Thursday, March 3, 2011

Size (and other) matters

Ever since I made those socks for Ady, I've wanted to knit something for Marty too.  She's glam and gorgeous and travels a ton all over the world for her job, so obviously a scarf or shawl out of some super luxurious fiber is the way to go: it's a versatile accessory right down to wrapping itself up for pillow duty on a plane.

I was leaning toward Citron with a beaded castoff, but the closest yarn I have to Right For Marty is some beautiful seasilky self-striping club yarn from Biscotte, and I just thought a Clapotis might work better for that.


Or not. I have got past the point of having to read every line of the instructions before taking a stitch, and I can see how this could comfortably become travel knitting, but I just don't like the way the stripes are working out here.  Also, while the needle size (small) is right for this yarn, the length of the circular I happen to have is just way too long to make knitting less than 25" of fabric on it enjoyable. I don't even think these colours are right for  Marty any more... unless maybe they were broken up over a gorgeous lace.

(looks fab with denim though, doesn't it?)

Later I was reading through an article on the features of different fibers (somehow I keep needing to be reminded of those) and read how great this particular one - leaving out the silk part, which to be fair is less than half of the whole - is for keeping cool.  I'm thinking now a pretty shell for summer is the way to go with this yarn, but probably for me rather than Marty since I'm sure to get her size wrong.

Speaking of wrong sizes, I sat down last night with my Mariner sweater and realized I'd done some of the short rows too soon.  I have amended my marking system to avoid this problem in future, and I took advantage of the excuse to rip back to go past the places where I accidentally elongated several stitches in a row and left some nasty gaps.

After doing all that ripping and repositioning on the needles and fussing over another short row (twice, because I got the half-linen stitch wrong) I looked at what I had left and thought:

It's awful big.

So I measured and yep, it's going to be about five inches wider than I am.  Yay for ill-advised yarn substitution.

There are a few options here.  I can go on and have an oversized sweater, but if I do that I will probably run out of yarn - I was going to be a bit tight anyway and I can't get more as this stuff is loooong out of production. I can just make the next size down, but I'm pretty sure that will come out about an inch narrower than me.  Or I can make the next size down with needles a size or two bigger.  I mean, it's not like I'm not getting fabric reminiscent of a board in the half-linen stitch panel with these ones.

Just now it occurred to me I can have the best of a couple of these worlds, by casting on with bigger needles for the smaller size and knitting up a whole new ball that way before deciding whether or not to frog the current effort.

But first I think I need some quality time with a nice simple pair of socks, don't you?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

What I like about your blog is that you admit when you make mistakes and have to rip things out, sometimes more than once. You also admit if you don't have a lot of experience and knowledge with a certain type of knitting skill and then you name an author that helped you master that same skill. I like you name names, showcase color photos, and so forth. It seems I learn something every time I visit your blog. Thanks! If you can do it, I can do it!

Mary Keenan said...

Heh - even if I *can't* do it, you can do it!!

Yvette said...

Whoa. My brain hurts. It seems you have a lot of figuring out to be done. Don't you just hate that sinking "I think I'm going to run out of yarn" feeling. Good luck and I hope you don't have to rip too much.