2011 sweaters (and other stuff)

At the beginning of this year, I resolved to knit seven sweaters, one of which I designed myself, which turned out to be the only knitting resolution I unequivocally kept (the rest were a flat out failure, or else need to be judged, um, charitably). Though I really enjoyed branching out this year into tiny sock yarn socks and lacy shawls, sweaters have always been my most satisfying knitting projects; also, this year, it's kind of cool to see all the photos of the different places we were living when I finished them! The first sweater is one of the last thing I knit in Japan: Snow White with Noro Cash Iroha. I miss our tiny Japanese backyard. 

After Snow White, things in Japan got too busy for me to knit, and then too hot while I was traveling in Vietnam and India (too hot is also why I whacked off about six inches of hair right before leaving Hanoi). I was in serious knitting withdrawal by the time I got to Iain's house in Scotland, which nonetheless does not explain why I felt the compulsive need to knit this Snowbird sweater in ten freakin' days. But I did. The photo above was taken in Iain's family's backyard the day before I left. Of all the sweaters I made this year, I wear this one the most, though I am quite embarrassed to say that I have still not woven in all the ends. 

I knit this Streamside cardigan in Los Angeles, where - in Iain's absence - I discovered the amazing time suck that is Netflix instant streaming and figured out how to use a remote control on my camera and take photos of myself, myself. I'm so productive when my boyfriend is in another country. 

I never posted about this but this also happened, I swear! I designed it myself and it mostly came out the way I imagined, but it needs a button or something. I have vague plans of fine tuning this and making it into a real pattern, but they're pretty vague. I count this as fulfilling my New Year's resolution because I did wear it out in public once or twice, but it was definitely not my most satisfying knit. 

I liked my first Cecily Macdonald Glowick sweater so much that I made a Goodale too, out of the madtosh pashima that never became a February Lady sweater, and finished it right before we left for Peru. I'm not a huge fan of this sweater. It hangs funny, and I know I keep saying I'll fix it, but I don't really know when that will be. Can't argue with the color, though - yay, Tart! 

Are you seeing sort of a theme with these poses? I have no idea what this pose is - maybe I'm so busy admiring my handiwork I can't be bothered to look at the camera? If I was on America's Next Top Model, the judges would totally mock me for my lack of posing ferocity and I'd be eliminated right away. In any case. Boe was a test knit for the amazingly talented Anke, and I absolutely love it, even though finishing it in Peru meant that I was't really able to wear it in the weather there. Also, I started knitting it in San Francisco on the BART train, and then I dropped the ball and it rolled down the aisles and under seats right as the door to my stop opened and I had to run after it, and it was one of those really frantic moments when I'm pretty sure I looked like a colossal idiot to everyone else on the train. The photo is from our host family's house in Peru, which was still being built. Our lovely host mother told it me was muy linda, and I felt really special. 

The other Peru sweater and probably my favorite of the whole year - a Tea Leaves cardigan in the most beautiful yarn on the planet. Iain took these photos of me in front of an Inca wall, which is probably way cooler than the sweater itself. 

So those were the sweaters of 2011! (I also started this Acer cardigan, but it quickly fell by the wayside when we started backpacking - there was no way I could cram a sweater's worth of yarn into our already crammed full shared rucksack.) In general, they weren't really as satisfying as the sweaters of the year before. So many short sleeved projects made me feel like I was cheating (plus I can't really wear them now that I'm finally in sweater weather), and I'm kind of meh on most of them. Next year I think I just need to make a few long sleeved, worsted weight cardigans that button all the way up that I can actually wear, especially since it's looking like I'll be living someplace cold. 

When I wasn't knitting sweaters, though, I was designing! I published four patterns this year, which doesn't sound like a lot but there was a lot of behind the scenes knitting and unknitting and things that never became patterns, so it did suck up a fair bit of time. The first pattern, published in early January, was Thisbe, above. 

This pattern was actually published in an actual, real-live magazine, and I am so lame about blogging while traveling that I never actually blogged about it until now. SO LAME, I know. And now that issue is long off the shelves. But in any case, these Ivonne mitts appeared in the second issue of the UK magazine Knit Now, and despite my relative radio silence on the matter in blog form, it was one of the most exciting moments in knitting I've ever had, as well as the one that reassured my father, who I was living with at the time, that all that time I spent knitting and vacantly watching Netflix instant streaming was, in fact, productive.  It is worth noting that the photo above is actually my submission picture and that the thumbs have changed, and also that I think I'll be able to sell the pattern myself eventually, so if you like it, you're in luck! 

The other thing I spent a good amount of time working on this summer was this Phaedra hat. Yay, things with leaves. 

And finally, there was Naiya, a free alpaca cowl pattern I managed to write in Peru, mostly because I wanted an excuse to use my pretty skein of squishy alpaca yarn from Cusco. And that's it, for 2011! If I didn't have as many satisfying FOs as I would have liked, it's only because I was too busy traveling or designing, and I can't complain about any of that. If you like any of these patterns, use the coupon code happy2012 before January 2nd on Ravelry to get 25% off any pattern! Except for the free ones, because they're already free. Happy knitting, and goodbye to an awesome year! 

