sweater knitting – Damselfly's Delights

For some odd reason I’ve been finding it difficult to get back into sewing. I have several projects that have been on hold, plus a couple of things to mend and a whole list of items I want to make. But so far…nope. Nothing doing.

Instead I’ve been knitting. I finished my Wolkig Cowl in my handspun Fernwood 2-ply yarn:

The pattern is a very easy one by Martina Behm from Knitty’s First Fall 2017 issue. It worked really well with the variegated yarn, neither getting lost in the colour changes nor obscuring them. The needle size was a little large (4mm) for this yarn which is slightly finer than regular fingering but the results are very soft and squishy and truly warm! Especially when I doubled the cowl on my neck. Mmmmmmm…

The cowl only used just under 90g of my 250g total of this yarn so of course I cast on for another accessory. This one is the Midas Hat by Laura Reinbach. I was going to make another Sockhead hat but the Midas has the extra-warm doubled band which is exactly what I was wishing for after a particularly cold walk a couple of weeks ago. There’s not enough of this project to show you yet.

I’m also finally plugging along on the self-designed Deciduous Pullover that I started way back in July of 2018. Somehow I got frustrated with how it was going and bailed on it for quite some time. I reassessed my issues with it and realised that I wasn’t going to have nearly enough of the main medium grey yarn to make it a tunic length, which was my first plan. So instead I went in the other direction and cropped it severely. With my fluffy belly this is only going to be wearable over dresses or longer tunics so we’ll have to see how much love it gets in the end. I’m on the last sleeve now and making use of my “sweater turntable” (I refuse to call it a Lazy Susan) to facilitate going around and around and around.

Thom made it for me and it wasn’t even properly finished before I snatched it into use. You can just see it under that heap of sweater. Guess I should have done a video so you can see how it rotates as I knit, huh? Too hard to hold the iPad and knit at the same time unfortunately. You’ll just have to use your imagination. The needles I’m using are my wee ChiaoGoo Mini Twist Shorties which work a treat for sleeve knitting. (I’ve mentioned them before on the blog here.) These 3.25mm tips are the largest size in this set so I was happy to discover that ChiaoGoo has come out with the companion larger tips set in the Blue case. So of course I had to have them too.

They go from 3.5mm to 5mm tips in 2″ and 3″ lengths. The connectors on this set are the Small size rather than the Mini ones of the Red case so they are not able to be combined together. But I don’t think that’s much of a drawback although I would like second sets of the stoppers so I can put two sleeves on hold at the same time. A possible future purchase! I’m pretty sure the eensy wee Mini ends would be too flimsy for the larger tips anyway so that’s likely why they went with the sturdier Small connectors on the new set. The blue cables are thicker as well. I now have really short circular needles in sizes 2mm to 5mm which should hopefully cover pretty much anything of a narrow circumference that I wish to knit. I rarely knit anything heavier than that anyhow. Oh, and I’m currently using the longer 3.25mm tips with the longest cable (Red set) to knit my Midas Hat so they are definitely getting a workout!

As I’ve mentioned before short circulars are probably not for everyone. Even I still prefer dpns for sock knitting though I did knit one pair successfully with the Shorties. So far I’m finding them most useful for sleeves and hats and necklines where even a 16″ circular is too long. The modular system of interchangeable needles makes them very adaptable to different situations. These little guys fill some of the gaps left by my Addi Lace Clicks which only go down to 3.5mm tips and 16″ length. As you might be noticing, I spend a lot of time knitting so to me it’s totally worth having the tools that I enjoy using. There’s a lot of options out there these days – enough to make every knitter happy.

Well here are some actual completed projects to show off! On the Make Space Project we’ve finally finished the kitchen section. I decided to just “git ‘er done” so after locating my original patterns for the foam padding, we ordered the pieces cut. Then we went to good old Dressew and found some good-enough dark red velvet-ish upholstery fabric. It unfortunately was a limited bolt and already cut into three pieces so I was unsure of how the pattern would lay out especially since it was only 56″ wide instead of 60″. So to be safe I bought the whole lot, just over 4 metres total, when I really only needed less than 3. At only $9.99 per metre it wasn’t a big sacrifice. There’s leftover pieces which can become some throw pillows for the front room couch eventually.

So there were four antique oak chairs and a stool to cover. The last time I reupholstered them, I not only did the seats but also made back cushions for three of the chairs that hang from tabs tacked to the chair back. This made them a lot more comfortable so of course I went all out and did that again. Also I hadn’t ever reupholstered the stool before which was originally covered with some tacky vinyl. The other pieces are over 100 years old but the stool is probably only from the 1960’s or ’70’s. (There’s actually two of them that were ~~dumped on~~ given to us decades ago but one lives in the basement so I cheerfully ignored it.) Thom took the upstairs stool completely apart and sanded and refinished the legs and rungs so it looks much nicer now.

Every piece of furniture in the kitchen has a family story!

The stool, which I mostly use to reach high shelves

In the first photo (which is somewhat more yellow than it should be thanks to the artificial lights) you can also see our new window above the kitchen table. Now I can sit at the table and not feel like I’m sitting next to a refrigerator with the door opened! The horrible old drafty louvered window should have been replaced 40 years ago when we did the other one. But we held off thinking we’d do something different like a larger window or a bay window or even a door to a solarium. Never happening. And then there was another year-long delay because we had trouble finding a company that would just make and install one itty bitty window. The building trades are so busy here that we were just too small potatoes to even get a call back on inquiries. However, we did finally get an excellent reference and they were great. Git ‘er done, eh?

We’re now taking a well-deserved break on the Make Space Project until after the New Year. It took nearly three months to do one half of the main floor! Whew. Hopefully the living/dining room and entry hall won’t take quite so long. Unfortunately there’s some more reupholstering to be considered there but since I’m not able to do such complex chairs myself, we’ll need to find someone else to do it. That’s going to be spendy for sure! I’m going to be lazy and not worry about reupholstering our old hand-built couch/TV table/bookshelf/spare bed but just clean it up as best I can. Just remind me I said that when I get tempted to go all out on it, won’t you? More on this section of the house when I get there.

So what else is there to discuss? Oh yeah. I finished knitting a sweater.

This is the Sammal cardigan, pattern by Joji Locatelli, yarn 100% Peruvian Highland wool (Cloudborn Fibers wool fingering twist) in Iron Heather. I probably should have gone up one size since I didn’t quite get gauge in this yarn even after going up a needle size. But it’s not too obviously tight. I increased at the sides somewhat to compensate for the pattern being straight from the underarm to the hem. I am definitely not! It’s a beautifully written pattern and I like the extra-warm sand stitch texture and the cute little opposing cables in the front. It’s knitted from the top down in one piece which is my favourite method for sweaters.

I counted up all my Finished and Unfinished Objects for 2019 and I’ll have a quick review in the next post. I’ve been feeling rather unproductive but there were more than I thought!

Tag: sweater knitting

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