A long neglected FO

So, there's a number of unblogged and neglected projects lying around. Sometime in the last few months I managed to finish up one of these unloved things and got it into wearable shape.

I did blog about this project a few times last summer...I started it on June 4th of last year and finished it on August 30. And then put it on and screamed in agony. Behold, the disaster that was the Aran Necklace Camisole:

Not so bad from the front, right? But look.

Ooops! For a summer sweater, that's a bit low in the armholes I'd say. So...the above pictures were actually taken in March of this year. It ended up being an easy fix when I finally got down to it. I started by just using some matching weight yarn and mattress stitching the armholes closed a few inches, but it looked terrible. Out came the yarn, in came a needle and thread. Ta da!

Not the best look up close, but it works in the wearing.

Sorry for the craptastic photo, but I'm on Day 5 of 10 of single parenthood - my photographer is gallivanting around northern China for the week, courtesy of his employer, so I'm stuck with the self-photo.

Pattern: Aran Necklace Camisole (Rav link) by Caroline Bautista
Yarn: Jo Sharp Soho Summer DK Cotton, 6 skeins (approximately 650 yds)
Needles: US 4/3.5 mm
Start/finish: 4 June - 30 August 2010, finally finished in March 2011
Comments/mods: loved knitting the neckline section with the cabley bits, even though I seem to have messed it up a bit so that it's off center. Picking up the stitches around the neckline and then knitting down in stockinette was, um, boring. And the yarn? Let's just say I'm glad that it is out of the stash and into a sweater that I can actually wear. Cotton and I do not get along well, particularly splitty harsh-to-knit-with cotton...

Note: this does not count for my August sweater, since the knitting was finished last year. But it will go in the FO win column for the year.

I swear to Bob I'm going to finish a sweater this month

Sadly, but totally unsuprisingly, I've fallen a bit behind in my quest to knit 11 sweaters this year. However, I have high hopes for the month of August!

That is the body and back, and the start of the front of a manly man sweater. That is going to be for...someone for whom I started a sweater before deciding (with some input from his spouse) that it wasn't quite his thing and I should probably give it to someone who would appreciate it fully. Like my spouse, who has been making goo goo eyes at the thing since I started it, but that's another story.

This yarn was rescued from my abandoned Hurrication vest from the fall of 2008. Intended recipient is a big fan of blue, so I overdyed the yarn with some Jacquard Acid dyes.

I've blogged before about my previous attempts to dye sweaterlots of yarn so as to avoid dye lot variability. As you can see from the above picture, it didn't work out so well this time! So I separated out the various shades of blue that I ended up with and re-dyed the seriously lighter ones. I'm knitting the sweater alternating every row or every two rows from two skeins of yarn, in hopes of minimizing any major color differences. It helps that even the darker/brighter skeins have some variability as well. I don't think you can see a difference...

I'm loving the way the stitch pattern looks. When blocked, it flattens out quite a bit, but still keeps that wavey feel. I'm hoping to finish this up in the next couple of weeks, and get the pattern out to testers by the end of this week. Look for this one to be available in early October, just in time for fall knitting!

The last of the Tour de Fleece yarns

A horrible picture of a nice yarn

Fiber: merino/alpaca/camel/silk from Krafty Koala
Spun/plied: 12:1
Stats: 278 yds/4.5 oz, about sport weight
Comments: I was drawn to two things about this fiber - the blend and the dark, gloomy colors. Maybe it was the fact that it was grey and rainy and cold during Knit Nation...in any event, I was excited to spin this up, and jumped right in during the Tour de Fleece.

I split the top in half across the length and then split each half into four strips - this seems to have become my standard fiber prep these days. I used to do a lot more spinning from the full width of top from one end going straight through to the other end, but I've been trying to mix up and blend the colors in a lot of the stuff I've been spinning recently, to move away from dramatic stripey-ness. It remains to be seen if that approach has been actually successful.

Back to the fiber: I had a tough time spinning this, largely due to the difference in staple length between the various fibers. The merino and alpaca and silk were all ok, but I kept ending up with little puffs of short, fuzzy, presumably camel fibers that wouldn't stay integrated in the top. The silk was also pretty obvious in the blend and not terribly well mixed in. To be perfectly honest, I should have expected this problem ahead of time, just given the composition of the top, but I don't think I'll try a similar combination again.

I was hoping to end up with enough yardage for a Bitterroot shawl, but fell well short. The yarn is lovely and drapey and has gorgeous sheen, so maybe this should be my yarn for a little shawlette design. I can do Bitterroot with last year's TdF laceweight instead.

Blue July

Well, August has suddenly arrived in full swing (it's gotten hot here, FINALLY!!!!), and I've discovered that there was quite a bit of blue in my fibery pursuits last month.

 

These include: some yarn I overdyed for a new men's sweater design, but ended up with some dyelot issues, a lovely pile of merino/alpaca/camel/silk fiber from Knit Nation, mohair/nylon/merino from Adrian, a finished Lacey Baktus for Dev's Year 1 teacher, my first Polwarth (from David) and two girls who finished yet another year of school. Not pictured: some lovely 3-ply SW merino/bamboo sock yarn I finished on Sunday evening, and a couple of handdyed BFL tops in navy and turquoise. I can not believe how quickly the summer has gone by so far, and there's a bit more to come before autumn!

August's colors are purple and pink. Hmmm...I think I'd better hunt through the fiber stash and find something to take to spinning tonight that falls into those categories. 

Fiber Friday: TdF Yarns #4 and #6

Fiber: Hello Yarn Fiber Club January 2010, "Loch", 83% mohair/15% nylon/2% merino
Spun/plied: 12:1, short forward draw
Comments: I was a bit concerned about this colorway - the combo of blue and orange has never really appealed to me, regardless of what the colorwheel says should be true. I decided to split my first 4 oz bump into two color groups and spin them seperately. Here's what the fiber looked like originally.

I broke the top apart into blue/green chunks and orange/olive chunks. Each piece was stripped into 4 lengths and I tried to mix them up as much as possible in the spinning. Here is the first batch of finished singles before plying.

I spun this with a short forward worsted draw, and the singles ended up a bit thicker then my usual default yarn - the mohair seemed a bit clumpy, more like tencel then wool I think. But really fun to spin, and so smooth and drapey - I knew the finished yarn was going to be incredible.

Originally I was going to split the second four ounces down the middle and spin for matching chain-plied stripey socks. However. Once the first two skeins came out of their spa treatment, I started thinking that I needed to do the same with the second bump. So when the cyclists hit the Alpes, I was spinning away on another orange vs. blue situation.

 

Hooray Tommy!

I ended up with about 220 yds of blue and 150 yds of orange, approximately DK weight. Now I just have to find the right pattern for them!