Cheater Stripes

Posted on December 8, 2021 by Deborah Cooke

Here’s another project that’s been hanging around for too long, without a very good reason to do so. This sweater was stuck on Sleeve Island because I was too lazy to cake up another skein of yarn for the second sleeve. The cakes I had didn’t start at the right point in the stripe sequence to match.

Finally, I got out my swift, caked the yarn and got back to knitting.

Here’s the finished sweater:

Stripes by Drea Renee Knits knit in Sugar Bush Motley by Deborah Cooke

The pattern is Andrea Mowry’s STRIPES!, (that’s a Ravelry link, although you can buy it directly from her website, too.) Instead of knitting it in a multitude of colours and creating stripes, I knit mine in a self-striping yarn. The yarn is Sugar Bush Motley in Peppered Teal. (That’s a Ravelry link, too – here’s one for Yarnspirations.) Of course, a self-striping yarn has a fixed repeat, which means that as the number of stitches in each row changes, so does the width of the stripes. I kind of like how this one came out anyway.

I first posted about this sweater in March.

Of course, I had my usual panic moment of being convinced I didn’t have enough yarn, and raced back to get another skein in the same dye lot. There were only two left so I bought them both, and (you saw this one coming) I didn’t need either of them, so I have a lot leftover.

Motley is a soft yarn made of an alpaca and merino blend. It runs thick and thin, which I always like better in the skein than when it’s knitted up. It’s a little bit itchy, so I’ll need to wear a t-shirt underneath.

Basic Sweater by Louisa Harding knit in Rowan Colourspun by Deborah Cooke

I have this sweater which I knit of Rowan Colourspun a few years ago, which is a bit big for me and looks dumpy as a result. I never do the waist shaping because it always ends up in the wrong place, but this sweater would have benefitted from a bit of that. I do like the long ribbing on the cuffs and the collar. The yarn is soft and has a lot of other colours in the grey, which is pretty.

I wanted this new one to fit a little more snugly and it does. Here they are, dancing together:

It’s good to compare them, because it shows other differences. I think the sleeves are a bit skinny on this new one – which happened with my Comfort Fade Cardigan from the same designer, too, so I should have kept that in mind – and it feels a bit short. Just an inch! My bind-off is a bit tight, so I may pick that back and add an inch of ribbing at the waist. maybe another inch on each sleeve, too. I don’t love the round yoke – it has a bit of a ripple in it still – but then, round yokes fit me so seldom. I really should concentrate on sweaters with set-in sleeves.

Another one off the needles!

Edited to Add – I picked out the hem last night and added another inch and a half. That extra length makes me much happier. 🙂

Stripes!

Posted on March 31, 2021 by Deborah Cooke

I can never resist a new project, even when I have a lot of projects to finish up. There’s something very satisfying about casting on.

In November, Andrea Mowry published a new pattern called Stripes! which I liked a lot. (That’s a Ravelry link.) It’s a top-down pullover with lots of options to vary the results. It looked like a quick and easy project – plus I had the perfect yarn in my stash (or so I thought).

I bought some Sugar Bush Motley at Spinrite last year because I really liked how it looked in the skein. (That link goes to the Motley project page on the Sugar Bush site.) I was expecting it to create an all-over speckly pattern. Once it was caked up, though, it was clear that this yarn was dyed to make repeating stripes. (This colourway is called Peppered Teal.)

I set it aside then, but pulled it out again for this sweater. I’d have stripes without changing colours every 8 rows. Of course, the stripes would vary in width, depending on the number of stitches on my needles, but I thought it would be okay.

Here’s the sweater so far:

Andrea Mowry's Stripes top-down pullover knit in SugarBush Motley by Deborah Cooke

This yarn is a merino-alpaca blend, so it will be warm. I decided that I wanted a turtleneck on this sweater, so I did a provisional cast-on, then knit down the sweater yoke as instructed. When I had a few inches done on the yoke, I picked up the neck stitches and knit up in ribbing to create the turtleneck. I also inverted the colour sequence – starting from the other end of the skein – because I knew the collar would be folded down and I wanted it to match up with the body. I had a hard time assessing the depth to knit – I thought it was long enough because I tried it on before the yoke was done. Once I divided for the underarms, though, the neck pulled down a bit and I had to rejoin the yarn and knit a few more inches on the neck.

