If you were tooling past the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue WA on Saturday evening, on whatever highway that is, you may have seen some strange women jumping up and down on the 4th-floor terrace — in the rain. That would have been Anna and me. As I mentioned, Kathy Cadigan did us the great honor of shooting these photos of us in our Tag Team Sweater Project sweaters. The sweaters themselves left a little bit to be desired. As you can see, my Trillium is currently a cap-sleeved number with no button bands or neck edging, while Anna’s Lila is a sultry, off-the-shoulder sort of thing. Very Flashdance. Still, we were wearing them, so they are technically sweaters. And although we didn’t finish them in time for the shoot, we had a ton of fun.
But let’s talk about this yoke for a minute. The true brilliance of the whole project became clear the moment I was knitting a yoke without having had to knit the whole big rectangle that precedes it. And I’m sort of glad I botched that first sleeve and skipped ahead, because this method of working the yoke upwards from provisionally cast-on sleeve stitches is brilliant. Apart from that little trick, the only modification I made to the yoke was with regard to the number of nupps involved. The pattern calls for basically a solid stream of them in the center of the chevrons. I decided to cut that in half and knitted only the ones at the peaks and valleys, omitting the ones in between. I’m in love with the circular yoke approach — in love with how well this fits my shoulders! — but am a little puzzled by the multiple sets of short rows worked in stages up the back, rather than just at the neckline. All that extra fabric is giving the sweater a little bit of a hunchback, but I’m trusting that it will work out in the blocking.
We had joked at the beginning of all this about whether we’d be great friends or arch enemies in the end. It’s not the end, of course, but it’s definitely been a great bonding experience between knitters. If we’ve learned a lesson, it’s that tag-team knitting is a fantastic idea, just as long as you don’t saddle it with an unrealistic deadline.
For the rest, stay tuned here and to @karentempler and @toltyarnandwool. And there are more photos and thoughts on Anna’s blog today as well.
p.s. There are a few more copies of the new Taproot in the shop — the one with the gorgeous Carrie Bostick Hoge shawl pattern. And you’ll also find a handful of XL bentos in red ticking. Assuming you act fast.
p.p.s. Those poor old ballet flats are officially OUT of the closet — so shabby!
.
All photos by Kathy Cadigan