Completed Cardigan (despite the heat!)

Thankfully it's a little cooler here today, or at least less humid.  I've found it pretty unpleasant the last few days I must admit.  It seems we're never happy with the weather, whatever it's doing, are we?

It's still too hot for me to wear my new cardigan though, which is why you're seeing it on Rosie.  

It's sort of self designed.  I used stitch numbers from a plain cardigan pattern I found, can't remember which one it was now, and then used the stitch pattern from Esther Socks for the body.   The sleeves are plain stocking stitch, and are elbow length because I didn't have enough yarn to make them longer. All the ribbing is twisted rib, finished with an I-cord bind off.

When I was knitting it I thought it was going to be too small, but if anything it's a bit bigger than I would have liked.  I really struggle with getting knits the right size.  I should probably always knit one size smaller than I think I need.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to it being cool enough for me to wear this.

I'm now planning another cardigan, using some Colourmart Extra Fine Merino I bought a while ago because I loved the colour.

It's called "Geranio" and is a kind of pinky, orangy red.  I have about 1300 yards of it.

I'm torn between 2 patterns at the moment.  I'd really like to do Meridien by Joji Locatelli.

I don't have quite the amount of yarn the pattern calls for though, and no chance of getting any more.  It looks pretty long, so I might be able to shorten it a bit.  I'm not too far off the yardage required.

My alternative is Chance of Showers by Heidi Kirrmaier. 

I've definitely got enough yarn for this one. 

Goodness, I'm so indecisive!  Maybe I should knit this in the yarn I have and then buy some more for Meridien, does that sound like a good plan?

Shades of Grey

I used to love black. 

For years and years I couldn't get enough of black.  If I was buying clothes, I'd see something I liked and my immediate thought would be "I wonder if it comes in black?"

Maybe it's because I'm getting older, but my feelings towards black have definitely changed.  I don't hate it, but I have far fewer black items in my wardrobe than I used to have.  I think one pair of trousers, one skirt, a couple of basic t-shirts and one smarter top that I bought last week.  That's it! 

My neutral of choice is now grey, which I used to hate.  Grey reminded me of school uniforms - particularly when combined with red - which is what I wore for 4 years on a daily basis long, long ago.

But these days I LOVE grey, all shades from the palest pearly grey to the darkest charcoal.  I find it as versatile as black and far more flattering to my skin tone. 

With that in mind I currently have 2 grey projects on my knitting needles.

The first is Kim Hargreaves Wallace cardigan, from her Touching Elegance book. 

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The book and yarn were a birthday present from hubby back at the beginning of September. I'm on the home straight with this, even though it doesn't really look like it from this pic.   The grey is darker than it appears here.

Please excuse Rosie rudely exposing her underwear!

I actually have the other front knitted too - just not sewn on yet.  One sleeve still to knit, then the making up, and knitting the collar, cuffs and pockets.  I think I'm only going to do the lower pockets.  I'm probably a bit too well endowed for breast pockets. We'll see about that nearer the time.

I'm also going to need to alter the sleeves a little.  The one I've knitted is almost exactly the right length for me at present.  However, there's still a cuff to be added, which will make it too long. I haven't decided how to resolve this yet, but I've got a couple of options in mind.

This is lovely, easy TV knitting.  In fact I did quite a bit during Strictly Come Dancing last night.  (How good were Denise and James?!)  The pattern is really well written, as are all Kim Hargreaves patterns. 

She has a new book out, called Enchanted.  I'm seriously tempted by it, as usual there are some gorgeous patterns included. 

My other grey project is completely different.  It's a large, lacy shawl/wrap in a very pale grey. 

The pattern is Pachelbel by Carol Sunday of Sunday Knits. 

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As soon as I saw this on Ravelry a week or so ago I knew I had to knit it.  I'd been searching for a while for a lacy scarf/shawl pattern but hadn't found anything that floated my boat, then this popped up as a newly released pattern. 

The pattern gives instructions for 4 different sizes; a scarf, a stole, a shawl and a wrap.  The one shown in the pattern photos is the shawl.  I've cast on for the stole, but I'm now debating starting again for the shawl.  Although I do want this to be something that can be worn as a big scarf with a coat, so perhaps I've got the right size on the go.  It's looking as if it's going to be about 20 inches wide. 