I like the yarn, even though it’s a single-ply, loosely spun and a bit splitty. I like it because of the result. The knitted fabric is soft and light, with a really nice drape. I think this will be a sweater I wear a lot.

I can hear you asking why I’ve only managed this much since November. As is so often the way with “quick” projects, I made a mistake. I had knit this sweater well past this point, almost to the waist ribbing, when I took it off the needles to check the size. I find it hard to assess the size of a top-down pullover, even when I try it on, until I knit past the bust. It was huge, way too huge – because (ugh) my gauge was off. I figured out that I needed 50 less stitches in the body and would still have a loose fit, so I ripped all the way back to the neck. I could have changed to smaller needles, but I liked the drape of the fabric I was getting, so I followed the instructions for the next smaller size. That made a difference of 30 stitches in the body. Then I added 20 less stitches at the underarm, 10 less on each side, and carried on. I’m quite happy with the fit now.

And I figured out a new trick. Instead of transferring all the stitches to a length of wool to try on the sweater, then putting them back on the needle, I knit half the body on one 80cm circular, and the other half on a second 80cm circular. That means I can put the sweater flat to measure it, and also that I can (carefully!) try it on, without transferring the stitches. 🙂

Onward with this one. Looks like it will be a sweater to wear next winter…

The Earth Stripe Wrap

Posted on August 18, 2017 by Deborah Cooke

Earth Stripe Wrap by Kaffe Fassett in Rowan Kidsilk Haze The Earth Stripe Wrap is striped shawl designed by Kaffe Fassett and knit in ten shades of Rowan Kidsilk Haze. It was published in Rowan magazine #42 (Autumn/Winter 2007/2008). The image to the right is from the original magazine – I found it online but the copyright on the image belongs to Rowan.

Given my love for KSH and my admiration for Fassett’s use of colour, I’ve always wanted to knit this piece. This week, I finally cast on.

The biggest challenge with this piece is that some of the colours of KSH specified in the pattern have been discontinued and are no longer available. (Whenever a knitter is DISO (desperately in search of) KSH in Jacob, you can make a good guess that he or she plans to knit the Earth Stripe Wrap.) Rowan has published an updated version of it as a free download on their website, which substitutes new colours, but I wasn’t that crazy about all of their changes. Let’s have a closer look.

The original pattern specifies the following colours:
A – Hurricane #632 – available
B – Jacob #631 – discontinued
C – Elegance #577 – discontinued
D – Drab #588 – discontinued
E – Candygirl #606 – available
F – Meadow #581 – discontinued
G – Majestic #589 – available
H – Trance #582 – available
I – Jelly #597 – available
J – Blushes #583 – available

This wrap is knit with two colours held together in a stripe pattern that repeats over 186 rows. The way the colours are combined changes the appearance of each colour in each stripe, which is part of Kaffe’s magic.

The discontinued colours aren’t shown on the Rowan website anymore, and here’s where Ravelry completely rocks. Knitters photograph their stash yarns and post the pictures to Ravelry. Even given the inevitable differences in lighting, over 50 images of the same yarn, you can get a good idea of its colour. You’ll need to log in to Ravelry to follow these links, but it’s free to set up a Ravelry account. Here’s the Rav link for stashes of Meadow, for example, which proves to be a pale silvery green. (There are 600 pix, but you don’t need to look at them all!) Three of the discontinued colours – Jacob, Elegance and Drab – are muddy browns or greens. Elegance might be called bronze. Drab is a medium greyed brown. Jacob is a bit elusive, as it seems to be particularly changeable in various lighting. (That’s probably what KF liked about it.) It’s similar to Drab but also a greyed brown, maybe a little warmer in tone.