FO: scotland snowbird

Hello from my last day in Aberdeenshire! These last three weeks flew by; despite it being June, it's been cold and rainy most of the time, which left ample time for finishing up my Snowbird sweater. Fortunately the sun came out briefly right after I finished it, so I was able to drag Iain out to take some photos:

I knit this in nine days, which is obscenely fast for me. Once I got started, with little else to do out here, finishing it became a bit of an unhealthy obsession. I knit an entire sleeve in one day and knit 35 cm in another; if I ever get so stupid as to decide to knit something this fast again, I'm definitely going for a shorter sweater with fatter yarn.

My frenetic knitting was made slightly stressful by the fact that this sweater looked like @$*&! while I was knitting it. Fortunately, I steam blocked this rather aggressively with an iron, and am very, very happy to see that steam blocking forgives a number of sins and results in a much softer, much drapier fabric. It's still not perfect, so, um, don't look too closely!

The Pattern: This is a gorgeous sweater, the kind I would buy in a store, and my first purlwise-facing project, which I like quite a bit; the directions are generally easy to follow, though they don't spell things out as much as some others do (something I always appreciate, since if there's a wrong way to do something, that's probably how I'll do it unless firmly ordered otherwise). The construction is not forgiving of mistakes, with some of the seaming or more fiddly bits in very visually central areas, like the shoulders (mine do not look wonderful). The seaming of the back threw me a bit, until some helpful Ravelers pointed out that to do mattress stitch on two different fabrics, you follow mattress stitch directions for stockinette on the stockinette side, and directions for purl-side on the other - a bit obvious when you think about it, but the sort of thing I need pointed out (also I was a bit delirious after my nine day knitting binge and was probably not thinking clearly).

I actually really enjoy seaming, though I'm not very good at it - like I said, I think I may use the last remnants of my yarn to redo the shoulders when I get home - and so I'm less happy with this sweater than others because all the goofs are in the most prominent places of the sweater. But, that's my problem, not the pattern's, and I would definitely recommend this to a confident knitter. And maybe not doing it over nine days!

Modifications: I didn't modify anything, except to knit one sleeve inside out (I knit the other sleeve entirely in purls; not surprisingly, it took three days where the other took one) and then pop it rightside out when I got to the cuffs. So much easier, so much nicer looking. I also purled the last row on the cuffs before binding off knit-wise to minimize rolling, and then blocked it with an iron (like, literally ironed it - not something I think you're supposed to do? but it worked for me) to flatten it even more. I'm not a big fan of curling.

The yarn: I honestly don't remember why I choose this yarn or the color - I seem to remember it being a decent price, though it doesn't fit any of my usual criteria for yarn (either ridiculously soft, or a crazy vibrant color that doesn't actually match anything I own).  Hence, it was a bit boring and scratchy to knit with, but after blocking has transformed into a softer, much drapier fabric that I like much, much more. Though I'm still toying with the idea of dying the whole thing black (it'd cover up all those mistakes in the shoulders!),  I do have to admit that oatmeal, while not the most striking color, definitely goes with almost everything.

PS, The knitting of Snowbird would probably have gone even faster were it not for this grouchy old lady, who developed an instant need to sit on my lap or stand on my project whenever I broke it out. Here she is studying the pattern. 

lost: knitting mojo

Whenever I don't knit for awhile, it always takes me awhile to regain my knitting mojo, for lack of a better, less dorky term, and my first attempts to pick up the needles again always feel clunky and awkward. Case in point: my tri-country Ishbel, to which I clearly did not pay enough attention during my intermittent attempts to pick it up while traveling through Vietnam and India (though partially this is because I crashed my motorbike directly onto my wrist and was a bit out of commission for a few weeks - though it's OK now!) After two days of dutifully working away at it here in Scotland, I finally had to come to terms with the fact that after three repeats of the charts, it looked nothing like the gorgeous Ishbels populating Ravelry. Not even a tiny bit. I've never been much of a lacy shawl knitter, so it's probably not surprising that I wasn't doing my best while trying to read a faded, crumpled pattern in a Mysore hotel room while deciding if I could justify ordering room service curry while watching reruns of last year's So You Think You Can Dance (I could, it turned out).

I'm too embarrassed to post photos of my terrible Ishbel, but - as much as I'd love to have a lovely knitted shawl I could say I worked on in three countries - I know that it's too far gone and that I'm going to have to just give in and frog the whole thing. My fear of frogging and all the wasted time it represents is one of the reasons I'm probably so willing to accept imperfection in my knitting projects, and though I'm typically fairly laid back about not being perfect, I do think that this time around, for myself, striving to get it right is the only way I'll ever be able to manage lace - otherwise I'll just end up with a closetful of horribly mangled shawls that even I'm embarrassed to wear in public. So a little perfectionism is a good thing, right?

In the meantime, depressed by my total loss of knitting mojo, I cracked open the only other project I had waiting for me in the UK. Months ago, when we were packing up and moving out of our house in Japan, I sent enough yarn for one Snowbird sweater to my boyfriend's Aberdeenshire home. I'm knitting it in Berroco Ultra Alpaca Light, which at the moment feels a bit scratchy, but which has a nice texture, particularly on the reverse stockinette in which most of the sweater is knit. Besides that, though, it just feels nice to be back in my knitting comfort zone, using nice familiar size six needles and being able to knit and watch TV again. Yay, sweater knitting!