There's not much to show on this so far, just a few inches.  It looks as if it's going to be pretty though. 

I'm using one of my favourite yarns - Colourmart's Shiny Cotton fingering weight, a blend of cotton, cashmere, angora and viscose.  It's extremely soft without being the slightest bit itchy.   

I saw a lovely grey felt cloche hat in Marks and Spencer yesterday, which I think would look gorgeous with this - and with my blue and grey coat when I make it!

Autumn Knitting Plans

After a scorching hot couple of days last weekend, the weather has turned decidedly cooler in the past few days and with it my thoughts have been turning towards Autumn knitting.

As I mentioned in a recent post, I am currently working on a striped sweater which is progressing quite nicely and I think the weather will definitely be right to wear it as soon as it’s finished – you watch, now we’ll have a heat wave mid-September!

I spent a bit of time the other day going through my “favourite” and “queued” patterns on Ravelry to come up with a bit of a plan for what I would like to knit for Autumn/Winter.  So far I have a list of three items, all of which I’m hoping to knit with stash yarn. 

The first will be a skirt, the Chelsea skirt by Cecily Glowik MacDonald.   This is a free pattern that can be downloaded here, from Knitting Daily.  

It’s knit in a worsted weight tweedy yarn.  I often have problems with tweedy yarns because I’m very sensitive to scratchiness in fabrics, knit or woven, and I find that tweed is terrible for being scratchy.  I’m slightly less worried about this as the skirt will not be directly next to my skin, but I was still apprehensive when I ordered the yarn. 

I’m using Donegal Yarns Soft Donegal that I found on Great British Yarns website.  The site says the yarn is soft, so I thought I’d give it a go.  And it is certainly much softer than many tweeds.  Not soft enough to wear around my neck, but as it’s destined to be a skirt, that shouldn’t be a problem!

The colour is scrummy – it’s called Eggplant and it’s a really dark purple shade with flecks of olive green,  violet, rose pink and fuchsia pink.  I'm really looking forward to starting this.

 

Next we have a Still Light Tunic, by Veera Välimäki, available on Ravelry.   I was tempted to knit this last winter and in fact bought the yarn I’ll be using and started knitting another tunic dress.  Unfortunately that turned into a massive failure as my gauge was way off, so it’s sat languishing in the cupboard for the best part of a year.  I’m going to have to rip it all out, skein and wash the yarn before I can start again!

 

I’ll be using an orange extra fine merino fingering weight from Colourmart for this.

Third on the list is a chunky cardigan.  The pattern is Kelly by Jo Storie, available here. 

 

Unfortunately, it’s knitted in a yarn that I know would make me itch just looking at it!  I find that many chunky yarns are very high on the scratchiness scale if they’re not a blend that contains a high percentage of acrylic.  I’ve got nothing against acrylic really, and in some cases it is exactly what is needed, but I do find quite a few of the heavier acrylic yarns have a tendency to look “cheap”.  (No, I’m NOT a yarn snob, I just like things to look worthy of the effort I’ve put into making them.  If the yarn that gives the look I’m after contains acrylic, I’m happy to use it!) 

I’m hoping I can use a yarn that I already have for this cardigan as well.  In fact, it’s yarn that is currently knitted up into a cardigan! 

 

I knitted this cardigan a couple of years ago, and while I still love it, it has stretched beyond belief, now almost reaching my knees.  I’m going to rip it out (I was planning on doing this anyway) and use the yarn doubled to hopefully get the right gauge.  I have a bit left over, so I’ll try with that first!  It’s another Colourmart yarn, this time a Cashmere/Silk/Viscose/Merino blend.

I think these three new projects should keep me going well into Autumn and possibly Winter as well!

 

Have you got any knitting planned for the coming months?  I'd love to hear about them.

 

Made by Me: Pebble Cardigan

I've had some issues with this stitching project, and at the weekend it was relegated (completed apart from all the ends being sewn in) to the spare room as it had angered me!

However, with some calm thinking and a little work the issues have disappeared and she is now my new favourite...... until the next one comes along!