Earth Stripe Wrap by Kaffe Fassett in Rowan Kidsilk Haze In the new version of the pattern, Rowan has made these substitutions:
B – Anthracite #639, which is a medium cool grey
C – Bark #674, a medium to dark brown
D – Drab #611 (apparently reintroduced with a new shade number, which suggests that the colour is slightly different. I don’t actually know.)
F – Ghost #642, which is a pale silver.

You can see the current shades of Kidsilk Haze on the Rowan site, right here.

Anthracite and Ghost are unexpected suggestions, to my thinking. To use cool greys instead of a mucky warm brown and a green is going to change the overall hue of the wrap. The newly photographed version does look more cool in colour. It’s still pretty, but it doesn’t have that “moors in the mist” look of the original to my eye.

So, I dug in the stash.

It turns out that I had some Elegance in my stash, which was a complete bonus. I didn’t have any Drab, but I had some Putty, which looks pretty similar to me. I couldn’t quite envision the green of Meadow with the other colours, so I used another company’s silk/mohair blend: Elann’s Silken Kydd in Aloe, which is a silvery green but more green than silver. I had a chat with a yarn store owner about Jacob and she remembered it well, suggesting Bark as the closest substitute.

So, my colour combination is:
A – Hurricane
B – Bark
C – Elegance
D – Putty
E – Candygirl
F – Aloe
G – Majestic
H – Trance
I – Jelly
J – Blushes

A quick peek through the projects on Ravelry also revealed that many people needed an additional ball of Majestic, using three balls instead of the specified two. Since I had to buy this colour, that was good to know in advance.

I put each colour of yarn in its own ziplock with one corner snipped off the bottom and the end of the yarn fed through that gap. Each ziplock is labelled with the letter of the colour, so I don’t have to try and figure out which mucky brown I should be using. In bright light, I can see the differences, but I often knit in the evening, so this works better. I think it’s imperative with a project like this to have a system for dealing with ends as you go. Weaving them all in at the end would be a nightmare (and for me, a job that just wouldn’t happen). I’m weaving mine in as I go, but some Ravellers used Russian Joins as they went. I find that a join makes KSH a bit stiff, so would rather weave them in as the soft fluidity of the finished piece is part of what I like so much about knitting with KSH. That’s a personal choice. Earth Stripe Wrap by Kaffe Fassett knit in Rowan Kidsilk Haze by Deborah Cooke

The wrap is designed to be knit entirely in stockinette stitch, then a round of double crochet is worked all around the perimeter. This is probably to keep it from curling. There’s also a lavish fringe added to each end. I’m not much for fringes and don’t want to do the crochet round. I decided instead to work the first three rows in moss stitch, as well as the first three and last three stitches on each row. And to give the shawl edges some weight, I’m adding beads. These are Rowan/Swarovski beads in the turquoise that matches Trance.

Here’s my progress so far. Earth Stripe Wrap by Kaffe Fassett knit in Rowan Kidsilk Haze by Deborah Cooke

What’s fun here is that you can see the blending that results from using two colours at once. The lowest pink stripe is Blushes with Majestic, a rose with the blue-grey. The next pink stripe has two combinations – there’s one row of the bright pink, Candygirl, with the dark brown, Bark, then three rows of Blushes with Bark. The two three-row bands with Blushes are different pinks, because of the second colour used with it. It’s fascinating. There are two combinations with Jelly, which is a vivid apple green – in the lowest one, it’s knit with Trance for a single row, which is a light teal (right above a single row with Trance and Hurricane, a darker blue). Right below the needles, Jelly is knit with Elegance for two rows–that’s one of those golden browns. Again, we get two very different shades of green. I’m finding this an addictive knit because it’s so fascinating to watch the colour combinations develop.

What do you think?

