FO- $5 February Lady

This has been in the finished pile for a while...we had a break in the freezing cold weather and got a sunny warm-ish day today. Perfect for getting out for a leisurely walk and enjoying the day instead of rushing from place to place buried in a pile of knitwear accessories. A little vitamin D does wonders.

Anyway, here is my February Lady beginnings:



This was some Suss Alpaca that I bought for $1 a skein when she closed her NY shop. Not horribly exciting.

Last year, I got into natural dyes. It was a perfect opportunity to turn blah into something truly special:



I used alum mordant and some madder root to get a deep peachy pink. I loved it. Natural dyeing takes a long time- I usually end up taking up the better part of a weekend with it- but you can't beat the colors you get.

And voila! My own February Lady Sweater:



It wasn't the most exciting thing to knit, but it takes up very little yarn and will zoom along pretty quickly. For a sweater with no shaping, it fits surprisingly well. To ensure a good fit, I did two things: went down a needle size once I got gauge and stretched the lace pattern out a bit any time I needed to measure the garment. Anything you make with 100% alpaca yarn will grow and stretch out like crazy, and lace will also block out bigger than what you might expect. Pre-blocking, it looked tiny...I actually had someone ask me if I was making a child's sweater. Once it had a bath and a block, it fell exactly where I wanted it.



I actually made a mistake in the lace pattern at one point but decided to keep it...it helped give the illusion that it had waist shaping. Horray!



The buttons were salvaged off an old tweed riding jacket.



I think it's one of those sweaters that will get a ton of use- it looks cute with a dress or a skirt and would easily work well with jeans as well.



The best part is that I only used a hair over 4 skeins...meaning this cost me $5 to knit, plus the $4 I spent in dye. I'm not usually a budget-minded knitter, but that's pretty sweet.

Scatterbrain

I finished the FLS sweater! I'll have pictures once I've blocked it and sewn the buttons on. It was a fast knit, but I got bored with it really quickly. I'm happy with how it came out though.

Aside from that, I've been really scattered with my projects. I'll sit down and start to spin for a few minutes. Suddenly, I'll spy my combs sitting on the table, and then I'll be off to comb some fleece. Oooh, and what's that over there? I should really not neglect my weaving.

I don't exactly have a lot of free nights at home, so any time I do have there, I get a little overwhelmed with all the stuff I could be doing. This leads to pretty much nothing getting done, or at least I don't feel the sense of accomplishment if I would just focus on one project.

I did cast on for not one, but TWO more sweaters. One is the Belle Cardigan from Interweave Fall 2007.



It's cute, but I know how "chunky is as chunky does". This might not be terribly flattering in the end. However, it will use up my stash of ropey Rowan Big Wool that I've had lying around for years and years. It's actually making me sneeze as I knit along because the yarn is a little dusty.

The second sweater is one I'm excited for. In a flurry of creativity brought on by frustration, I started designing my own sweater using some Noro Silk Garden. I really love Silk Garden. I've made a giant Clapotis and the Sunrise Circle Jacket from it in the past.



I love the colors and the long stripes, but I was having a hard time finding another flattering pattern using the yarn. I had a few patterns that I almost liked, but I was worried about them being unflattering or a little too hippie-dippy looking.

I got out the graph paper and a calculator and started swatching and sampling. Then I washed and blocked my samples- this yarn tends to grow quite a bit once it is washed, so it's a good idea to make a big swatch and wash it before you take measurements.

I have a few shapes sketched out and all my measurements worked in. I'm hoping to have some time this weekend to really get cooking on this.

The Week in Knitting

I finished the knitting on the Avast last week. It just needs to be blocked and I need to put a zipper in. A slight problem: it seems as though the cabled band along the bottom is much, much tighter then the rest of the sweater. It might come down to cutting it off and replacing it with a few rows of ribbing. It seems a pity to take out the best detail of the sweater, but if that's the only way to make it fit, so be it. I will evaluate post-blocking.

I finished the body on the February Lady Sweater.



That picture is a few days old. It works up so fast that I almost forget that I'm bored with it!

I also CO for the Wilson hat:



It's a simple cable hat from Norah Gaughan. I'm using leftover yarn from the Avast sweater for it, and I'm knitting it in the round instead of flat as it is written.

This Week in Knitting and Spinning....

MMMMMMmmmm....Cashmere:



It's 100 yards of laceweight 2-ply Mongolian Cashmere. I spun the singles on my wheel and then Andean plied it on a spindle for better control. I have a wee bit of roving left over, so I'll end up with more yardage. It's super soft and by far the hardest I had to work on a fiber.

I finished a couple of small projects that I still need to take photographs of: One being the Snapdragon Tam.



I love the way this knitted up. I hate the way it looks on. I mean, who looks good in a tam? Really now. At least a beret is cute and floppy and fun. I was going to make the matching mitts, but now that I don't like the way the hat looks on, I'm thinking about backing away for this matching set.

I got my skein of Malabrigo in the mail and finished the Damson. It's a simple, gorgeous shawl. Pictures soon, I promise!

I'm chugging along on the Avast sweater. The sleeves are attached and I'm almost done with the yoke. The problem is, it's way too big to take with me on my commute now, which is where the majority of my knitting gets done. To give myself something to do, I cast on yesterday for my Sweater #2- the February Lady. I'm using some Alpaca I got years and years ago when the Suss store in Manhattan closed down. It was an epic sale. It was plain white, but at $1 per skein, I grabbed as much as I could carry home. I dyed it using Madder Root, which gave me a nice peachy pink.



It's so girly, I can't help but making a high-pitched squeak every time I see it.

I'm not a huge 100% alpaca fan. It tends to be too drapey for sweaters and I get worried about the garment growing and stretching into some sort of monstrous frankensweater. Still- I think I can make it work with this particular pattern. I'm knitting it at a slightly tighter gauge then recommended to make up for any stretching that may occur. It's a small enough sweater that it won't be too heavy. Alpaca can be too warm, so the shorter sleeves and open lace work will help with that issue.

Wish me luck.