Monday, March 16, 2009

Froggabilities and a freebie preview

This weekend, in the midst of hunting down solutions to my knitting storage problems, I felt compelled to add to said problems by drifting into a charity store. Yeah, ever since I read Knit One, Embellish Too (two thumbs up) I've been intrigued by the notion of recycling yarn from other people's sweaters, and when I'm intrigued, I'm dangerous. This is what I got:



This sweater above is too soft and fluffy to be wool. I suspect its donation resulted from being cast on so tightly at the cuffs I could barely try it on, and the huge lumps along the sleeve seems. Great stitch though - a full flower that looks more like crochet than knit, and rounder than star stitch. Hate to rip it out but it's not wearable as it is, and I'm pretty sure it's not feltable.



This one is beautifully knit with a yarn that's too soft and flexible to be wool unless it was generously washed and blocked, which is possible in spite of the very slightly plastic-y feel, but the burn marks on the front imply some acrylic content. Or maybe those aren't burn marks so much as condiment stains? Anyway it looks great here and super frumpy on, so: froggable.



Isn't this one gorgeous? Hand-knit in Italy with a front that's all cables, this small-sized vintage sweater has three quarter raglan sleeves (raglan being my fave). And the colour! I'd lose weight to wear this thing if the yarn, 70% wool, 20% mohair and 10% nylon, wasn't waaaay too itchy to come anywhere within skin range.

Okay, perhaps my time could have been (and will be) better spent on other things given the impracticality involved in ripping these out - the salmon one in particular is a bit matted-together. What keeps me going is how fabulous the colours look together. They do, don't they? And surely I'll think of something to make with scratchy yarn. Right? urg.

Meanwhile, I have not neglected the promised chemo cap pattern:

Took me all weekend to get the brim right, but it's good now and will not be at all floppy in the finished product, I promise. I'm hoping to have the rest done today so I can block it tonight and post the pattern later this week. Needles crossed!

2 comments:

Kathleen Taylor said...

Can't wait to see what you do with the sweater yarns!

Karen said...

Hey, you know about the burn test for wool, right? You carefully burn a tiny amount of an unidentified yarn (as in Sweaters 1 & 2), and if it smells like burning hair or feathers, it's wool. If it curls up and melts, it's acrylic or polyester. If it flares up and burns brightly, leaving a papery ash, it's cotton.
(I know all this from last year's Science Fair extravaganza!)