Stripey Noro Scarf

Posted on January 29, 2016 by Deborah Cooke

I also finished a Stripey Noro scarf. It doesn’t really have a pattern: I just cast on in Noro Silk Garden, knit alternating rows in garter stitch. Mr. Math has grabbed his one. I just love it, so I might grab it back once in a while. Stripey scarf knit in Noro Silk Garden by Deborah Cooke Here’s a shot in different lighting while it was still on the needles:
I cast on in the corner, then added a stitch at each end of each right side row until I decided it was wide enough. From that point onward, I increased a stitch on the right side row at one edge and decreased a stitch on the right side row at the other edge. I kept knitting until it looked long enough, then decreased one stitch at both the beginning and the end of each right side row until there were no stitches left. Presto! The gradient stripe of the Noro Silk Garden makes the magic happen.

Turn-a-Square Hat

Posted on January 11, 2016 by Deborah Cooke

I completed a quick project this week. It’s a hat in Noro Silk Garden and Noro Silk Garden Solo (that’s the kind that doesn’t stripe but still has the same fibre content.) The pattern is free from Jared Flood, called Turn-a-Square. (Yup, that’s a Ravelry link.) I’m kind of amazed at how big this came out – even though Mr. Math really likes it. I used a 4 mm needle instead of the recommended 4.5mm, and knit the depth as specified, but he still has to turn up the rim. Maybe I’ll felt it a bit for him. I like the colours a lot – it’s funny but the black and first green stripes almost disappeared when I was knitting it, but now that it’s done, they’re quite evident. Turn a Square hat by Jared Flood knit in Noro Silk Garden by Deborah Cooke The Silk Garden is the same colourway that I’m using for the garter stripe scarf that’s still on my needles. I thought he needed a hat to match.

Here’s what it looks like from the top. I learned how to make a jogless seam with this pattern – that means that the stripes match up, even though it’s knit in the round. Without this nifty trick taught in the pattern, the stripes would be more like a spiral at one of the corners. Turn a Square hat by Jared Flood knit in Noro Silk Garden by Deborah Cooke

What have you been knitting this week?

Noro Cropped Jacket in Revision

Posted on November 30, 2012 by Deborah Cooke

Last week, I showed you a cardigan in garter stitch that I thought was almost done – that post is right here. It soon became clear, though, that I’d been ridiculously optimistic about its completion.

(Interestingly, Tupperman’s story has been doing much the same thing to me. That’s another story.)

At issue was the seaming. As mentioned to you last week, once the knitting was done, I would just fold the sweater in half, then seam up the shoulders and neck, then seam the underarms and sides. It was a great theory, but once I folded the sweater, I saw the problem.

Actually, there were two problems and they’re both on the back. Here’s a close-up:1/ First of all, the back has a little flange on each side at the side seam. On the left side, there are three green stripes between blue, and on the right there are three blue stripes between blue. That little tab doesn’t fit into anywhere when seaming up the underarms. Apparently, I should have added stitches from the top of that flange when I picked up the stitches for the sleeves. Oops! I had left the stitches live for the sleeves from the fronts and back, and my count came out correct without picking up anything from those bits. I was thinking it might be a gusset, but it can’t be.

I don’t really want a little flappy bit at each side seam.

2/ Have a peek at the collar and shoulder seams. That little Christmas tree shape should be sewn up. If you look on the right side of the image, it’s more clear that the back shoulder seam is too long to be matched to the front shoulder seam. It could be eased in – garter stitch does that pretty well – but my impression was that there was too much to ease. It might end up more like a gather, which isn’t a good thing at the shoulder. (Most of us don’t have puffy bits there. I don’t and I’m glad.) This likely happened because I just knit too many rows on the back for the shoulder, possibly because the movie was at such a good bit I lost count. (Feh.)

So. What to do? There were two choices.

1/ Frog the sleeves, frog part of the back to make the shoulder section shorter, pick up the sleeve stitches for the whole length and reknit the sleeves.

Not an appealing option.

Or 2/ Cheat.

