It's Not Going to Work

Or, A Tale of Two Toes, if you prefer.

Once upon a time I purchased this orange sweater second hand with the intent to harvest its wooly blend goodness.

At another time, I found the same sweater in pink, like bubblegum pink.

I used the orange for a pair of socks already (this pair) but I always had the secret wish to use them together in an awesome, albeit eye-searing, project.

When I saw a project from the book Op-art Socks, I thought I may have found my muse. I got the book from the library, carefully considered many projects and then set my heart on this swirly masterpiece:

The designer, Stephanie van der Linden, has conquered my knitting heart with this masterpiece of a design. Look how the swirl moves seamlessly from one sock to the other. Incredible. How much more awesome would it be in orange and pink?

So I set about casting on the sock - I figured I could use the toe as a gauge swatch.

First I tried it with one strand on my smallest dpns (bottom sock above and right sock below). Then I tried it with a double strand on slightly larger needles (top sock above and left socks below).

I calculated my gauge as the following:
  single strand: 41st/4" and 72 rows/4"
  double strand: 34st/4" and 52 rows/4"

What the pattern called for was 34st/4" and 46 rows/4". It looks like the double strand was pretty close, right? It's right on for stitch gauge, which determines how wide the sock is (the fit around the foot); but the row gauge is off (determining the length of the sock).

I debated about reworking the pattern to be knit from the top down so I could adjust the foot length as needed after the colourwork section was done, but the pattern has an unusual heel and it was going to be more work than I wanted.

I went to bed and hoped for inspiration to strike overnight.

It did.

I had the brilliant idea of doing a provisional cast on, working the sock toe-up (as written) starting with the colourwork section, and then coming back to knit the toe as long/short as needed at the end. Ok, now I was set...

I knit happily for the morning and got this far on the colour chart:

It was enough to see 1. I love pink and orange together. 2. It was far too big around. I had had my fears beforehand because the pattern calls for 72 stitches and I don't ever use that many stitches for my own socks, but the maths said otherwise. I followed the maths and obviously was led down the wrong path. (Happens more often than you would think.)

So I gamely ripped it out. No easy task since I had to separate the strands that had been knit together, but I persisted.

I cast on again, with one strand and smaller needles and knit the early afternoon away.

I got most of the way through the colour chart and I saw two things. 1. It is the right size to fit around my foot. 2. It's way, way too short. Where I should have about 4.5" of knitting, I have less than 2".

That is where I stopped.

I have two thoughts: 1. I could knit the chart repeating each row so that it is effectively double tall. This would be a pain in the butt to keep track of because many of the rows are already the same and I'm not convinced it will be tall enough even with that modification.

2. These yarns and this pattern are just not meant to go together.

That is where the project sits. My knitting time that day ran out and I haven't picked it up again. But after a few days in time out, I'm leaning toward thinking it deserves one more try.

Baby Things (and a Discourse on Charts)

I've got three babies due in the family this year and it has turned my crafty mind to little things. I'm thinking about bibs (with little elephants), a baby cocoon (for picture taking), and little dresses (so many little dresses!) But I only know the gender of one so far and no girls yet. (I don't like to make my baby things too "gendered," but even I'm not making a dress for a little boy!)

But we are expecting one boy (at least), so I thought I should start there. (Like test taking--start with what you know.) I found this darling little thing on Ravelry:

All the babies are due in spring and summer so no tiny hats, warm sweaters, or woolen booties. But if I make this cardi a little large and out of cotton, I think it will get some wear.

I happened to have a lovely blue cotton from a raveled sweater and I'll use the same cream I used for my lace tunic. I had a false start when I used the yarn doubled. This turned out to be too dense and would have run me out of yarn. It also hurt my hands to knit it, so I ripped out the couple inches of progress I had made and started with a single strand. It's much better this way.

The bottom of the sweater is done in garter. It's a lot of garter after just finishing some garter projects before Christmas, but it looks great so I'll like it (whether I want to or not).

One change I made to the pattern is to knit the back and front sections in one piece:

I also added some armhole shaping so the fit would be a little nicer. Oh, and obviously I skipped some of the stripes. They would have been a fun way to break up all.that.garter.stitch, but I thought it looked too cluttered.

I started the "fleurette" pattern on the top, but quickly ran into trouble.

