Category: Cats Are Not Helping

Unraveled

No, not that Hudson cardigan sweater. That is finished as of this morning. The bit of collar that was finished last is drying, and then I’ll do a “finished” post.

It’s this*:

I started this one forever ago. 2018, according to Ravelry. The pattern is Shinsetsu, which is quite pretty. That is nearly the whole back, about a few inches short of shoulder shaping.

Here is what it looks like now.

I have gotten at least marginally smarter about choosing flattering patterns as I’ve had more experience in sweater knitting. This pattern is gorgeous, but it is intended to be worn with quite a bit of positive ease, and has a drop shoulder type of construction. This is actually very similar to the one I just finished. However, that one is in a lighter yarn, and the fabric has a lot of drape. In this yarn it will just be a big bulky sweater with a lot of baggy bulk under the arms.

I sort of knew this. I kept knitting along until I got to the part at the underarm where you add even MORE stitches to make it wider. Then it went into time out when I got distracted by a new, shiny pattern. There probably was a reason why it went into time out.

Also, if you click on that pattern link, and look at the photos, you’ll see one of my knitwear designer pet peeves. The model is crouching down, or standing with her arm out, holding the sweater out. No straight-on shots to show what it really looks like.

Anyway, I adore this yarn, and want a wearable sweater out of it, so out it came. John was a bit horrified. “All that WORK!”

I’m swatching again to make sure, but I think this will be the new sweater. It has a much more fitted profile, and I like the cables a lot more.

Stay tuned.

*Cat included for scale. I put that sweater down, and picked up my phone to take a photo. That’s how long it took Ripley to make herself at home.

Linen somethings

And sort of a blog fail. I finally finished all the Euroflax linen gift somethings yesterday. I had this grand idea to knit a bunch of them, finished four.

Now that they’re (mostly) gifted, I can tell what they are. Don’t be too excited, I spent all of December knitting garter stitch linen face cloths.

I know, right? Those shouldn’t be too hard. They are just big garter stitch squares. And I forgot to take photos of the first three (the green, pink, and lavender ones) before I mailed them off. These are for my sisters, I packaged them with some nice bath soap. Linda just got one, the yellow one was finished yesterday so I’ll get it in the mail when we figure that the crush at the post office is over.

I’m not doing a whole finished project thing for those. It’s Euroflax linen, sport weight. I used this pattern. It starts with 3 stitches, increases every row until it’s wide enough, then decreases back to 3 stitches. “Wide enough” for me was 89 stitches.

You would think that with as few things that I finish around here, that I’d remember to take pictures. Oh well.

I organized all my knitting projects today and got them out of the jumble that they’d turned into.

That is 4 lace shawls, 2 pairs of socks, 2 sweaters, a Hitchhiker, and another linen washcloth. And Ripley. My plan is to finish one of the sock pairs, one of the sweaters, and one of the lace shawls next. We’ll see how that goes. Ripley said she’d help.

Arlo

We had a little excitement with Arlo on Thanksgiving. We had a houseful of people, some that stayed overnight, and with one big friendly extra dog. Arlo disappeared, which isn’t unusual, but I couldn’t find him the next day still. I was beginning to think he had escaped and gotten outside, but he eventually came sauntering out of some hiding place.

He is starting to be a little more cuddly than when we got him earlier this year. He is now sleeping on our bed, and today for the first time he jumped up on my lap while I was knitting.

Speaking of knitting, that missing yarn finally showed up a couple days later, delivered to one of our neighbors. Fortunately Larry doesn’t knit, so he was happy to turn it over to me.

That’s all the colors that I now have of this*. Aren’t those pretty? It brings just a bit of springtime, which is quite welcome in these dark, rainy days of December. I only have one skein of each color, but I’m thinking a summer top out of that pale aqua would be lovely. Or the purple. Or maybe one of each.

*Euroflax sport weight linen.