11 for 2011

I started 2011 with 11 sweaters in WIP status. (I know, I know, I'm completely crazy.) Most of them were started during NaKniSweMoDo 2009. I did manage to finish a record number of sweaters in 2009, but I didn't finish ANY in 2010.

It's time to rectify that. I have decided to finish all 11 of those UFO/WIP sweaters this year. NaKniSweMoAlmostDo 2011 here I come!

One of the things I DID manage to do in 2010 was to keep my yarn purchases down to very little. At least my stash was not expanding exponentially while I wasn't knitting much!

As a carrot/reward this year, I have decided to allow myself 1 yarn crawl or major purchase for every 3 sweaters I finish.

This one is the closest to being done. The knitting was actually completed in 2010, but it still needs finishing work.




It's the matching cardigan to a vest I completed in 2008.
The yarn is Louet KidLin Laceweight that I bought on sale when Knit & Hook in Kirkwood decided to have only the rug hooking side of their business.






Finishing work includes doing a 3 needle bind-off on the second shoulder, sewing in both sleeves, & crocheting around the front opening & neckline. I decided not to do a regular buttonband because of how loose this cardigan is. I've lost weight since casting it on, so it flows loose even more than designed. I'll just close it with a shawl pin if I ever decide to wear it closed.

Third Time's a Charm

At least, I hope the third time is a charm. I'm going to have the entire Aleita Shell pattern memorized by the time I'm finished with this vest. Between the initial false start & the sizing adjustments & my latest mistake, I'll have done as much knitting on this vest as I would have on a full-sized long-sleeved sweater.

As evidenced by these pictures, I thought I was making great progress. However, it turns out it’s not a good idea to glance at the instructions once & then not bring the pattern with you when KIP’ing. That's 4 inches into the top section of decreasing every FOURTH row instead of every THIRD row. Oops! Back to frogging.

Originally I thought I'd pick the stitches back up on the row after the first decreases, so as to re-knit as little as possible. However, I tried the sweater on again after removing the needles for this latest batch of frogging, & discovered that I really needed another inch of stockinette between the smallest part of the waist & the start of the reverse stockinette/neck division part. Perhaps the latest problem was a blessing in disguise, as otherwise I wouldn't have realized I wanted another inch in the stockinette section until I was either much further along, or perhaps even finished with the vest.

That decision meant frogging back even further, not being able to save the fiddly rows where the neck divides, & more boring stockinette in the round. I think I’ll be happier with the end result this way, though.





It's amazing the difference between decreasing every 3rd row & decreasing every 4th. One good thing about it is that the number of stitches per row decreases faster, which makes for less knitting.
At least re-doing the neck division was much easier & faster the third time around, since I already figured out the directions on how to do it.
Now that I'm back on track, I still hope to finish this before the end of "Vest-uary".

Works In Progress Wednesday

I have the same things on my needles as I did two weeks ago, so there's nothing new for What's on My Needles. I have made progress, but haven't had much chance for pictures. We're more than half-way through Vest-uary, & all I have to show for it is 3 half-finished vests.

I had to do some sizing adjustments on my Aleita Shell, so I've been doing some frogging & re-knitting. I'm reached the neckline division again, though, & am now closing in on the armholes.

The red & blue is the Shawl Collar Vest by Amanda Berka in Elizabeth Austen "Andes" wool from Chris' Needlecraft. The pattern is doing a reasonable job of breaking up the colors. Because the piece is folded & sewn together, I'll also avoid the dreaded vertical lines across my front, so I'm continueing with this experiment.

These are the possible colors I'm considering for yoke section of the Vormorgun Létt-Lopavesti by Védís Jónsdóttir. I went into Chris' Needlecraft to find the grey yarns, since I knew they carry Plymouth Galway.

