FO: Beagle Pullover

I have waxed on previous years about my obsession to knit men's sweaters. I love them so. And you have to love them, as you will be working on them for a really long time.

This one was another design from the Norah Gaughan Men collection. It's the second one I've made from this booklet- the first one being the Devon pullover- and I really love the designs. Rustic, not too fussy, totally wearable.

I knit the sleeves on this first, and then put it down to knit a couple of hats for friends. When I picked it back up to do the body, I was able to finish it in two weeks without bloodying my hands too much. That's a lot of stitches! Give me a deadline, and I will give you a sweater. The only modification I made was that I knit the body in the round and then split at the pits.

The yarn I choose was a discontinued bag of Cascade 220 Tweed in Stone color. It's good workhorse yarn like anything else 220. I was a bit sick of the tweedy bits by the end though. I don't often knit with tweed yarns but I now know that I much prefer a subtle, heathery tweed instead of flecks of ground-up crayola bits in the yarn.

It's warm. It fits. I love the textured stitches. It's pretty much perfect. While drop-sleeves aren't my favorite fit, they are the simplest, especially if you are working around a stitch pattern.

I used 6 skeins of yarn on this- 1320 yards. My trick to getting it done was to try to force myself to get through one skein every two days. A great strategy for getting through the dark days of winter as well. This is the 44" size, which gives the wearer a couple inches of ease without it being too bulky.

My only gripe is that the sleeves are a bit long and the cuffs need to be rolled. I want to fix it, he says he doesn't mind. Still. I might fix it.

The photoshoot was in the town of Amiens in Picardy. I'll have more about our outing there tomorrow, but it is home to the most massive cathedral in all of France, and it's cold and a good place to wear a good wool sweater.

FO: Insane Clown will Eat Your Brains

I made a sweater. I dislike the way it turned out. It's the Caftan Pullover by Norah Gaughan from the Spring 2006 issue of Interweave Knits.

It was supposed to look like this:

Pretty, right? It's all bohemian floaty and comfy. I might go to a gallery and spend the day decoding some modern art and then sip cappuccinos and nibble little cookies which cause me to not gain weight or have wild mood swings because of my blood sugar crashing afterwards. La vie est belle.

I cast on for it and started on my way. I do love Norah Gaughan and cables and sweaters and I'm even starting to like silk a little bit more. The cables are fun, and I liked the yarn despite the yarn being a slippery silk novelty yarn- Berroco Ultra Silk. It's a silk knit tube with a nylon roving core. Using size 9 needles this moved along nicely. It's such a pretty shade of summery beach blue.



I made the front, I made the back. I seemed them up. Then I realized: because the front is heavier than the back with all those lovely cables, it stretches out alarmingly more than the back. Even though I made them the exact same length and seemed the armholes so they match perfectly, the front just hangs down lower, like a tumor. A floppy, heavy tumor.





Also, because I still have a bit of dignity left, I seamed up the front panels instead of leaving my ta-tas to awkwardly flop around in the breeze. One the model, it works for her, but she's doing nothing but drinking soy half-caf skim lattes and batting her eyelashes at the off-duty fireman in the corner. Also, because the yarn is mostly silk, there's no way to keep the neckline opened up and keep from rolling over. Silk has not structure and it just wants to collapse in a heap. So it got seamed.

Except, seamed, the two front panels create a face.



A deranged clown face. This is almost as rich as people seeing the image of the virgin Mary in their toast or other mundane everyday objects- except this one isn't a peace and comfort to anyone. Insane Clown is Out to Get You.



It can not be unseen. I put the sweater on and then I break out in a cold sweat, get twitchy and then spend about 20 minutes trying to get this thing off me. Like it's a cicada clinging to me. GET IT OFF GET IT OFF GET IT OFF ME! Sadly, it does not. Insane Killer Clown Face is here to stay. It terrifies me, and I can really only blame the book "It" for all this.

Also, I didn't make sleeves. I couldn't give the clown any more power over me than he already has.

Ah well. You win some, you lose some. Novelty yarn + complicated pattern= the potential for Insane Clown to appear. The Insane Clown will appear to you someday in something you do- or does he just appear to me?

FO- Devon Pullover

I love cabley things. I also love huge swaths of stockinette.



I make Bry a new sweater every winter. Here's the deal- he gets to choose the pattern (it's usually based on a commercially made sweater, and I either re-create the pattern or find something similar in my library) and the color. That way, he'll actually wear it. He's starting to amass quiet the wardrobe of handknits.

