Saturday, September 23, 2006

Frog or finish?


I guess when my Kyoto sleeve finally started going well, I would finally get out of denial about my Not So Shrunken Cardigan (NSSC) having a lot more ease and room than I realized I would be comfortable with. While I chose to knit the 38 bust size for my LBT and the Kyoto, for some inexplicable reason I chose to knit the NSSC in a size 40. I knew the body had a bit of ease in it that I thought I wouldn't mind, but it just didn't click in my head that since this pattern was top down, it made the sleeves huge, even with the decreases. So now the question is, do I frog or finish? (And pardon the pic, it actually isn't as uneven as it looks. I simply didn't place it evenly on my body.)

Well, actually my choices are 1) frog the sleeve back and decrease 3x more often at least but it would still be loosey-goosey at the top of the arm and underarm area, 2) frog the whole darn thing, or 3) finish per pattern, throw it in the dryer after washing and hope for the best (but it is unlikely it will shrink how I want it, if it shrinks at all due to the silk content) or 4) seam up the sides by an inch. It would actually need to be seamed another inch for at least 2" total but that would leave a ridiculously large seam "allowance." But since this sweater if for me, I do not have any time constraints on finishing this and since I do love this yarn knitted up (yum), the idea of frogging the whole thing and starting all over is actually palatable. Well, at least for the moment.


On the positive side, I finished 1 of my Kyoto sleeves and my first adult size sock in Knitpicks Simple Stripes Snapdragon is going along rather well. The caveat being I have made a couple mistakes that I fixed and shouldn't be too noticeable. One thing I realized though is that I am not a self-striping yarn person. I think I'm a little too fussy and anal about where the stripes are going. I made the cuff 2", probably at least 0.5" too long because I didn't like ending the cuff only partway through the purple stripe. The other thing with this yarn and probably why it's on clearance is that there are brown flecks there and there where the dye colors dripped/mixed together outside their respective stripe areas. It's definitely not as soft as the other sock yarns I've gotten but have yet to knit up. Then again, I haven't washed it yet.

And thanks to tapmouse I am now the proud owner of her leftover Socks that Rock (STR) Fairgrounds yarn in medium weight. There's definitely enough left over for toddler socks, but it's a maybe for girls socks. I was going to try a toe up pattern to see if I can get girl anklets out of them, but monkey1 doesn't want them due to the presence of the green color in them. The other STR yarn samples she gave me are a bit of Rainforest Jasper in lightweight and a bit of Rolling Stone to swath with and to may a microscopic sock for the sock blocker key chain she also gave me. This will be cute and fun to do!


And now I know why the Yarn Harlot says that sock stash doesn't count. It can grow exponentially! In a weak moment I ordered Koigu 123A (first pair of yarn on the left)from the kyarns.com sale knitty board members posted about. Very cute and tropical-y. A lot greener than the online pic though. Then another knitting friend told me about Yarn in Alameda's going out of business sale so we headed over there at lunch and got myself a pair of Loet Gems in Tobacco, Fleece Artist merino sock yarn in a pretty royal blue (Polar Seas? No color name or number on the label), and Lorna's Laces Shepard Sock in Somerset. They only had 3 skeins of the LL left, all in different colors, so I got the pink and green colorway for a pair of toddler socks for monkey2 before I found out monkey1 wasn't excited about the STR Fairgrounds colors. Oh well, I guess that means monkey2 will get way more socks than monkey1.

1 comment:

tapmouse said...

Yay for stash enhancement!!! Don't you just love the way sock stashes don't count towards your yarn stash? And another thing I discovered-you can subdivide your sock stash if you are good enough at growing it! You know..."CTH stash", Koigu Stash, STR stash...
>;)

The Enabling Tapmouse!