seen several books illustrating it but feared I would not be able to figure it out unless a human being showed me how to do it.

Then one night about a week ago or so I decided just to TRY it and see what would happen. I got out a ball of my old friend GOA - the easiest yarn in the world to knit with - and gave it a try.

You know what? It's super easy!

I'm not doing anything fancy, just two stitches on the needle, but I understand the process now and will be able to forge ahead with more complicated stuff.

Here's a hat I made - it's seed stitch with two cables at either side!



(one ball of 50g yarn, and not knitted in the round because I didn't want to have to worry about the cables joining properly at the top. So I did it as a tall rectangle, then folded it over, sewed the two side seams, threw on some tassels, and called it finished)