#11 of 11!

Yarn rec’d in the KP swap from ncreely!

A couple of tips: If you happen to have more of one color than the other, use the one you have more of as your CC. Because you will absolutely, positively need more of the CC than you will the MC if you follow the pattern as written. (Stripes 11 & 12 alone will take >400 yds - that’s my best guess based on the grams I used for 10 & 11. I didn’t have enough to get through 12.)

To conserve yarn, you could do 25 stitches before the W&T instead of 20. Something else I considered doing was switching colors; that is, doing a two-row/one-ridge stripe of MC, then a two-row stripe of CC, then picking up the short rows with MC. If I ever get around to making another I might try this.

As for the wraps, I don’t recommend skipping the pick-ups. It’s true that garter stitch generally hides short rows, but the more space there is between the stitches (for instance, if you’re using larger needles and/or thinner yarn) the more likely they are to show…and I read comments from several other Ravelers who were unhappy with the visibility of the wraps. Here’s my recommended pick-up method: Insert your R tip down into the wrap around the stitch on your L tip. Pull it up and onto the L needle. Knit both loops together.

Another method I’ve read about but never tried: Instead of wrapping a stitch, just turn the work when you’ve knit the last stitch you want to knit. When it’s time to knit past the turn point, slip the stitch that you would have otherwise wrapped. Then knit the next row normally. If you try this, let me know how it works.

I am really liking these two colors together. The contrast is definite but subtle. Also, this Gloss is much softer to work with than what I’ve bought…judging by the labels, it appears to be an older incarnation. It’s so lovely and squooshy! The newer Gloss is nice too, but not as soft till it’s washed. This is luscious straight out of the skein.

5/23: Made it to the end of the 3rd stripe.

5/24: End of the 5th stripe. So far I have used about 10 gms of MC and 16 of CC. I KNOW it’s going to look cool when it’s done, but the asymmetry is still offending my OCD…LOL

5/30: End of the 7th stripe. Still working on the first ball of each, though the CC is dwindling. I’ll get one more stripe out of it, but probably not two.

6/2: End of the 8th stripe. 38 gms of MC and 6 gms of CC remaining (of first 50 gm balls).

6/4: First ball of CC lasted till somewhere in the 9th stripe.

6/19: 25 gms of CC left at the end of 10th stripe.

7/4: 6 gms of CC left at the end of the 11th stripe. I think I probably had about 95 gms total of the CC, so even 100 gms (supposedly 440 yds) wouldn’t have been enough to do the full 12 stripes. I should have reversed the colors but I am NOT redoing it now!

7/11: Slow-going on the border. I think I’ve got about 2” done. I’ll definitely have to dip into the second skein (only about 5 gms left of the first one) but I doubt I’ll need all of it. Hard to say, though…at this point each row is taking about 1.5 gms, and my gauge is about 6 ridges (12 rows) per inch.

7/23: I got the border just shy of 3” and couldn’t take it anymore. So I’m binding off. After about half an hour I made it to the spine marker but that’s probably only about 1/3 of the total stitches! My wrist was hurting so I had to stop. I’m using JSSBO, and doing it on the right side…I forgot it was the wrong side that actually wound up with a neater edge. Oh well…it still looks nice! I think I’m going to a movie tonight so this probably won’t be done till tomorrow.