KTFO-2016.5 : Blue loopy pullover

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FO: Blue loopy pullover

This is the most absurd thing to have knitted, on impulse, in April — which, when you think about it, is the whole fun of it. It’s good to go a little rogue on one’s well-laid plans once in awhile, as long as A) the journey is fun or B) the outcome is worthwhile. Hopefully both — and in this case, I can say both. Making a sweater in about a week is fun, no way around it, and the relative kookiness of the finished sweater will do my increasingly reserved closet some good. So I’m very happy with it, even while I’m leery of how this yarn will wear over time. As I mentioned somewhere in the comments last week, given that it’s basically single-ply merino (at superbulky gauge) I fear it will be a giant pilled bathmat within a couple of wears. I truly hope I’m wrong, but even if I’m right, I’ll be perfectly happy to wear it around the house nonstop with my flannel pajama pants in the cold months, because putting this on is like climbing inside your favorite pillow.

The pattern is a bit lacking, I have to say. The extremely basic construction of this makes it a great candidate for a beginner sweater, but I would never recommend it as anyone’s first sweater. Just because if you don’t already know how to put a sweater together, you’ll have no chance at making sense of these instructions. But if you’re capable of filling in the holes for yourself, and can get by on some rudimentary stitch counts and measurements and wing the rest, you’re good!

Pattern: Super Cropped Sweater by Loopy Mango
Yarn: Loopy Mango Merino No. 5 in Lady Blue
Cost: 5 balls (one more than the pattern calls for) at $28 each = $140

NOTE: I bought the yarn from the incredibly lovely Loopy Mango ladies while at Stitches South, and they very kindly threw in the big US19 needles (with hot pink cable!) in addition to their Loopy tote bag. I was super pleased with the whole shopping experience!

Modifications: My row gauge was more compact than theirs, so already it was going to take me more rows (and more yarn) to reach the designated measurements, but I also lengthened all of the parts. The body is meant to be 16″ and I made mine 18″. The sleeve length isn’t given, but if you tally up the rows and compare to their row count, it would come out to 10.4″ — too short for me. I wanted them a bit cropped but not elbow length; however, I was limited to what I could squeeze out of 1 ball per sleeve, which wound up to be just dandy. I also added neck shaping at the front (as opposed to the square neckhole of the pattern); knitted the sleeves flat rather than picking up stitches and knitting them top-down; and worked the neck band on US17 needles. I wish I had noticed that the pattern was not written for the nice long cuffs the sample had, which I loved — it appears to have had 12 rows of ribbing instead of 10 — but by the time I noticed it, I wasn’t going back.

I have only steam-blocked this, but did widen the body considerably in the process — mine is about 42″ circumference (compared to the pattern’s 32″), and as noted above, knitted to 18″ length (not 16″).

FO: Blue loopy pullover

By the way, I opted to photograph this with the same clothes I had on that day at Stitches, and up until 10 minutes ago I could actually have gotten away with this exact outfit. But now we’re into the 80s and staying there. Hopefully there will be a cool night or two on the porch between now and fall, but I look forward to wearing this with a dress and boots once summer has come and gone.

See all posts on this sweater on the blog and on Instagram.

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PREVIOUSLY in 2016 FOs: Blue sleeve/less dress

Yarns in waiting

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Yarns in waiting

Once upon a time (have I told you this story before?) I ran a community site about books and I was on the mailing list of every publishing company on the planet, whether I wanted to be or not. Every day books landed on my doorstep unsolicited — most of them wildly inappropriate for my site (kids books, self-help, pulp fiction …). People always think it sounds like a ridiculous thing to complain about — who doesn’t love free books! — but try getting hundreds of books out of your house on a weekly basis and tell me what a blessing it is. So I’m now incredibly cautious about people who seek to send me yarn. I really don’t want a lot of yarn in the house, generally speaking — especially single skeins — so am frequently in the awkward position of turning down offers of yarn, no matter how luscious it may be. Every once in a blue moon, though, I cave. And then there’s the fact that I have a lot of good acquaintances and close friends in the yarn business, and sometimes they send me yarn without my knowing anything about it. So things find their way in.

