My mum requested a warm shawl to wear, preferably with cables. We sat down with some of my pattern books on Christmas Day, once the nieces had gone to bed and things had settled down a bit, and after some discussion we decided to go with the reversible cabled shawl from an old Vogue Knitting (never throw out your pattern magazines!). She asked for it to be grey, and in a more "substantial" yarn than the thin stuff they'd used for the magazine photo.
I checked Ravelry (login may be required), and people have made this same shawl in everything from lace to worsted weight. Impressively, they all look good. Different, of course, but good.
I decided to stick with a DK weight yarn, since that matched the original pattern gauge most closely, and wound up with some superwash wool. Here's what the first 20cm looked like:
I keep thinking it's too narrow, but when I measure it, it's exactly what the pattern calls for, and falls to waist-length on me when I hold it up to my shoulder. The fabric is nice and substantial without being heavy. I like scrunching it a lot.
It's taking about one skein for 10cm, so at the present rate it will take 18 skeins to get done. I bought 20, so no worries there.
The tiger jacket for the eldest niece continues as well. I got the back done:
Whenever I talk to other knitters about intarsia, there's always someone who makes a comment about "all those ends." The trick for dealing with ends to is weave them in as you knit. That way, when you're done, you can just clip them off. Here's what the back of the jacket looks like right now:
I still have to do some weaving-in at the edges, where there weren't long enough runs of one colour to knit in the ends, but compared to the original number, there really isn't a lot to do. And, unlike the intarsia knitting itself, weaving in ends on a finished piece is portable.
I suspect the shawl will get done a lot sooner than the jacket. I'm having a hard time staying motivated on the jacket. Not because it's nasty evil intarsia — I quite like intarsia — but because I have a bad feeling it's never going to get worn. We'll see.
I'm also missing Knit That Shit terribly. It feels good to miss finishing things so badly. That didn't *ahem* stop me from getting yarn for a jacket for me while I was getting the shawl yarn, but still, I would like to get back to the meta-project. Besides, the jacket for me should go quickly. Really.
I checked Ravelry (login may be required), and people have made this same shawl in everything from lace to worsted weight. Impressively, they all look good. Different, of course, but good.
I decided to stick with a DK weight yarn, since that matched the original pattern gauge most closely, and wound up with some superwash wool. Here's what the first 20cm looked like:
It's taking about one skein for 10cm, so at the present rate it will take 18 skeins to get done. I bought 20, so no worries there.
The tiger jacket for the eldest niece continues as well. I got the back done:
Whenever I talk to other knitters about intarsia, there's always someone who makes a comment about "all those ends." The trick for dealing with ends to is weave them in as you knit. That way, when you're done, you can just clip them off. Here's what the back of the jacket looks like right now:
I suspect the shawl will get done a lot sooner than the jacket. I'm having a hard time staying motivated on the jacket. Not because it's nasty evil intarsia — I quite like intarsia — but because I have a bad feeling it's never going to get worn. We'll see.
I'm also missing Knit That Shit terribly. It feels good to miss finishing things so badly. That didn't *ahem* stop me from getting yarn for a jacket for me while I was getting the shawl yarn, but still, I would like to get back to the meta-project. Besides, the jacket for me should go quickly. Really.