Arien – a finished cardigan

It’s late, but it’s done! I gave it to my mum today (the 8th) as a “Thanks for giving birth to me” present. I even wrapped it!

Front

Back

Side (action shot!)

Side (still shot)

Pocket

Click on any of the pictures for a larger view.
I’m leaving the issue of fastening the cardigan for now. The reason for this is because my mum very, very, rarely fastens her cardigans. If she does, it’s usually snowing!

I’ve been thinking about the pattern, and the possibility of publication on somewhere like Magknits (assuming Kerrie would take it).

Pros:

1. More people would get access to it than the twenty-or-so regular readers who pop by here
2. I like sharing
3. I’m quite pround of it

Cons:

1. Somewhere like knitty wouldn’t take it becuase I’ve blogged about it
2. I don’t have the confidence to do multiple sizes
3. I don’t have the confidence to publish a proper adult garment
4. It looks too similar to Stef Japel’s stuff to be published
5. I have weird row gauge and the pattern wouldn’t work without it!

So, having said all that, the notes will be up as soon as I’ve found all the bits of paper and deciphered my own handwriting!

ETA – pattern notes now available here.

I need a quick fix

But more on that later …

I present to you “Brigitte”!

Well, that was the plan. Unfortunately, the seams add up to about seven miles in total and I’m still going. So instead you get a lovely picture of a crumpled cardigan:

(Click for a mattress stitch close-up – I hope!)

Full low down over on the project page.

I’m also zipping through the last of the “Six sox” socks: Go Team!

As usual, I’m working from the toe up, with a short-row heel and toe. I’m not going to reveal “my team” until I’ve finished them – it’s too geeky to admit just yet!

So, after working on a longline cardigan and 8 sts/1″ socks and with a fiddly 4-ply cotton cardigan coming up, I’m ready for something fast. Please step forward: Ribbon Xback from the Spring 05 edition of Knitty.

I have 10 balls of Rowan Cotton Tape sitting in my room (that’s it up there) and it’s been begging me to knit it up into something. I was part way through tossing around garment ideas in my head when up popped Xback. Of course, there will be one or two changes (I’m adding waist shaping and I’m undecided about the actual X of the Xback) but it’s still pretty much the same as the pattern.

So, next time: Brigitte will be finished, I promise.

I was just frontin’

Brigitte now has a back, two matching sleeves and a front left pocket! Ooh, it can’t get much more exciting than that, can it?

Take a look at this:

And this:

I know: thrilling, isn’t it! All I have to say is thank ITV1 for the James Bond season. Two hours of solid knitting time. I have seen all of the Bond films at least once, and would watch all of them again (with the exception of “Moonraker” – yuck!). I always wanted to be Bond when I was a little girl (of course, an intelligent, non-philandering, sensible, female version).

I’ve done the tension “square” for Martha and all is OK; right gauge on the right needles. I don’t actually appear to own a pair of 2.25 mm bamboo needles, so a pair of 2.5 mm will have to do! Being the miser that I am, I ripped the tension square back as soon as I’d finished it, so no pictures I’m afraid.

My plan for the fastening of Martha is to use press studs (a.k.a snaps), as wonderfully illustrated by Bonne Marie here. However, I’m a little reticent because I don’t like the idea of punching holes in my knitwear (I always have one eye on ripping back and reusing the yarn at some point in the future). I might still do the press stud thing, but use the sew-on ones, therefore negating the holes (I hope!). Or, I could do a more traditional knitted-on buttonband and therefore I’d only be punching holes in a small amount of yarn. Just thinking out loud again!

In sock news: I’m just about to change from the green stocking stitch to the purple in rib and then I’ll be done!

On a little additional note: I was doing some website house keeping and I launch I.E., just to check that it rendered correctly. Well, it didn’t ( – none of the pictures were displayed. So, this is now fixed and I apologise to anyone who didn’t get to see project pictures of the links I posted. If there are any problems, just leave a comment or email me. But be gentle – the internet has changed so much since I first started using HTML about 10 years ago!

Oh, Martha: why did they name you thus?

No, not that Martha …

… This Martha.

I’ve joined the “Martha-along” hosted over at Jessica’s place.

It’s all Bonne Marie’s fault : See the 10th of March entry. I already had the magazine (courtesy of my Rowan International subscription) and I nipped over to Jannette’s Rare Yarns on eBay, spied some discontinued 4-ply cotton in Olive, and away I’ve gone.

Whilst waiting for the yarn to arrive I did this:

A quick test in some baby acrylic to get a “feel” for the pattern. I think I’m going to like this. I’ve had to upsize (like I normally have to) but I don’t see this being too much of a problem.

I have to confess that until she was “banged up in chokey” I’d never heard of Martha Stewart (apart from a passing reference in “3rd Rock from the Sun”). I think the closest we come to her in Britain is Delia Smith (but on acid).

In sock news, I now have these:

Well, actually a bit more now, but you get the idea! Funnily enough, considering all of the problems I’ve had with the stashbuster socks, the numbers work quite well for doing the gusset increase/decrease as the child’s small size. I’m hoping that these will fit my mum perfectly. It’s a certain birthday and, quite frankly, these socks are going to be the best thing she’ll get (apart from the triple chocolate cake that I am now the master of). I’ll be making her a cotton long-line cabled cardigan, but since the yarn is currently somewhere over the Atlantic, that ain’t going to happen any time soon!

The back of my gargantuan cardigan (a.k.a. Brigitte) is now done, and I’ve cast on for the left front. Lovely pictures soon.

Ta-ra for now!

Two steps forward, one step back

Well, progress has been made on Brigitte and the Stashbuster Spiral socks, and I’ve also cast on for “Blaze”. However, the work done on the socks was all for nothing in the end. I didn’t check my tension (slap my wrists!) and I ended up getting 9.5 sts/1″ instead of 8 sts. I also worked out that I would need about 100 rows to make the length of my foot! It was at that point that I check the pattern (oops!).

So, anyway, I took a picture for posterity:

And the new (better for me) toe:

Short row, garter stitch, 64 stitches in total.

The progress on Brigitte has been all on the back (wow – 54 cm has never seen so long!):

And casting on for one sleeve from Blaze:

With flash:

With daylight lamp/without flash:

I can’t seem to get a good picture of the “Zeal” colour of the Rowan Calmer. It appears to suck the light into itself and makes me go a bit ~#][{/> (there doesn’t appear to be an appropriate word in English, so that will have to do). The link to the knitty.com pattern is here.

I hope to have the first sock done by the middle of next week, but we’ll see. In the meantime, I’m learning more than I ever needed to know about TB and syphilis (part of my university work, not a hobby!).

Edit: if, in the past, you’ve wanted to leave a comment but not been a member of Blogger, you had to leave an anonymous comment. Well, they’ve now changed it so that even if you don’t have a Blogger account, you can still leave a comment as “you”. Just chose “other” from the choice of three in the comments box that pops up. Much better! Comment away, dear reader.