Lately my mail has been pret-ty amazing, and I thought I’d tell you about some of these beauties:

1) I don’t have any friends at luxury yarn company Jones & Vandermeer, but after I posted about trying to find the perfect camel-colored yarn for my upcoming Channel cardigan, I got a nice note from them asking if I wouldn’t like to swatch with their 100% camel-fiber yarn, Clever Camel. And obviously the answer was yes, I really would. Swatching will commence this weekend.

2) My friend Kristin Ford of Woolfolk sent me a hilarious email recently about some random colors of Far she had from the mill, wondering if she could share some of it with me. I asked her for a pic, and a few days later I got a box. My favorites are the few skeins of this blue-and-white marl. No idea what I might do with it (or if it will be going into production), but it will be heavily petted in the near term.

3) I mentioned before that my friends at Purl Soho sent me a box of their Linen Quill before I had a chance to complete my order. Knowing me as they do, they sent skeins of the black and the grey-natural marl, both so incredibly stunning. I’ve already wound two skeins of the black and started playing with it last night.

4) A dear friend in the biz sent me these two incredible skeins of aran-weight tweed yarn that I’m pretty sure I’m not allowed to talk about just yet. But ooh la la … coming this fall, I think.

So for me, this weekend is for swatching and seaming, seaming and swatching. And maybe drowning my tax sorrows in a nice glass of rosé. What are you up to?

IN SHOP NEWS: The spring/summer issue of Amirisu arrived this week, packed full of great little sweater patterns and three shawls. And you’ll also once again find all three shapes of brass hangers and both sizes of brass-and-steel scissors on the virtual shelves waiting for you. Among the Field Bags and all the other lovely things at Fringe Supply Co.!

 

New Favorites: Flying Squirrel to the rescue

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New Favorites: Flying Squirrel to the rescue

Already our Fringe HQ next-door neighbors are cranking the shared A/C, and I’m sitting huddled over the space heater on perfectly warm days with my big grey shawl around my shoulders, trying to get it to stay draped over my goosebump-covered arms. I’m dreading those long months ahead where it’s 100 degrees outside and 65 inside. Thinking about my spring/summer clothes — and specifically the fact that several of my favorite things are wide-cut smock tops that don’t play well with cardigans — I started wondering if there was such a thing as a single garment that could be left over my chair at work and pulled on over literally anything, including those smocks. After a few not-useless hours spent combing through kimono- and batwing-shaped cardigan patterns on Ravelry, I finally realized the answer was right here on the blog, in a New Favorites post from three years ago: Flying Squirrel by Michiyo. It’s a wide rectangle shawl/wrap/stole (ok, it’s a blanket), and can be worn as such, but it also has cuffs. CUFFS! For those moments when you need your blanket-scarf to pretend to have sleeves. But given that it technically has none, there’s no garment interference to worry about. And it’s cute!

I found the unicorn! Now I just have to knit it (minus the sporty stripes) … which might take me a lifetime of frozen summers. That is a whoooole lotta garter rib right there.

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PREVIOUSLY in New Favorites: Dafne

To soak or not to soak

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To soak or not to soak

I asked a serious question in a funny manner on Instagram yesterday, and nobody realized I was actually asking. But I’m actually asking: Would you wet-block this yarn?

This is Loopy Mango Merino No. 5, and I know they say you can handwash in cold water, but that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a good idea! It’s basically a big puff of 100% merino roving, with a single lace-weight strand very loosely plied around it. It’s by far the gooiest yarn I’ve ever knitted with. (I like my yarn more on the rugged side. Sheepy. Minimally processed. Hard-wearing.) It literally feels to me like if I put it in water, it will turn to paste, or even dissolve completely. I realize that won’t really happen, but I have blocked soft yarn before and had it come out the other side utterly lifeless. So I’m inclined to only steam or dry-clean this, unless one of you tells me you’ve knitted with it and wet-blocked it and it’s totally fine. Anyone?

Obviously, given the circumstances, I did not knit and block a swatch for this one. And unfortunately I don’t have enough yarn left to knit one now, if that’s what you’re very sensibly about to suggest …

A sampling of Annas

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A sampling of Annas

This little Anna Vest Knitalong has been just as low-key and casual as advertised, and I’m loving seeing some finished or nearly finished vests appearing on the interwebs. You can see them on Instagram under #annavestkal, and there are a few on Ravelry as well. But I also wanted to highlight some here:

TOP: Rebecca Seifert (@ascending.rain) captured her WIP at such a great moment of evolution — one armhole finished, and the band pinned in place to check the length.

