A Year in Review

I didn't think I had knit very much this year. Or rather, I didn't think that I had finished very much in 2009, so I was a bit surprised when I saw that I had completed 32 projects in the past year. Not bad, if I do say so myself.

Here is a brief look at what has happened here at Tinks and Frogs:

2009 Finished Objects

4 sweaters: Victoria, Alpaca Raglan, Staghorn, and the Barbara Walker Sweater






3 hats: Seaman's Cap, Shedir, and Claudia (which was gifted away too quickly for me to remember to snap a picture)

2 Toddler Gifts: the Owl Dress and Tomten




6 pairs of fingerless mitts (5 of them look like the garter mitts shown first)




2 Blankets: Bear Claw and Hemlock Ring




7 shawls/scarves: Cluaranach, Fiddlehead Scarf, Madli's Scarf, Ene's Scarf, Peak's Island Hood, Handspun Scarflet, Fir Cone Cowl

And 8 pairs of socks (not counting all of the single socks waiting for me to knit their mates)

What does 2010 hold for Tinks and Frogs? Well, for one thing, I would like to blog more and more consistently. I have some fun projects planned for this year: Forecast and Miralda's Triangular Scarf are on the needles right now and there are more to come. My two giant Christmas gifts from 2009 are almost done. The secret project just needs its buttons sewn on and Lismore has about 100 or so more ends to weave in. I hope to have FO pictures of both of those soon.

I hope you all have a happy and productive new year. Thanks for reading.

Swatches lie

I know that I've done a lot of knitting over the past couple of weeks, but it feels like I have nothing to show for it. A big part of this is because, while I finished my Barbara Walker sweater (my little experiment in top down knitting with seamless, simultaneous set-in sleeves) a while ago, it doesn't fit. Here's the problem: my gauge swatch lied.

I was good on this project. I dutifully knit a swatch and even washed it before measuring my stitch and row gauge. Unfortunately, while the swatch shrank a bit width-wise, the sweater did not. This means that the "seam" lines on the shoulders hit an inch down my arm from where they should sit at the edge of the shoulder. The effect is so unflattering that I can't bring myself to take a modeled pic for you. In fact, I've shoved the poor thing at the bottom of a pile of sweaters until I can give it to a friend with broader shoulders than mine.

There, now you have proof that it is done (and that it's been sitting at the bottom of the pile for some time now).



Pattern: my own, based on guidelines set out in Barbara Walker's fantastic book Knitting From the Top
Yarn: Nature Spun Worsted, colors Plumberry (2 skeins), Cranberry Fog (1.5 skeins), Ash (0.5 skeins)

Needles: size 7 circulars for the body, size 6 circulars for the ribbing

Interesting Techniques: I didn't want to work the upper body section back and forth, so I decided to work a steek for the neckline. I used a 6-stitch steek and then sewed a reinforcing line with fingering weight yarn on either side of the center before cutting. Once I had picked up and worked the neck ribbing, I secured the steek to the inside of the sweater using blanket stitch. I'm actually pretty proud of how that turned out.

The seamless simultaneous set-in sleeve technique is pretty nifty. And if I had worked with the correct shoulder measurements, it would look great, too. However, I don't think I would use it again with stripes. While the technique looks nice from the inside, the effect on the outside is not nearly as neat and tidy.




I think working this technique in a single color (or perhaps with more practice on my part) would help hide some of the messiness along the "seam."

Gift knitting has been progressing, too. I've made it into the yoke decreases on the secret sweater project:


Unfortunately, Lismore has stalled until I can find some big blocks of time in which to work on it. Hopefully that will happen this week. That project is not conducive to 5-minute spurts of knitting. Instead, I've spent that time working up a couple of little cold-weather pieces for myself:





Pattern: Peaks Island Hood (Ravelry link)
Yarn: 2.25 skeins Malabrigo Worsted, colorway Vaa
Needles: size 10 circular
Mods: None

This was a quick, easy knit and the shell motifs were cleverly done. However, it's not wind-proof enough to serve as a hat substitute in a Chicago winter. Add in a hat and you'll be just fine.

