Sweet spot update
Apr. 20th, 2012 07:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
redhedlvr2I've spent the last week knitting my wee knitterly fingers to the bone it seems. And although I'm going to chalk this past week up to progress, I do have to say I have nothing to show for my efforts. It has become obvious to me that HALF of the sock yarn I bought last week will not produce the incredible stacking and pooling effects that this afghan requires.
To be more specific, I started with this yarn. The colors in this pic aren't true at all. I find the yarn itself to be very pretty and will save for another SOCK yarn afghan I've been seeing around. But for this project, it's just not working out. And on the subject, tell me, what kind of masochist knits an afghan out of sock yarn anyway?
Here's the lowdown. With a #2 needle, I cast on 64 stitches and worked the pattern, which is extremely easy and the swatch worked up quickly. It did become apparent after about an inch that the desired pattern wasn't working so, as per the directions, I first increased by two stitches, knit for another inch, increased two more, knit for an inch. Nadda. I frogged the whole thing and repeated with a #1 needle. Still no joy. At that point, I ripped the whole thing out again and cast on with only 54 stitches, wash, rinse repeat as above.
My conclusion is this. Sock yarn that will produce a "wider" solid stripe with jacquard patterning will not work. It is possible that I have not hit the sweet spot, but I believe the nature of that thicker/wider stripe won't allow for the zig-zagging pattern that was intended.
Did I mention that I don't own any straight knitting needles other than double points? Have I also mentioned that 64 stitches is too long to hold safely on a double point without some stitches falling off the back side? My solution? I rooted around in the kitchen junk drawer searching for a rubber band I could cut in half and wrap around the needles as sort of a point protector. No rubber bands were in the drawer but there was an unopened pair of squishy ear plugs that I jammed onto the ends and have worked quite well.
The things we do for our craft, right?
I sent this from my phone to my yahoo email because for some reason I couldn't get it to go to my gmail email. See what I mean?
To be more specific, I started with this yarn. The colors in this pic aren't true at all. I find the yarn itself to be very pretty and will save for another SOCK yarn afghan I've been seeing around. But for this project, it's just not working out. And on the subject, tell me, what kind of masochist knits an afghan out of sock yarn anyway?
Here's the lowdown. With a #2 needle, I cast on 64 stitches and worked the pattern, which is extremely easy and the swatch worked up quickly. It did become apparent after about an inch that the desired pattern wasn't working so, as per the directions, I first increased by two stitches, knit for another inch, increased two more, knit for an inch. Nadda. I frogged the whole thing and repeated with a #1 needle. Still no joy. At that point, I ripped the whole thing out again and cast on with only 54 stitches, wash, rinse repeat as above.
My conclusion is this. Sock yarn that will produce a "wider" solid stripe with jacquard patterning will not work. It is possible that I have not hit the sweet spot, but I believe the nature of that thicker/wider stripe won't allow for the zig-zagging pattern that was intended.
Did I mention that I don't own any straight knitting needles other than double points? Have I also mentioned that 64 stitches is too long to hold safely on a double point without some stitches falling off the back side? My solution? I rooted around in the kitchen junk drawer searching for a rubber band I could cut in half and wrap around the needles as sort of a point protector. No rubber bands were in the drawer but there was an unopened pair of squishy ear plugs that I jammed onto the ends and have worked quite well.
The things we do for our craft, right?
I sent this from my phone to my yahoo email because for some reason I couldn't get it to go to my gmail email. See what I mean?
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no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 05:06 pm (UTC)I honestly don't know how anyone deals with the yarn that changes colors on the skein. That seems worse than pattern matching! But, yeah, I do think that shorter color lengths would look better. (I honestly find it kind of amusing that you just happened to get stripes, though. Crazy!)
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Date: 2012-04-20 06:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 06:43 pm (UTC)There's self patterning yarn? That's kind of crazy, really...cool, but crazy. What kinds of patterns?
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Date: 2012-04-20 06:54 pm (UTC)Here (http://www.yarn.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/categoryID/A6F9CF2D-EE6C-43CC-A022-AF9CB6A3290A/productID/C45807B5-DF75-4EC5-B761-E54C7752E1D2/)
Here (http://www.patonsyarns.com/product.php?LGC=kroysocks&SPP=999)
and here just to name a few (http://www.carodanfarm.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/regia_yarns.html)
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Date: 2012-04-20 07:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 07:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 07:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 07:34 pm (UTC)As for those knitting people, I think I read somewhere that she was Canada's fastest knitter several years in a row or something. Which is why making an afghan out of that yarn was something she probably did during nap time. I'm so slow!
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Date: 2012-04-20 07:39 pm (UTC)Ah, well, being able to work fast does help!
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Date: 2012-04-20 07:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 08:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-20 06:55 pm (UTC)