Today, I will start where I ended my last post: I'm making a sweater. Until you block the sweater pieces, it's not easy to see their exact shape because the edges tend to roll up, so I'm weighing down the top with scissors for you. From my last post, I was just about to start the neck and shoulder shaping for the sweater back. It's complete now.
I was wondering if the entire back could be knitted with one ball of wool, and as luck would have it NO! Unless you knit, you won't realize what goes through our minds. "Will it make it? Watch it run out the row before I cast off, or WHILE I'm casting off." Anyway, it all worked out. For this sweater, you cast off in the middle to shape the back of the neck and then knit the two sides separately. That makes the fit nicer. The ball ran out as I finished the first side and I started a new ball with the matching colour for the other. Yay! Looking ahead, I hope when I do either side of the neck at the front, it works out so well.
After the horror challenge of winding the other hanks into balls, I had to psyche myself up to wind this one, and although it may look funny to use the chair legs, it was the best approach by far. It still took 40 minutes.
I started the sweater front (on the right) and here are the two pieces side by side. Before I began, I wound off the grey wool at the beginning of the next ball so I would start the front with the same colour as the back. The colour changes seem pretty consistent so I'm really, really, really hopeful the stripes will work out and they seem to be, and the decreases and increases for the slight hourglass shape are identical between the back and front so this should continue. Oh, please, let it continue.
You probably can't see where I have done the decreases, marked by the pins. I decreased from 120 stitches on the needle to 108 and I'm about to start increasing again. If you don't knit but you sew, you might be surprised at the shaping that can be done in knitting. The decreasing and increasing here are like two vertical darts to bring in the waist a bit.
So what can I say? It has been some time since I've taken on a knitting project but I'm cautiously optimistic that it will all work out and there's no need to start drinking. It's the first fitted sweater I have done, although I have made fitted vests, and the subject of ease (how much bigger/smaller the sweater's dimensions are compared to mine) is interesting. This one has negative ease at the bust so, in my mind, that's like making the sweater too tight on purpose, but as I have read, a leotard is made too small everywhere and they are designed to fit. Anyway, I'm following the pattern and keeping my fingers crossed, and the knitting has been kind of fun with this beautiful wool, but it sheds a few gossamer light fibres in the air and I keep joking about hacking up a fur ball. I'm sure I will survive. lol
