The Knitting Scotsman

I washed and blocked Reid today.  Maybe I just suck at blocking, but this thing was a major pain in the …

 Probably doesn’t help that this the first thing I’ve really ever blocked.  The pattern calls for the back to be 15 inches wide by 11 inches tall.  After washing, it was about 13 wide and 13 tall.  It easily stretched to 15 wide, but I couldn’t get it to lay flat any shorter than 12 inches tall.  Luckily, the front was the same way, so it’s going to be an inch taller than the pattern calls for.

The sleeves were not a big deal, they went pretty much right into shape. 

The front was another story all together.  Since the pattern didn’t have dimensions for blocking the front, I had to guess.  I laid them on top of the back, and pinned them together.  I stretched them as wide as I thought I could get away with, making sure the lace looked right.

I think it will come out just fine…

 Now, I have nothing on needles at all.  I’m going to cast on a seaman’s cap for myself, and I’m getting some yarn for FLAK.

…The needles that is.

 My Triquetra fingerless gloves are done.  What started out as a pair of fingerless gloves turned into a bit of a fiasco.  I started knitting these based on a pattern and gauge of what I thought was a similar yarn.  Well I learned that lesson, with an Andre the Giant sized glove.

Frog time.

I got the gauge right, with two sizes smaller needles.  I re-knit the right glove, added the finger stubs, cast off, and…  I didnt’ like them.  This yarn is way bulkier than I expected. The gloves are so heavy and think, that I couldn’t use them for typing like I was planning.  After putting them away for a few days, I decided to just make them into full-on gloves.  I set the right one down, and knit the left.

The left glove came out so good, I decided to frog the finger stubs on the right and start them over.  I was originally going to just join the yarn and finish the stubs.  However, there were holes and loose spots where I picked up the stitches, so I frogged them out.

Now that I’ve got them both done, I really like them.  I’m very happy with how they came out.  I love the yarn (Queensland Collection Kathmandu Aran) but this stuff is way bulkier than it looks.

I’ve finished knitting REID for my daughter Gwen.  I started a month or so ago.  It wasn’t too challenging, if you’re new to lacy patterns, don’t be afraid.  It’s really not that bad.  The basic patter repeats over 16 rows.  Once you do it a few times, you don’t need the chart at all.  And the same rows repeat exactly the same across all the pieces.  The only difference is the start and end of the rows.  This was a fun project, but I’m glad to be moving on to other things.

 I knit both sleeves at the same time.  I’ve never done that before, and it was a bit challenging at first.  I kept getting the yarn tangled.  Once I got going, it was definitely easier.  Especially since you repeat the same patter row twice.  It made for fast knitting, not to mention I know both are identical.  It did, however, make the end of the sleeves seem to go slowly, since each ended up with 63 stitches, I was knitting 126 stitches on each row.

One word of advice on this one, after every pattern row, count your stitches.  Don’t skip this, as this is a difficult pattern to pull out.  Tinking is about the only options.  I can’t imagine trying to frog several rows when about 40% of the stitches are yarn-overs and 40% are decreases.  If you make a mistake, you really, really want to catch it before you move on to the next row.  The majority of mistakes I made were skipping a yarn-over, or forgetting to pass a slipped stitch over.  Luckily, these can be remedied on the next row very easily, without going back.

Unlike my usual self, I followed the patter exactly.  I didn’t make any modifications.  If I were to knit this again I would try one alteration.  The center of each diamond is: YO, Pass one knit-wise, K2tog, PSSO, YO.  This center reduction is not really centered well.  It tends toward a “left slant” as the right stitch (which is passed over) is on top, so it looks kind of like a big chunky SSK.  I think I would try substituting a double reduction that looks more centered: YO; insert needle as if to K2tog, but slip the stitches instead of knitting, K1, Pass both slipped stitches over the K1; YO.  I didn’t try it, so I don’t know if it will work right, but I’ve seen that reduction on other pieces, and I really like the way it looks.  The original center stitch ends up on top, in the center, so the whole thing has a nice symmetrical look that the original doesn’t have.  Also, it makes a raised “rib”, which seems to fit well in the lacy patter of this sweater.

 I’ll be blocking this weekend, and I should be assembling soon.  Keep a lookout for updates.

It’s taking me forever to finish these gloves!  I’ve only had about 30 minutes knitting time since my last post, so I’m only to the thumb gusset on the left glove.  I haven’t touched the right since the last post.  I’m hoping to work on the gloves some more tonight.

 On a different note, I’m very nearly finished with the knitting on the Reid I’m knitting for my daughter.  I’ve got about 4 more rows on the two sleeves.  I’m knitting them both at the same time, which is really the way to go.  I hope to be blocking this weekend.  I’ll post some pictures once I have it pinned up.

My wife, daughter, and I went to our favorite LYS today, Ewe-Nique Knits in Royal Oak, Michigan.  We had the best time there today, and they didn’t even have what we were looking for.  We spent over an hour there looking at yarn, patterns and books.  My 32 month old daughter even had a good time.  They have blocks, coloring books, and a few other toys for the little ones.  To top it all off, one of the owners brought out her spinning wheel and showed my daughter how to spin yarn.

 My favorite part of the trip was when I looked around, and there were more men in the shop than women.  I think that’s the first time I’ve seen that at any LYS.  I’ve had different levels of acceptances at yarn stores, being a man.  Some, like Ewe-Nique are wonderful, others that I won’t name here are terrible.  They always treat me well at Ewe-Nique, they’ve never assumed I’m unskilled or inexperienced just because I’m a man.  I find the fact that other shops treat me that way amazing, especially given the history of women being treated poorly by male salespeople (think car dealerships).

 While I was there a man came in with a problem he was having with a pattern he was knitting for his wife.  Three different employees looked and they were all unsure.  They didn’t bat an eye when I came over and had a look myself.  I was able to help decipher the problem was.  Turns out it was a missing stitch on an increase chart that was causing the problem.  Not only did they help him with a pattern they didn’t sell him, using materials he likely didn’t buy there, but they didn’t mind me getting involved.  I’ve seen other shops charge for their time and not let you bring in projects and materials you bought elsewhere.

If you are ever near Royal Oak, Michigan, make sure to stop by and see this wonderful gem of an LYS.

 http://eweniqueknits.com/

I picked up the needles and cast on my fingerless gloves again.  This time, after I made a gague swatch.  Turns out with this yarn, I need size 6 instead of size 8 needles.

 So far, the sizing is much better.

 I’ll post some pics when I get  little further along.

So, last night I worked on my fingerless gloves.  I finished the cable panel, and I was nearly to the finger stubs, when I realized…

 IT IS FRIGGN’ HUGE!!

 Seroiusly, this thing is way too big.  It’s too long, and too big around.  Then, I measured my gague.  What was supposed to be 5 stitches per inch, turned out to be only 4.  So, with some crude math I calculate that it’s 2 inches too big.

So, I ripped it all out.  That will teach me for not doing a gague swatch before starting.

Anyway, before I frogged, I took some pictures.  I think I have the Triquetra cable down.