What's On My Needles This Wednesday

In honor of Vest-uary, my knitting so far this week has been all about the vests. I'm nearly finished with the plain stockinette section of my Aleita Shell. I'm not sure when I'll have enough free time to puzzle through the start of the divided section, though.
To that end, I've started another project to have plain stockinette available for KIP knitting. This is the start of Vormorgun Létt-Lopavesti , free pattern at Istex. I'm using Plymouth Galway Worsted from my stash of going-out-of-yarn-business wool, purchased at what used to be Knit & Hook. (It now only sells rug hooking supplies.)

Another Finished Object for Friday

This is the Boogie Vest from an older issue of Knitty.




The yarn is Madil Yarns Iceland, purchased on sale at Knit & Caboodle in St. Charles. The vest used just under 4 skeins. For the most part, I really enjoyed knitting with this yarn, & I love the color. However, I found a knot in a couple of the skeins, which didn't make me happy.

It's my second completed NaKniSweMoDo 2009 sweater. By getting something quick out of the way, there won't be as much pressure to only work on simple knits. Some of the sweaters I have planned for this year are definitely multi-month projects.

What's on My Needles Wednesday

This month has been all about the sweaters. I'm slowly but surely making progress on my Susie Hoodie, but have also been lured into starting new things. The pinkish beige is the start of Mr. Greenjeans, from Knitty.com, in Dream In Color Classy that I bought on clearance as Kirkwood Knittery.

I'm also experimenting with a vest/shrug pattern for this two-tone yarn. I haven't decided yet whether I like this or not.

Finished Object for Friday

My first finished NaKniSweMoDo 2009 sweater is my February Lady Sweater, which I started last September. I bound off on Monday night & wove all the ends in during the Inauguration Tuesday morning.

The yarn is discontinued Colorado Yarns Knitaly bought on clearance from Webs ages ago. I used a little under 5 balls (500gr) for a size large.

False Start

Is it a bad sign when the first new project of the year doesn't work out? I picked a project involving lots of stockinette in the round, for mindless New Years Day Time-With-Family knitting. In keeping with my goal of using stash yarn this year, I took out 3 skeins of purple sport-weight Louet Gems that I had bought on clearance with the idea of making some sort of vest, & found a project from the Spring Interweave Knits that appeared to be a good fit.

However, I think I goofed the first time I cast on for my Aleita Shell.
I had experimented with using the cable cast-on for this sweater. Cable cast-on is supposed to help with rolling. However, because this sweater is knit in the round, the cast-on-edge ends up backwards from how it would sit when knitting back & forth. (Wrong side out, in other words.)

I made good progress on Aleita over New Years, but it was rolling like crazy at the bottom, so I was contemplating ripping it out & trying a different cast on.


I ended up taking the second ball of yarn & experimenting with the cast on. As the knitting progressed, it became obvious that there was much less rolling going on with the experimental second try. There’s still a bit that may need to be blocked out, but it isn’t quite as bad.


The second time I did the cable cast on, but then knit back along the cast on before joining. That way, the opposite edge of the cast on is towards the outside of the fabric. It does mean a tiny bit of sewing the first back & forth row together, but not much. You can sort of see what I mean here:



Is it too much to hope that this may get my "false start" mojo over for the year?

The Year of the Sweater

This year I am focusing on enjoying & using my stash -- primarily big projects, so that I remove the temptation to break up any of the larger "sweater's worth" amounts only run short later.

In the process of knitting somewhat from stash in 2008, I realized I had several sweater's worth, with only vague ideas of what sweaters I might make. So last November, I decided 2009 would be the year to knit some of my "sweater's worth" stash yarn. I spent Thanksgiving break matching up my "stash list" with my "queue list".

Catching up on my blog reading the following week, I came across this post by Margene. It seems I'm not the only one making 2009 the Year of the Sweater.

Over 400 other folks are also concentrating on sweaters this year, with the goal being a nice, round dozen sweaters over the next 12 months. That's an average of one a month, but not a requirement to finish one every month. A month of no Finished Objects followed by 2 sweaters the next month is still right on track, in other words.

Speaking of words, the word for this insanity is NaKniSweMoDo. Button to be added to my sidebar later...