The pattern is the Pebble Cardigan, by Nancy Eiseman, which can be found here on Ravelry.

The issues were not due to the pattern at all, which is lovely.  In fact I'm not sure what they were due to, but whatever it was caused the finished cardigan to twist so that one front edge was longer than the other, and the whole garment seemed to hang to one side.  The cardigan is knitted in one piece from the top down, so there are no side seams to help things hang correctly.

You can see the difference in length here - at this stage I thought it was the circular needle pulling things out of shape.

After ranting and moaning, and counting several time to make sure I'd picked up the same number of stitches for each front band (I had - 81 each side), I did the sensible thing and gave it a good bath and laid it out flat to block dry, carefully shaping it all into place. 

Then I got on Ebay and found some pretty striped grosgrain ribbon to stitch along the button and buttonhole bands to prevent them from stretching again (or whatever they'd done!).

Stitching it to the button band was easy, measure the length, pin carefully and sew neatly in place. 

However, the buttonhole band was a bit more tricky - how to cope with the buttonholes?  I debated several solutions, but in the end I measured (several times) and marked out positions for buttonholes on the grosgrain and made them on my sewing machine.  Then I lined everything up with the buttonholes on the knitted band and stitched in place.  I had to sew a few stitches around each buttonhole (which I'd hoped not to have to do) as the different coloured stripes showed through onto the front side of the cardigan.

Yesterday morning it even stopped raining long enough (and the sun came out for a few minutes) so that I was able to get into the garden and snap a few photos. 

Worn here with the denim skirt I made at the weekend!

Lets Talk About Knitting

So far my (few) posts have concentrated on sewing, so today I thought I’d have a little change and share some knitting with you.

I have knitted for as long as I can remember, on and off, although more off than on in recent years.  It was only a chance visit to a local yarn shop with a friend about 3 years ago that tempted me to try it again.  It was about that same time I discovered Ravelry, and since then I haven’t looked back.

Pre Ravelry I thought that everything had to be knitted exactly as the pattern stated.  No yarn substitutions, no altering lengths or sleeves or body, no omitting parts you didn’t like.  The only change I thought as being acceptable was to choose a different colour yarn from that shown on the pattern.  In my mind knitting patterns were "the law", to be followed to the letter!

And I was never really happy with things I’d knitted.   They never fitted quite right, or I’d think “if only this bit was different...”

However, 3 years on I hardly EVER follow a pattern 100%.  Most of the things I’ve knitted have had alterations of some sort, obviously some more successful than others.   Want longer/shorter sleeves, a more fitted shape, a wider neckline?  No problem!  Sometimes a little bit of maths is involved, or a little bit of trial and error, but I quite like that.

Found a gorgeous lace design on a sock pattern, but don’t like to knit socks?  Take that lace design and turn it into a beautiful scarf or add it to a sweater.

Of course, sometimes you need to follow the pattern fully, a lace shawl for example (although more experienced knitters than I may beg to differ - or not).    

On other occasions the pattern almost begs to be altered in some way.  A top down, in the round cardigan?  (Possibly my favourite item to knit by the way).   Alter the sleeve length, body length, add some waist shaping, a bit of lace, the choices are endless.  And knitting this way you can try on as you go, rather than having to wait until all the individual pieces are completed and sewn together.

 

What's on my needles?

I’m currently knitting a top down cardigan, Pebble by Nancy Eiseman.   The pattern is lovely, very well written and a simple knit.  I love the slightly vintage look it has.

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Mine is a lovely coral orange, knitted in Louisa Harding Albero, which is a cotton/rayon blend double knitting yarn.

I’ve almost finished the body and while I have made a few alterations, they are quite minor.  I’ve added a little to the length, about 2 inches in total, and added a bit of waist shaping as boxy cardigans don’t really suit me. 

When it comes to the sleeves I will probably make them a little more fitted than the pattern photo shows them.

The alterations I have already made and will be making to this before it's complete will give me a cardigan that flatters my shape much more than the original, more boxy cardigan would have done.

Once you realise you CAN make alterations to a knitting pattern it is much easier to end up with a garment that fits you well and flatters your body shape.

 I just wish I’d known that years ago!