My Grace cardigan has been on time out for a month. I know it looks pretty good. I got the sleeves in. But as I put the first sleeve in, I saw that my gauge had changed a little. No matter, blocking would fix everything.
Blocking did not fix everything. I know that the gauge difference looks slight. But as a point of reference, I only blocked the sleeves.
I have to face the facts: these sleeves have negative ease. And while I don't have a problem with negative ease, I don't like that the sleeves push my shirt sleeves up. Realistically, I won't wear a cardigan I can only wear with a tank top, so these sleeves have to be ripped. I just haven't had it in me to do it because not only is the yarn fingering weight, but I also blended two skeins along each sleeve. That means I'll be untwisting 2 skeins from each other as I rip. The other problem was that I had given myself a deadline of finishing the cardi by February 15th, otherwise I'd have to put it aside to finish knitting for The Book. When I have some time, the new plan of attack is to go up two needle sizes AND add two extra stitches in the underarm. Am I overcompensating? Maybe. But I gotta get me some ease.
This left me with no "relaxing knitting". I had recently cleaned out my stash and found this skein of handspun that I had made a few years ago. It's one of my favorites and I finally found a project to match it with. It is becoming an Arbutus.
Both patterns are from Jane Richmond's ISLAND book. So I'm having a bit of an ISLAND party.
7 comments :
I had exactly the same problem with a change of gauge on my sleeves. I think it it's because I went from knitting flat to knitting in the round. I just went up one needle size and it seemed to work, but I was dealing with Aran weight. I hope you get the sleeves you want. There is nothing worse than sleeves which are too tight!
Cute sweater even if the sleeves are too tight. I have no idea how the sweater is constructed, but would it be possible to frog just the sleeves and re-knit them??? I think it's common to knit stockinette in the round at a tighter gauge than flat, since there is no purling involved. I've often wondered if designers should include gauge for knitting in the round and knitting flat, if their patterns involve both type of fabrics.
Eek, frogging is bad enough but untwisting two skeins at the same time? Torture. If I were you, that cardi would quickly become my "want to show off my guns" sweater.
(Guns being sweet arm muscles, in this case.)
I've been seeing Arbutus around a lot, it is a great project for single skeins of precious handspun, that is for sure! I can definitely see why that skein is one of your favorites too, it is very, very pretty. I'm sorry to hear that sweater is giving you more trouble, if I were in your situation I would probably rip the sleeves out too even if it is heartbreaking.
Oh dear. That's a real killer. The yarn is so pretty though - I guess you'll just have to think of the lovely cardigan you'll get in the end.
My needles finally arrived yesterday... hehehe!!! Guess what's going on my needles tonight!
Oh no! Do you really have to frog the sleeves? Untwisting the skeins will be tough work.... Couldn't it be a cardi to wear over a summer dress? Maybe another blocking (a little bit more agressively) could help?
Oh, this is the worst! I've had a sweater with sleeve problems sitting in a bag in my stash for a year now. I want to wear the sweater, but every time I think about picking it up and dealing with it my will to knit just dies.
DO NOT LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU! Seriously, I thought I was just taking a short break. Ugh. One of these days...
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