My usual go-to hat is a little stranded color work number that I knit while I was in college. It's lovely, but gives me absolutely horrible hat hair now that I have a pixie cut. When a friend of mine started knitting up a Shedir hat out of some Silky Wool, it wasn't hard to jump on that bandwagon.

Pattern: Shedir (Ravelry link)
Yarn: 1 skein Elsbeth Lavold Silky Wool in a mossy green color (I've lost the ball band)
Needles: 3.25mm (size 3) 16" circular, size 3 DPNs for the top of the crown
Mods: I used a tubular cast-on (these instructions were great), and only worked 4 pattern repeats before beginning the crown decreases. At the top of the crown, where the designer wrote two plain rounds between decrease rounds, I only worked one plain round.

There's been even more knitting here at chez Tinks and Frogs, so I'm just going to leave you with this little teaser for next time:

Sleeve, take two

Phew. I've finally made it past the point where I ripped back the sleeve last weekend. It sure is nice to be truly moving forward again.

Before and after:

That sleeve looks much better now, don't you think? Only another half-repeat to go before I start the ribbing at the cuff. I may actually finish the first sleeve this month after all.

Forwards, backwards, and forwards again

Last night I finally acknowledged the problem with Lismore that had been nagging me for the last several days: I really did need to rip the sleeve. I had abandoned the pattern directions for the sleeve decreases weeks ago because my row gauge is a bit off from what the pattern calls for and because my husband's arms are rather long.
The pattern calls for starting the ribbing after two pattern repeats. As you can see below, that would never have worked. So, with no calculations (and apparently not much luck), I settled on a rate of 2 stitches decreased every 5 rows.



A bit too wide, don't you think? I had noticed this bloomy fit when I had my husband try the sweater on over the weekend and have spent the last few days trying to talk myself into keeping the sleeve. Last night I gave up and called for reinforcements. Sometimes you really need someone else to tell you that you have to rip back 50 rows of intricate color work. Out of sheer preservation, I decided to rip back only to the second green band rather than all the way to the beginning of the sleeve.

Well, it's done. Not the most pleasant process, I have to admit. On the plus side, the yarn sticks to itself very well and I didn't have any problems with stitches dropping as I ripped. That certainly makes me feel better about the unreinforced steeks.

I'm moving forward on the sleeve again, now decreasing at a rate of 2 stitches every 3 rows. This is how far I had progressed earlier this evening:



For some reason, these rows are flying by. I can't wait to get home from class and knit on this some more.

Cinnamon Ene

Last weekend I finished up a lovely little lace project that has been my break from gift knitting over the past few weeks.



Pattern: Ene's Scarf (Ravelry Link) by Nancy Bush, found in the book Scarf Style.
Yarn: 1 skein of Dream in Color Baby, color Cinnamon Girl.
Needles: size 5 Addi Lace circular.
Finished Size: 61.5" wingspan and 31" in height.
Mods: none.



All in all, this was a very easy project. The only tough part was the cast-on and I am pretty sure it took me three or four times to get it right. Ene is knit from the bottom up, with each right-side row shorter than the last. The designer used a knitted cast-on with the yarn held double, which provides a nice sturdy, yet stretchy, edge. Usually the nice thing about a knitted cast-on is that you don't have to estimate how much yarn you will need up front. Not so with a single strand of yarn held double. After several failed attempts to correctly estimate how much yarn the cast-on would use, let me offer a suggestion: whatever rule of thumb you use to determine the appropriate length of yarn you will need, double it. This will save you the frustration of casting on 300 out of 375 stitches and running out of yarn.



While the initial rows seemed to take forever to knit, I loved how quickly the last repeat worked up. My delight was dampened only slightly by the stress of watching my ball of yarn rapidly diminish and wondering if I was going to have to go buy a second skein in order to knit the last couple of rows. Happily, the crisis was averted and I was able to complete the shawl with a few yards left over. A word of caution: if I had used a larger needle size, I would have needed a second skein - it was that close.