Once past the armholes, I will work on the fronts and back
separately. Here the front sections are being worked on.

The pattern is written out row by row and not charted. As I worked, it wasn't lining up. I wasn't sure if the pattern was off, or I had messed things up while I was doing the armhole shaping and my stitch count was changing.

It just didn't look like the picture, but I couldn't work out what was going on. So it was time to rip it out, and make a swatch.

The first repeat (two blue stripes) doesn't look right,
but the second one (top blue stripes) seems to match
the picture in the pattern.

I did a much smaller swatch than I normally would because I was only interested in getting the pattern to work. I didn't have to use the swatch to measure for gauge or anything else. (I still should have made it at least one repeat bigger, but at that point I was going to work with what I had.)

Without a chart, you have no way to see how the stitches relate to each other. You just follow instructions stitch by stitch and hope there are no mistakes. But if you think there is a problem, there's nothing to guide you. Is the slip stitch on row 2 supposed to line up with the yarn over on row 1, or alternate with it? This pattern could have been interpreted either way.

The pattern also claims this stitch can be worked over a 4-stitch repeat plus 1. So 13 (4x3 + 1) would work, but 14 would not. I now think that part is wrong so when I adjusted my stitch count after the armhole shaping to work with the fleurette pattern, I didn't get the results I should have. I'm not going to worry about this part though, because now that I have the pattern worked out*, I can work it over however many stitches I need and just "fudge" the extra stitches on the side.

I read, learn, and memorize patterns according the way the stitches relate to each other. (See the pattern in the pattern, so to speak.) Of course I need to know what to do on a particular row, but it's more helpful to know that when I get to the three stitches I slipped on the previous row whether I should knit them on this row or (K1, Slip 1, K1), or whatever. The stitches of each row will take care of themselves if I know how to work each stitch from the previous row. This also gives you a way to double check yourself as you work a pattern. Much easier to discover mistakes before they become a huge problem.

Stepping off the soapbox, I'm looking forward to making good progress on the sweater again. For something so small, it feels like it is taking a long time. (Of course, garter stitch is famous for that so no surprise there.)

I've also realized about myself that I am a process knitter when it comes to making things for myself (love the process, the end result is not really the point of the exercise) and a product knitter when I knit for others (screw the process--let's get this puppy done)! Not exactly a flattering trait, I think, but it's helpful to know yourself. It also explains why this thing feels like it's taking a long time. And once I have the explanation, I can relax a little and try to enjoy this project too.

___________________________
*In case you are working on this pattern, this how I interpreted the fleurette stitch:
On rows 2 & 6: The stitches you want to slip are the (K1, YO, K1) stitches from the row before
On rows 3 & 7: The stitch you want to slip is the center st of the (K1, YO, K1)
On rows 4 & 8: The stitch to slip is the same stitch as in the row before
Not quite as good as a full chart (sorry), but I hope that will help.

In Which I Think I'm Clever

I've been working on my Lace Coat pretty steady. I have picked up 197 stitches along the straight edge of the hem band and started what the designer calls the "day lilies pattern." (I'm half way through the second repeat, and it's starting to look like it could become a skirt, rather than like a long odd scarf.)

In the pattern, the day lilies pattern is written out and not charted. It has a 16-stitch repeat, so it's not too bad to read the pattern the "long way" but I do prefer charts. I decided it was worth the effort to make my own chart in Excel. I've done this before and used my own symbols for the stitches, but it's easier to use standard symbols that I'm used to.

Enter this amazing knitting font which has knitting symbols instead of letters (and includes a handy chart so you can know which keys to press). I downloaded the font, made a chart, and then saved the chart as a pdf so I could load it onto my new Kindle Fire. (I'm very excited about that part!)

But I took it one step further...I actually saved several copies of the chart where a different row is highlighted on each one. That way I could not only more easily read the stitches, but I could also keep track of which row I'm doing. When I restart the Kindle, I can tell which pdf file I last used and that will tell me which one I need to do next. Here's a shot of the chart for row 3:

I only made charts for the odd numbered rows since almost
all the even ones are just purling. I didn't include a complete key
because I'm familiar with most of the symbols. I just added a
reminder above the chart for the symbols I may not remember.

So now I not only have charted the pattern, but I have made it easier to read, portable, and provided a way to keep track of what row I'm on. Clever, no?