Swatchy

No update on the shawl, as I seem to be ripping out almost as much as I knit. Something is not right with my edge stiches , and I'm ending up with one extra, or one short. Not sure how that happens. Good news is that the hands seem to have nupp problem resolved. Even with the ripping, the shawl is moving along, and I'm thinking about another project.

I did learn that I have become a very loose woman. I did some swatching for a Rogue hoodie for my daughter. The yarn label said 18st/4in on #8 needles. In my past, I knit exactly per most yarn labels. I know I've been loose, so I started with #6's. Then #4's. Then check the label to make sure I'm reading it correctly. Then #2's. Finally. I brought it on my business trip with me, and may cast on later today.

Yesterday, after getting packed for the week, I played with my yarn. I've been thinking that I had stash yarn for this sweater from "Poetry in Stitches" and decided to try it out.

So, here's a swatch in vintage Bear and Fleishers "wool and shetland wool" won off Ebay during my Ebay yarn binge. I'm not sure about the green stripe. It was a more muted shade in the book, but this is ok too. I remembered I have some more avocado yarn about the same weight, and my duplicate stitch over to see if I like that better.

Not bad, but not quite to gauge. 25 1/4 stitches to 4" instead of 26. I did some calculating, and should be able to re-write the pattern. I also noticed that this pattern comes in one size in the book. Cheesy. But then, who am I to whine. I want a cardigan, but not cropped, and not asymmetrical, so I'd be messing with the pattern anyway.

So, I'm channeling Meg Swanson, or Deborah Newton. To get the bust dimension I want, I can reduce the repeats of the large flower pattern to nine instead of ten. But then I have to mess with how the patterns line up around the body. Now, I could reduce it to eight repeats, and "leak" the leaf pattern down the sides. Make sense? From the front you would see two flowers on either side of the buttons, the back would have four flowers, the leaf pattern would start on the sides, and then blend in on the body. I'd have a vertical line for the flower pattern so no stitch jumps. Hmmmm.