MIDDLE: Ding Ren (@halfcrystalline) opted to knit a version of the vintage waistcoat pattern that inspired my Anna pattern, modified for a seamed-on band, and I love her choice of charcoal grey.

BOTTOM: Anna Dianich (@toltyarnandwool), for whom the pattern is named, put a shawl collar on hers!

The Tuesday Morning Stitch Circle at Tolt also all knitted Anna together, and this photo of them in their finished vests made my heart go all puddly. I especially love those contrast pocket linings.

I’ve answered several questions about button-band seaming along the way, and it’s been my intention to do a blog  post about it when I’m seaming my own band — it’s just taking me longer to get there than expected! As noted, I don’t have enough yarn to finish, and I also interrupted it briefly for the blue thing … but I finished the principal knitting of ol’ blue last night and have more black Terra on the way for my Anna, so I’ll be picking up where I left off posthaste. My pieces are all blocked and will be seamed this weekend, so with any luck I’ll have a seamed button-band tutorial for you next week!

Meanwhile, it’s never too late to cast on! Just use hashtag #annavestkal wherever/whenever.

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PREVIOUSLY in the Anna Vest Knitalong: How to make it match

Q for You: What gauge are you?

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Q for You: What gauge are you?

I’m a 7. I don’t mean, like, on a hotness scale of 1 to 10. I mean, my natural gauge — the gauge at which I feel most at ease as a knitter — is 4.5mm, aka US7. I’m content anywhere from US4 to US10-ish, am not unhappy on the bigger fellas, 11-13. But these US19s I’m currently knitting on? Not a fan. I just don’t enjoy working with needles bigger than my fingers. The obvious upside is it goes faster — although the gains of giant stitches are somewhat offset by the clumsiness of wielding the tree trunks.

It’s largely a matter of perspective: To sock knitters, my beloved US7s seem gigantic. To the people who knit on PVC pipe, the standard-range needles must all seem hilarious dinky. After knitting for a few days on these 19s, if I pick up the 4s above, they feel like toothpicks. So there’s no going back and forth between my two current projects. (My blue Loopy and my black Anna, that is.) Plus given my lack of joy in the act of this knitting and the fact that the blue sweater isn’t exactly seasonally necessary at the moment, I know if I set it aside to knit even a stitch of anything else, I’ll never pick it back up again. So if I don’t want it to wind up an orphan, I have to just power through. Fortunately, after a week of knitting here and there, I’m almost done!

I feel like we all have a range on the scale where we’re most comfortable, but if I had to choose just one needle size to use forevermore — say I could have whatever assortment of circs and DPNs, etc., but all in the same gauge — the automatic answer for me would be US7.  So that’s my Q for You today: What gauge are you?

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PREVIOUSLY in Q for You: Do you also sew?

Elsewhere

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Elsewhere: Yarny links for your clicking pleasure

I’m so happy it’s Friday, you guys. It’s been about a month since I had an actual day off, and I intend to be wildly lazy this weekend — me and my blue sweater might never leave the couch! If you’ve got some time to kill or fill, I offer you these gems:

– File under Heroes: The sock queen of Alabama (via)

– Here’s a woman taking a very academic approach to Morse Code knitting. (Me, I just did it to be goofy. But hey, it made it onto the telly!) (via)

– Frequent Fringe collaborator Jen Hewett on teaching her craft to others — can’t wait to listen to this

– How have I not known about Tender Buttons?

– Sashiko: history and how-to

– Nice overview of the spinning process, from fleece to drop spindle

– “The first tailor exclusively for women in the history of Savile Row” (via)

– More and more fashion brands moving away from the tyranny of “seasons” (via)

– “prêt-a-jeter” is my new favorite term (via)

I also want to say a HUGE thank-you for the amazing response to the new toffee Field Bag. It’s been an incredible week, and I couldn’t be happier that you clearly love this color as much as we do! As always, I’m so thankful for your support of both the blog and the shop — it means everything to me.

Happy weekend!

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PREVIOUSLY: Elsewhere