I whipped up this beast of a sweater in no time at all. It took me about 3 weeks of half-assed knitting to get it done. Bulky yarn and size 10 needles make for a quick knit, no matter what the size.



The yarn is Cascade Eco. It's a bulky woolen-spun 2-ply. It's not super-soft, but good for an outer layer. The yardage of each skein is huge- 478 yards- so this was a project that didn't leave the house. The wound ball of yarn took up my entire hand bag, so I stuck to my sock knitting when I left the house. It's warm, but because it's woolen-spun, it's fairly lightweight.



The color is "lichen". It's a perfect guy color.



The only modification I made was I knit the body in the round. I'm going to go back and make faux seams to give the sweater a bit more structure. That should help with the weird wavy thing it's doing at the bottom edge.

Once I seemed everything together and blocked, the sleeves grew and grew and grew. It was amazing, and my washed swatch didn't reflect that. I ripped back about 8 inches and re-ribbed the cuffs. Now they are perfect.



The pattern is from "Norah Gaughan Men" booklet. There are a few winners in that booklet.

I ended up buying way too much yarn for this sweater. I thought I would need about 1200 yards for this sweater, so I bought 3 skeins- over 1400 yards. I ended up using only 1 full skein, and about 400 yards off a second. I wasn't counting on that and I need to think of a new project idea for the remaining 600 yards.

This is part of my A-Z stashdown challenge. Slowly, my stash is getting smaller. Except for that gift certificate that my awesome coworkers got me, which made the stash much bigger. Damn them for foiling my plans.

Some Works in Progress

I've been a busy worker bee lately. I need to take advantage since I usually get sluggish in winter. I'm totally on a roll and checking things off my to-do list at a furious pace.

We made beer.



I don't even like the taste of beer. I keep trying it, thinking one day I will get over it and be the average beer-drinking american. I drink beer and I feel bloated and full of burps and unwell. Because I drink it so slowly, I never get a buzz going and spend the rest of my time desperately searching for a glass of wine to wash the taste out of my mouth.

I do like to make things though. I seem to like to make things that people will ask/tell me, "You could get that at WalMart/Target/Safeway, etc for cheaper/easier". Also, isn't science fun? Starches and sugars being converted into alcohol for our pleasure? It's entertaining on so many levels. Get to work, you yeasty bastards!

Please observe my wort.


I'm in love with the way everything smelled in the brewing process. It's currently sitting in the fermeneter, getting big and strong and alcoholic. If anything, I figure the one with the beer is the one with the friends, so this will get drunk by someone eventually.

My brew-happy co-worker also informs me that no one has ever died from drinking home-brewed beer. Always a huge concern of mine.

So I cheated and even though I took a dumpling-making class, I went out and made someone else make them for me.

Mandoo in Koreatown makes their own dumpling, right then and there. They are beautiful little gems that are the perfect cold-weather cheap-but-delicious eats. There's pretty much no limit to how many dumplings I can eat.



If this woman goes missing it's because I've kidnapped her. She'll be safe in Brooklyn, I assure you, making a mountain of dumplings in the comfort of my own kitchen.



Now I'm inspired...I will make dumplings very soon. I've been also making pickles lately. Cukes and cauliflower and garlic and hot peppers and pretty much anything else I can put in jars. Then I make bloody marys with the leftover pickle juice. It's fantastic.

I've been knitting and spinning as well, but I'm slow with the picture taking.



This is the Devon sweater by Norah Gaughn. It's from her lovely little book of men's knits that was published by Berocco a couple of years ago. This picture is a bit old as it is now done the sweater with the exception of the ribbing around the neck and blocking. It took no time at all- I really love making sweaters that are huge swarths of stockinette stitch, with some interesting details thrown in to keep things interesting. I used Cascade Eco in the lichen colorway (the yarn color doesn't show up true in the above photo at all, and that's my fault).

I finished another handspun hat, but I need daylight to do it justice in photographs.

I cast on for a pair of ribby socks in BMFA yarn. Socks are my daily commuting activity and I feel kind of lost if I don't have a pair in the works.

I spun up some fiber:



I made a big fat 3-ply from it. It's very soft, and I would imagine that it really blooms up nicely with all that downy baby camel in it. I'll post pictures soon.

Oh, and my mom got me some Angora fiber. She bought it at the Fryeburg Fair, which is an enormous agricultural fair that happens every fall in picturesque western Maine.



It's lovely and soft, but I think the downy fibers need some humidity in the air in order to be manageable- the static really creates a monster.

