FO: Gacci...

As inspired by the Gucci found posted on knit lit.



Pattern: My own
Yarn: KnitPicks Andean Silk in slate, 5 balls
Needles: US7/4.5mm Denise Interchangeables
Time: 1 week
Extras: 7/8in (22mm) button

Notes: Another destashing project down. I still have nearly one ball of Andean Silk left, though. I wonder if that's enough to turn into a beanie or fingerless mitts?

I think the only construction explanation I have left is the collar. Originally I thought the stitches to the collar were picked up and workes as "K 2 rows, P 2 rows, K 2 rows", but that didn't look right. Then I tried knitting it separately as K3, P2, K3 for the length of the neck edge and sewed it on. This turned out more like I'd hoped.

I intended the sleeve to be less puffy than the inspiration piece but the rib hides what puff there is. After blocking the cardi, I steamed the top of the sleeves separately to flatten the ribbing enough for it to show.



This is going to get a lot of wear because I practically live in 3/4 and half-sleeved tops and I'm into layering.

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And now, a return to something blue(ish)...



Let's hope the math is right this time.

Reknit: Ballet Wrap

The sash is finally shortened. It probably wouldn't have bothered me if I hadn't noticed a couple inches of the ends peaking out of the bottom of my trench coat one day. I think its weight helped drag it down. I shortened the sash by five inches on each side. It's long enough to stay tied but short enough that it doesn't get in the way of normal life.

In other news, I have one sleeve and the collar to Gacci to go.



I seamed up one side of the cardi and set in the first sleeve just to make sure it puffed the way I liked. Originally, I made the top of the sleeve cap twice as wide as it was supposed to be and used the one-over-two bind-off method. This didn't produce as much puff as I'd hoped for, partly due to the rib drawing the fabric in, and I found it hard to seam. I ripped back a bit and inserted a couple short rows and bound off by doing k2tog, k2tog, sl first stitch over, etc. This was easier to seem and I liked the end result much better.

The body pieces were much easier to figure out than I expected.



I knitted the pieces sideways starting with the body half. I increased over a couple rows for the armhole shaping before casting on the remaining stitches necessary for the entire armhole. On the back, I bound off the same number of stitches cast on earlier and decreased over the the last couple rows. The front neck shaping is achieved with short rows. I used the yarn-over method and ended up having to fiddle with the yo's on one of the front pieces so that the turning rows wouldn't be visible on the right side. Rather than reversing the shaping for one of the fronts, I simply reversed the rib. For example, If I started the left front K2,P2 I would start the right front as P2, K2. Then I can work the shapings exactly the same for both pieces.

FO: Lucky Red...

Pattern: My own for Chinese New Year, so I'm calling it Lucky Red.
Yarn: Lion Brand Wool-Ease in cranberry (5 skeins) and Patons Decor in burgandy (less than 0.5 skein)
Needles: US7/4.5mm and US8/5mm KnitPicks Options
Time: 10 days

Notes:

I may have mentioned before that I originally bought a bunch of Wool-Ease for another project that I never got around to making. I was able to use up three skeins on the vest for my mom but that still left 11. Now I'm down to three, which I'll probably use for charity knitting. The buttons on the front were from an old duvet cover. They had fallen off and, when the cover had worn out, I just never bothered to sew them back on (I probably should have taken the other buttons off for future use before getting rid of the cover, though). They worked out quite well for Lucky Red.

I had envisioned this as a wrap cardi with a cowl-like neck. My inspiration was a cabled cardi I saw while living in England that cost nearly £100. I think H&M had a similar one in all stockinette. I've spent the last year, on and off, trying to figure out how to replicate it. I'm not quite there although making this has given me a much better idea of what I need to do. The wrap cardi I was hoping for can wait a little longer.

This turned out to be more like a jacket than intended, but I like it. I think later on, when I have more time, I'll add a few more buttons for two rows of three on the front to take it all the way to jacket status. Speaking of buttons, I had a bit of trouble with the fabric pulling where the buttons were sewn. I ended up scrounging for a couple more to sew to the other side of the fabric (back-to-back), which more or less took care of it.

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The Ballet Wrap has finally been re-done and blocking. It really shouldn't have taken me this long since I was only shortening the sash. Speaking of which, I had over five balls of KnitPicks Andean Silk leftover from it that I couldn't figure out what to use it for. Now, 13 months later, I saw this post at KnitLit and thought, "I can make that!" I just hope I have enough yarn. I'm pretty sure I will since I'm not planning on making that sleeves that puffy.



I'm going to call it "Gacci" (gah-chee) because "gah" (or however you spell it) means fake in Cantonese. It will be knit sideways and shaping is minimal due to the ribbing. I think the only hard part is the neck shaping for the front pieces.

The red cardi really did get done in ten days! I'm just waiting to throw it in with the laundry before blocking. It's knit with a synthetic blend and pretty sturdy, so I'm not too concerned with how I handle it. It didn't turn out exactly how I envisioned, but I'm still happy. It's very cozy. Pictures and specs to come.

I got back into my RIP, which I'm more motivated to work on now. I'm not quite feeling the Felted Tweed raglan I had to rip out a couple months ago as I need to recalculate everything (I noted the swatch measurements incorrectly). However, I just got yarn and needles for a project I've been eyeing since it came out--Venezia from the Winter Interweave. I'm really excited about this, and it will be one of my first Project Spectrum pieces.

I'm not into a lot of different colors in one piece so I've decided to work it in three colors. I ordered some KnitPicks Pallette in bark, sky, and cream so the pullover will look something like this only the brown will be much darker:



Brown and pale blue is one of my favorite color combinations.

A sweater in 10 days?

My Chinese New Year project is getting close to finished. I have all the main pieces, button bands, seaming done is just eight days! Right now I'm working on the collar. Just have buttons to sew in after that.

The button band was a bit of a challenge. I wanted a doubled fabric for more stability--I don't really like the way buttons pull at single layers of fabric sometimes. This was my first time trying double knitting. I got a pretty good idea of how it works from the knittinghelp videos. Only problems were I had no clue how to cast on or pick up stitches for double knitting and it took me a while to figure out how to make buttonholes.

For the former, I found a tutorial on Stitch Diva. It didn't help me with picking up stitches but reading the cast on section helped. I ended up holding both the main and contrast colors together and picked up stitches. Much simpler than I expected. The buttonhole took some improvising. I finally decided to take a couple DPNs, slip the contrast color stitches for a button hole, and make them for each side separately. I plan on sewing the two sides together with thread later.



The second picture is of the inside. I bound off knit-wise on the wrong side, which resulted in a train track look. Not what I expected, but I like it.

CNY knitting...

I've postponed Project Spectrum knitting for Chinese New Years knitting. While working on the grey blob that is my current RIP, I remembered that I still have several skeins of red yarn in the stash. It was originally for another project, which I've changed my mind about so it's been sitting in the stash for a while. I decided to use it for a project that I sketched last year but hadn't gotten around to figuring out, yet. It's more or less a wrap cardi--or jacket, rather, with a thick collar. It's hard for me to explain but hopefully it'll become clear in the next week or so.

I started this on January 31 and in three days of knitting have completed the back, the right front, and 2/3 of a sleeve.



I'm going to knit the left front last in case I'm short on yarn. Since this piece will be covered up, it won't matter much of the yarn is in a different dye lot. I'm also planning on making double knit button bands with the inside being a contrasting color (mostly to make it easier on myself).

Red, by the way, is a difficult color to photograph. The best results I had were using the flash in the sunlight and next to a window facing the setting sun with no flash.