Let's talk felting today! Specifically, on-purpose felting the sweater I made last winter, which came out huge and floppy and pilled a lot. Here she is when I first finished her:
Pretty colours, right? I love this combo and I love that I was able to find 100% wool yarn to put them together. Only the wool was so underspun it pilled like crazy, and the sweater was so oversized it just sagged on me. As you may recall if you were around this time last year, I even had to turn up about two inches on the hem or it woulda been a minidress.
In the fall I remembered that felting is a thing, and might just be the *very* thing I was looking for. And over the holiday I remembered that I would rather wear this sweater than let it hog a lot of shelf space in my closet. But before I could felt, I had to take out that hem...
... which was a very big job. And in unpicking all the ends I used to do it, I accidentally unpicked two ends that were really just a join between one ball of yarn and another. Oops!
It left quite a hole, but with effort I was able to remember how to restitch through the exposed loops, and the result was more than satisfactory.
And then I had to run in the ends again.
What a mess inside, huh? Or, as a Canadian, I might say, eh?
Sorry about the colour change in these photos. The sweater really is that lovely rich green, but the light today is so uneven... truly grey and wintery. We've had snow!
Hence my desire for a functional sweater. Okay, moving along...
I couldn't risk this baby on the washing machine, so I decided to felt by hand in a big bowl in the sink. I put in hot water and some Soak Wash (the better to avoid having to rinse out a lot of soap later) and started kneading my sweater like it was bread dough. When the stitches started to look a little blurred, I stopped, figuring I could felt more later. Then I set it out to dry.
That was yesterday, so it's still a little damp. But check this out!
The stitches no longer have big airy gaps in between. And the heft I wanted in the fabric is there - just a little heaviness, still with some floop. Plus: SO SOFT. I honestly don't think I'll see much pilling with the new finish.
Here's a closeup of the before and after, again with iffy lighting quality and poor placement planning:
The size shift, by contrast to my photography, is near perfect! The chest went from 46 inches down to 43, still huge but workable; the swing hem from 54 inches to 52; the overall length from 29 inches to 28. My ideal length is 27, but even that one inch reduction makes such a difference to how this thing hangs.
Weirdly, the sleeve length got worse. It was 27 inches, and now it's 29, covering my hand to the knuckles. However, since the dream was always wear this sweater with loads of layers underneath to sub in for a winter coat on less than freezing days, the extra hand coverage is not unwelcome. The rest of the time, I can just roll up the sleeves, amiright?
I was also pleased to see the inside looking super neat and tidy after a bath:
So I'm asking myself, what took me so long? Felting the sweater took less than an hour. Unpicking the hem and repairing the hole? Maybe ninety minutes. I'm not sure I'd ever make an oversized sweater on purpose again, and I might felt this one a second time in the future if I find I need it to be smaller still, but right now I'm just so pleased. Not least because I just bought a cute pair of walking shoes that match it perfectly, ahem.
(If the link is no longer active when you're reading this, the shoes are Birkenstock Londons, in suede, in the colour Thyme. This is my third pair of this design as I absolutely love them! All the perks of Birks with the added security of a totally closed shoe. Obviously I will not be wearing these in the snowy conditions we currently have going on, but once the roads are clear in spring, and the weather is still chilly enough for this sweater, this outfit is happening!)
I hope your weekend is lovely and hopefully a bit escapist, as we all need that break, don't we? Thanks for spending this time with me, and I'll see you next Saturday. Probably still not with a finished crochet blanket though, sigh.