Now I've got to get back to my gift knitting. Lismore is not going to finish itself.

Who spilled hot cocoa on my grey tabby?

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Gifting season is in full swing here at chez Tinks and Frogs and I am happy to say that the knitting is progressing smoothly. Picture taking . . . not so much.



First, we have Madli's Scarf (Ravelry link). You probably know this pattern as Madli's Shawl. This was a birthday present for my dear friend N.



Pattern: Madli's Shawl (found in the Summer 2004 Interweave Knits and Nancy Bush's book, Knitted Lace in Estonia)
Yarn: one skein Malabrigo laceweight, colorway Cuarzo Verde
Needles: size 3 Addi Lace circular
Mods: I only worked 4 repeats of the pattern (with slightly fewer stitches in the garter stitch edging along the borders to make up for the difference in stitch count between the border and body patterns)

I don't have a single good pic that shows off the lace, but I do have a happy recipient:



Next up, I finally finished the Tomten Jacket for N's daughter, little n.



Pattern: Elizabeth Zimmerman's Tomten Jacket, found in The Opinionated Knitter
Yarn: 4 skeins of Cascade 220 Heathers (colorway ?)
Needles: size 6 Lantern Moon circular needle for the body and DPNs for the applied i-cord edge
Mods: I'm pretty sure that I followed the pattern as written, although I knit the bulk of this piece so long ago that I don't really remember. I added an applied i-cord edge all around the bottom, up the sides of the front opening, and around the hood. The button loops are incorporated into the edging. At the appropriate places, I would work an extra 4 or 5 rows of plain i-cord before continuing with the applied i-cord. The straight bits of i-cord formed the button loops.

Again, apologies for the lack of a decent picture. Little n was pretty enamored of her bumble bee costume for Halloween and most of my pics show her running around in her back yard, a bit too excited for a still shot that shows the sweater.

My latest gift is a pair of socks for my father's birthday last week.



Pattern: Gentleman's Half Hose in Ringwood Pattern from Nancy Bush's book Knitting Vintage Socks
Yarn: 1 skein Dream in Color Smooshy, colorway cocoa kiss
Needles: size 1, 47" Addi Lace needle for magic loop
Gauge: 8.5 spi in stockinette
Mods: Since my stitch gauge was slightly smaller than what the pattern calls for, I decreased to only 64 stitches at the ankle and 66 stitches on the foot. Otherwise, I knit the pattern as written, including the delightful round toe.

I'm not normally a fan of the combination of brown and grey in a single piece but this colorway really won me over. It is a beautiful mix of their colors grey tabby and november muse (go look). Every time I looked at it, all I could think was, "who spilled hot cocoa on my grey tabby?" It's a great colorway to use when knitting for a guy - nothing too bright or objectionable on the color front but still interesting to knit with (especially for those of us, like me, who get a big kick out of watching the colors change).

I also have a little gift for myself. Over the last several weeks I turned this



into this



and finally into this



Somewhere in the ballpark of 800 yards of 2-ply alpaca laceweight, spun from 3.5oz of combed alpaca top from the Frontier Fiber Mill (purchased at the Midwest Fiber & Folk festival two summers ago). The fiber was beautifully prepared, with only a piece or two of vegetable matter in the whole batch. It didn't even need pre-drafting, and that should tell you something.

Here's a very blurry shot to show scale:



When I say "somewhere in the ballpark of 800 yards," what this really means is that I stopped counting after 500. For the time being, I am winding my freshly plied yarn off a bobbin on the lazy cate and on to my table swift, set at the 2-yard size. My swift is constructed with two crossed arms, making four spokes, and each spoke has holes in which pegs can be set depending on the size of the skein. Unfortunately, once you wind a sufficient amount of yarn onto the swift, the pegs start bending inwards rather precariously and threaten to pop out. I really need to get my hands on a niddy-noddy.

That's all for now. I have a new lace FO, but that will have to wait until later in the week.