All over but the finishin'

Cast off the other side of DD's wrap sweater last night. Had to wind a third skein of the yarn and then only had to knit three (four?) rows. I think I'm going to make a hat, scarf, and mittens for her out of the remainder. It's going to be a lovely sweater. Now, I just have to decide whether to do i-cord ties or ribbon. And sew up the seams. And possibly embelish the neckline, hem, and/or sleeves.

Next up is to fix the mess of the Clapotis. I've got a long US3 straight or my Bamboo Sister US5 with a long cable. We'll see which is better for picking up the stitches back a repeat or so. Argh.

Yarn P***

Darn those crazy b's at Lime 'n' Violet! I listened to their podcast on the way to work this morning and am now (again) obsessed with the idea of hand-dyed sock yarn. I have yet to knit a pair of socks, but the stuff out there is so yummy. Be sure to check out sKnitches to see what I mean.

DD cardi

With lots of counting and measuring, I've reached the second front of my lady's sweater. I even had to do a little tinking, since I'd forgotten the measurement I was going for until I'd gone an inch past it. Luckily, with this yarn I didn't have too many rows to go back.

I tried to put it around the little miss yesterday to see if I had measured correctly, but she would have none of it. I think I'm close enough though.

Now, the big question is how to finish it, aside from sewing up the side seams/sleeves. I did see a wrap cardi with a ruffle collar on someone else's blog last week (and forgot to note the URL, so you'll have to google it yourself, if you're interested). I believe it was from a Debbie Bliss book. I could pick up and knit around the whole edge, but that might be a bit bulky in this yarn on her. It would be sort of like the pinwheel cardigan on elann's website.

I guess I need to see how it looks plain before I make any additions. the increase stitch I used on the neckline was to M1 but without twisting the stitch, so it makes a little hole, which I like in this instance. I thought about doing kfb but am happy with what I've got here.

My other thought on "embellishing" was to do a perpendicular knitted section along the bottom like Kyoto on knitty.com, though that would involve more sewing. I'm going to have to wait and see.

There is a lot of pooling with this variegation at this gauge in these dimensions, but it's kind of cool, sort of like a butterfly wing pattern or something.

So, I did end up adapting the wrap cardigan from Simple Knits for Cherished Babies. With my gauge and the dimensions of a sweater that fits her now, I used the stitch count for the smallest size as a starting point. But since then it's been almost all measurement-based.

Pattern Generator

This is very cool. I think I should probably verify my Haiku cardigan. Better go find my gauge swatch...

DD wrap sweater

I cast on for this over the weekend after discovering the Clapotis disaster. I ended up doing a gauge swatch and then adapting the wrap sweater pattern from Simple Knits for Cherished Babies using dimensions of a sweater of DD's. Whee, lots of math.

I'm just doing stockinette, so it rolls. I may go back and knit an edging of some sort on the bottom (ruffle?), depending upon how it looks, but I'm a fan of the stockinette roll being a J.Crew rollneck sweater girl from way back. I'm not sure yet whether I will have to do some sort of edge on the collar. There is a cute Jedi sweater I found the other day that just let's the stockinette roll. We'll see.

The yarn is yummy. While the variegation is leading to some pooling, I kind of like that. The Shells colorway is beautiful.

I think it's going to be very cute. Just hope DD likes it.

Sounds to Knit By

Unfortunately, I don't have enough time in the day to knit and listen to podcasts. I don't have much time to knit at all. But I do spend close to two hours in the car a day, so I've started listening to podcasts while driving.

Lime 'n' Violet - I've mentioned them before; they're fab! Unfortunately, family circumstances have them on a short (I hope) hiatus.

Cast-On - Many online knitters consider Brenda Dayne the grande dame of knit podcasting. Darnit, she's on hiatus, as well, working on her next season of the show.

CraftLit - Heather Ordover is so someone I'd be friends with: knitter, spinner, mom of two, former English teacher. I've really enjoyed her craft and literature discussions and am looking forward to the next book (her first choice was Pride and Prejudice - how could I not like it?!)

Math4Knitters - I just started listening to this, and it's very interesting, though brief, which is a pain in the car, since I haven't figured out how to tell the nano to play all podcasts in order from the beginning. There ought to be a way.

I know there are more knitting podcasts out there, so I have lots of listening to do...

Oh, the places you'll go

when you start googling knitting. Did you know the V&A has, essentially, a knitting department? Now, you do.