Both issues are with the back, and I had live stitches on both edges of the back. Remember I told you about knitting upside down? Well, this looked like another great opportunity put that technique to work. I thought I’d take one row apart at the shoulder, narrow the back, delete the flange, then reknit the pieces together without ever unraveling the sleeves. My intent was to remove about 4 garter stitch ridges from the back. This would also fix another detail that was bugging me – the backs ended on the dark teal at the shoulder seam. The fronts ended at the bright turquoise in the contrast colour. By pure coincidence, the contrast colour ended at the same bright turquoise on the back, but the extra two rows of teal meant it didn’t look like the pieces matched when joined for the sleeve.

The problem with cheating? It would make the body of the sweater 4 to 5″ narrower in the body. That meant it wouldn’t fit me. It’s a trim-fitting cardigan, without a ton of ease. I wasn’t going to do this much work and end up with a sweater that didn’t fit.

So, I frogged the sleeves. I’ve fixed the backs and am knitting the sleeves all over again. I’m trying to be a Big Strong Knitter and just fix this – instead of chucking it into my knitting basket to fester for a year or so while I sulk about it – so we’ll see how that goes. Right now, I’ve finished those two shoulder wedges and am knitting down, knitting both sleeves simultaneously. I took advantage of the opportunity to rewind the yarn (again) and continue the colourway in order. The shoulder wedges are now blue.

It seems very fitting that I called this sweater ‘Compulsion’ in my Ravelry projects!

As consolation, I cast on a scarf for a Christmas gift, which I can’t possibly mess up. It’s in Patons Lace Sequin and I’m going to knit until it’s long enough. (Quite intellectually demanding, this project.) The colour is Amber, which is kind of taupe, because it’s for a person who likes taupe a lot. This is also a person who doesn’t like to handwash things and can’t wear wool, so the acrylic is the way to go. I’m liking the sparkles and will show you next week.

Noro Cropped Jacket in Progress

Posted on November 23, 2012 by Deborah Cooke

There is something about Noro yarn that speaks to my knitter’s soul. I love the colour variegations in these yarns, and – unlike many knitters – I love the texture of the yarn. I love that it’s a single ply, spun loosely, that it runs thick and thin, and that it’s a “yarn that remembers the barn”. I don’t mind sticks in my string.

Earlier this summer, I started a jacket in Noro Silk Garden. Here’s the first post about it. I could call it a cardigan, but the shaping is so structural and the finished fabric so firm that it feels more like a jacket to me. I’ve almost finished the knitting now and love it even more.

Here it is, with one sleeve not quite done:That’s the back of the sweater at the top, with the back hem at the very top. Sleeves on either side, fronts at the bottom. (And my foot! That sock is knit in Lorna’s Laces, btw.) The shoulder seams are still open and the notched bits are the collar, which will be joined. Then the whole thing will be folded down the length of the sleeve, so I can seam the sleeves and each front to one side of the back.

Although I was very matchy-matchy, I don’t think the mirroring will be perfect. Oh well. You can see on the back, for example, that I didn’t have a second run of that black through gold bit, so I had to fake it. The sleeves are slightly different from each other – the one still on the needles will probably end before it gets to the bit of green at the cuff of the other one.

It’s funny how the blue looks so prevalent in the picture. In real life, it looks very green.

I did make a few modifications to the pattern:

1/ I left the stitches live instead of binding them off when instructed, and used a provisional cast-on where there would ultimately be a seam. That means my seams will be grafted instead of sewn. The shoulders have no seam at all – I just picked up stitches and kept knitting. I’m curious to see whether this affects how stretchy the finished garment is – it might well be that the sleeves get droopy without that seam.

2/ I rewound the yarn multiple times to try to keep the colour variegation consistent. I did do one goofy thing. When starting the first sleeve, I misread the colour progress from the front and inverted the order of colours on the sleeve. Instead of the shoulder of the sleeve beginning with that beige, it should have started with the deep and ultramarine blues.