FO: Eastlake Pullover

I trust that everyone had a wonderful Winter Solstice (the days...they are stretching out into lazy sunshiny afternoons already) and a great Xmas if you celebrate. I love giving gifts and I always make sure that everyone I know knows that as well. Lucky for me, once the giftwrap finally settled into piles on the floor, a huge blizzard hit the city and dampered the hustle for a couple days. It was glorious. After so much hectic running around in the past month, the idea of being snowed in was downright comforting. I made a huge batch of chicken stock with all those bones in the freezer and made a vat of soup that warmed up the house and everyone in it. As long as I didn't run out of booze, all was right in the world.

This was also the perfect opportunity to sit down with the manual for my new camera. I'm pretty excited about this. There's a pretty big learning curve on a complicated electronic camera but I think I've got the basics down. I'm also glad my old SLR got some use as a model.



RIP, my sweet Dinosaur.

Which brings us to my newly finished sweater: the Eastlake Pullover by Norah Gaughan.



It's from her Berroco collection Vol 3. I modified this quiet a bit from the original pattern.



For starters, I knit the body in the round instead of flat. The less seams to clean up at the end means a happier me. Secondly, I didn't like how the fern leaf pattern ended and a decorative band bisected the sweater mid-boob. I would be constantly tugging on that to get it going above or below boob level. No one needs a line going across their boobs. So I ended the pattern early and did about an inch and a half of short rows across the front to give it more shape. Short rows are always a good idea if you have curves- it makes everything fit much better. The other modification I did was only one band of pattern over the arms instead of two, just because I didn't like the way it looked. That was more of a preference thing than a fit issue.



I love the way this came out and I've worn it quiet a bit already.



The yarn is Berrocco Inca Gold. It's a lovely blend of 80% Merino, 20% silk. It's a tightly twisted cabled yarn- 4 separate 2-ply yarns are plied together to make a 4-ply that has a nice amount of spring and shine, and it's very soft. So far, I've had no problems with pilling and it seems like it will wear well, as most well-made cabled yarns do. It also has great stitch definition. I really loved working with it and I'll be hoarding more in the future.





The specs: I used about 9.5 skeins, or 1159 yards of this dk weight yarn for the 38" size. The maid body was knit on size US 5 needles, and the ribbing was on size US 3. I had to go down a couple of needle sizes to get gauge, and a sweater on 5's does take quite a bit of time, but it's well worth it in the end. I have an extra ball and a half of yarn left, and I immediately cast on for a hat to use up the remaining bit.

FO: Phyllo Yoked Pullover

I had to get my eyes dilated at the ophthalmologist on Friday, which left me looking freakishly stoned.



Part of me wanted to just sit in a dark room and wait for it to wear off, but I had much too much to do. So everything I saw that afternoon was blurred and accompanied by a bright glare, which made me start to think I was stoned.



Anyway. The gin and tonics probably didn't help.

I finished the Phyllo Yoked Pullover from Norah Gaughan's Knitting Nature.



I love sweaters like this- you go on for almost forever in plain stockinette stitch, and then BAM there's a pretty and unique design element that pulls it all together. It's based on the Phyllotaxis Spiral found in plants- sunflowers, pinecones, daisy, asters and mums- they all have a spiral pattern that runs both clockwise and counterclockwise to form a lattice.



It's a fairly simple lace pattern with the decreases built in so the spiral is uninterrupted. When I get cooking on something like that, I can't put it down. It's addictive.





I didn't do any major modifications except for the sleeves. The way they were written, they were going to be hourglass shaped. Big belled cuffs that taper to the elbow. I'm a big fan of rolling up my sleeves (or at least having the option to) so I nixed the sleeve design and just did a plain sleeve with decreases every 10 rows until I hit the number I needed to get them to fit in with the yoke.



It's really just a lovely sweater. And the yarn...Rowan Calmer almost makes me feel silly for all the smack I've talked about hating cotton and how it hurts my hands. It's made up of 75% cotton, 25% acrylic microfiber. The Microfiber makes it silky soft and gives it a bit of drape. It is elastic enough hide stitch inconsistencies better than 100% cotton. Love. Love. Love. It's lightweight and comfortable to wear as well.

The specs: I used 8 skeins of Rowan Calmer in "Refresh"- about 1400 yards- for the 40" size. I used US size 6 needles. It is knit and pieces and seemed up before you attach everything on one long circular needle for the yoke. It could have been modified to knit in the round, but the front is shorter than the back to make the neck dip lower in the front, so you would have to plan on that.

FO- Pucker

Instant Gratification comes in many forms. This one just happened to be a feminine Norah Gaughan sleeveless top.