3/ I slipped the first stitch on each row while knitting the fronts and the backs to keep the edge neater. I really didn’t need to slip the first stitch on the edge of the fronts that goes into the side seam, but it was easier to slip every row and not think about it.

4/ I think there is an error in the instructions for the larger size, because the two wedges at the top of the sleeve aren’t centred over the sleeve if you follow the directions. I recalculated and centred them. I made a mistake on the first sleeve and didn’t start the decreases right away after finishing the wedges – those instructions that give lots of details for striping or whatever, then say “at the same time…” get me every time! – but began them after the third repeat of the 6 rows A and 2 rows B stripe. I decided this might work out better for ease in the underarm, so just carried on and did the same on the other sleeve.

Now I have to wash it, block it and sew up the seams. I’ll show it to you again next week, once all that nitty gritty work is done. I do love it, though. It’s amazing how all those colours blend into a coherent whole. Here’s my Ravelry project page, btw.

What do you think?

Noro Striped Cardigan

Posted on August 3, 2012 by Deborah Cooke

This past year, the first Noro magazine was published. As you might expect, it’s full of wonderful patterns that show the colours of Noro yarn to great advantage. I had to get a copy when I saw this jacket, the cropped jacket by Irina Poludnenko. This link for the jacket is a Ravelry link.

It’s a very clever piece of business, using short row in garter stitch to tailor the jacket. It also uses two colours of Noro Silk Garden Sock, so you get that wonderful alternating stripe thing going on. That’s really striking in Noro yarns because they self-stripe, so the striping pattern is constantly in transition. The jacket is cropped and fitted, with a shawl collar and long sleeves.

Here’s the left front of mine:

This is the left front, so the edge on your left is at the centre front, then forms the collar. The edge on your right is the side seam. The notch at the top is where the collar of the front meets the collar of the back and the shoulder seam is beside it. The stitches on the stitch holder are the front side of the shoulder seam – even though the instructions say to cast off this edge, I left the stitches live so that I can simply pick them up along with the back shoulder stitches and keep knitting. After the fronts are done, the back is knit side to side, then the shoulder seams joined. The sleeves are then knitted down from the shoulder to the wrist, and the side seam – from wrist to waist – joined last. I thought it would be better to eliminate that shoulder seam. The two colourways I’m using are 289 for the main colour and 313 for the contrast. Of course – because I’m fussy like that – I rewound the yarn so that the colours in the right front will mirror the left one. I’m deciding how fussy I’ll be about matching the backs and sides – you can see that I didn’t cut the yarn at the shoulder, just in case.

Self-striping yarns are always addictive to knit – using two colourways at once seems to be even more so! I’m really enjoying this knit.

Sonny Vest

Posted on May 24, 2012 by Deborah Cooke

Here’s a finished project to celebrate the end of the week. This vest is for Mr. Math and is knit of Rowan’s Colourscape Chunky. The colourways were designed by Kaffe Fassett, so you can imagine that I’ve been fingering this yarn (and lusting after it) since it was introduced. It’s a single ply chunky weight yarn, spun of merino – and now it’s discontinued.

Here’s the vest:

The pattern is called Sonny, from the Colourscape Folk Collection pattern book. I knit it almost 2 inches longer because Mr. Math is tall. It’s even knit in the same colourway as in the book – Camouflage – and Mr. Math is very happy with it. It was a pretty quick knit.

The yarn is fabulous. It has so many more colours than even show in the photograph. And it’s soft. I hope it doesn’t pill as single plies often do, but we’ll see. On the one hand, I’m disappointed that it’s discontinued because that means it will eventually disappear from the world. On the other hand, the fact that it’s discontinued means that it’s on sale at a lot of outlets, and that price drop makes it easier to acquire.

I’d bought four skeins – the pattern calls for three – thinking I might need more for the extra length. I did go into the fourth ball to play matchy matchy on the second side of the v-front, but all my bits together weigh more than one skein. Theoretically, I could have bought just three skeins, but I do like the matchy matchy. And I love the orange on the neck ribbing. I was hoping for that!

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