The aptly named "Pucker" from Norah Gaughan's Volume 4 collection. It took me just a couple weeks from start to finish.



I made the second-smallest size- the 38"- and I have plenty of room in there. It gave my heart the pitter pats when I was seeming it up because it looked enormous. All that extra fabric just hangs around and gracefully drapes and swishes around when you move.



It's a lot of stockinette and then some interesting detail at the front to create the namesake pucker.



The yarn makes this pattern. Seduce is a really unique yarn. It is composed of 47% Rayon, 25% Linen, 17% Silk, 11% Nylon. It appears to have two strands of yarn spun around a thin core. It's very slick. I had to change to bamboo needles after about 5 minutes of trying to work with metal and having the entire project fall off the needles. It's a bit thick-and-thin, which helps hide stitch inconsistencies, and it blocks out lengthwise quite a bit.



It was kind of cold on picture day so I had it layered, but this will be nice in July with a thin tissue tank or cami underneath.



The Specs: I used almost all of 9 skeins of Seduce- 900 yards- for the 38" size. I used size 6 needles, which helped control the stretching issues I had when swatching- this could easily turn into a mini-dress if your gauge is loose.

I didn't modify the pattern at all- it's simple and fast to knit up. I might try and do this in the round next time, but I think the side seams give it weight and help with the drape.

WIP- Phyllo Yoked Pullover

I just can't seem to help myself- as soon as I have one sweater off the needles, another one gets cast on right away.

I impulsively cast on for the Phyllo Yoked Pullover.



It's from Norah Gaughan's book "Knitting Nature". I bought the book when it first came out a few years ago, but let it sit on the shelf until I felt confident enough to tackle a project. Her patterns tend to have unusual construction elements or some sort of crazy cable or lace pattern that looks harder than it actually is.



This pattern is fairly simple- you knit the body and sleeves in plain stockinette, attach everything on one circular needle, and then start the yoke pattern. There are decreases worked into the pattern so the spiraling diamonds get progressively smaller as you work your way up to the neck.



It is also very addicting...I haven't put this thing down since I started it a couple weeks ago.

Since it's the season that requires me to try non-wool yarns, I decided to give Rowan Calmer a shot. It's a cotton/microfiber blend. I'm really quite pleased with it...cotton usually hurts my hands because I find it tough and inflexible, but the microfiber really does wonders to make this soft and almost silky.



Meanwhile the Escargot mitts are languishing away at the bottom of my knitting bag. I need a sunny afternoon to sit in the park and finish those already.

Some Works in Progress

I put the Biggy Smalls sweater down for the week. It's hard to carry it around with me and pull it out on the subway at this point, but I haven't been home too much either. I have 6 more inches of sleeve to go. I should just finish it and deal with my little mishap later (which just looks a bit smudged and fuzzy at this point). It is my goal to finish it this weekend.




After a 90 degree day a couple weeks ago, I went ahead and cast on for Pucker.



It's a simple summery top by Norah Gaughan from her Volume 4 book of designs for Berroco.




I'm using Berocco Seduce in the Jaunes Vermeer colorway, which is a really interesting blend of silk, rayon and linen. It's like knitting with straw, but when you wash the fabric it turns fluid, drapey and graceful. Stitch consistency is kind of a problem as it has no forgiveness at all. I love the sunny yellow color.



Well, that was a letdown. It was hard to get a good representation of the yellow in an indoor photo. There are some gold highlights in it. The picture makes it looked washed out and weak when it's really more sunshiny and bold. I'll try harder next time.


I also cast on for a Lobster. It's probably not a great choice of project for me as I hate finishing and finicky little sewing jobs. Still. A lobster is needed. So far I have the tail done:



The yarn was some leftover worsted weight mystery stash from eons ago. It was white so I dyed it something close to a boiled-lobster red.

Oddly enough, I'm making something else that has a shell:



These are the Norwegian Snail Mittens by Adrian Bizilia. I love Escargot. They taste so good. It's very earthy tasting...kind of like mushrooms but with more tooth. Plus, I could mainline drawn butter and garlic, so it makes the consumption of that a bit less conspicuous. Also, I love these mittens. They are my second A-Z stashdown challenge in Artyarns Ultramerino. I also used some leftover Shubi Sock Yarn in Seaweed for the cuff. It adds a bit of slime to it.



I had two skeins of the Ultramerino in fingering weight in my stash. I overdyed one darker blue so I could do the colorwork.

The cuffs are a bit involved- They have a lot of decorative elements that take some time and patience. I'm on to the actual stranded pattern now and it's moving along now.

Hopefully I'll have a FO or two to show off next week.