Mar 1, 2019

Stupid me, I left too smallish red wine stains for weeks (Christmas?) to nicely set into the fabric and nearly, nearly got them out again (potato starch, lemon)… but there were still slightly visible. As I did not like the colour really, I’ll give it a go with Kool-Aid: 2 grape, 1 strawberry, 1 cherry, 2 black cherry. I just threw in all the reddish shades I had plus the grape for not make it too red ;) Had the jumper soak in water for 1 1/2 days, then overnight in the dye. It looked pretty even from what is visible of a jumper in a pot, the dye had been absorbed into the fabric over night and it is heating now…

20 May: All done with:))) Very happy with everything.

Weight: 498 g

Ever since the yarn arrived I have been trying around with a pattern for a kind of oversized aran sweater. The idea:

• not quite cropped but not overly long either
• quite a bit of positive ease 10 - 15”
• the sleeves as thight as possible to work somehow out with a raglan design

I would have loved to knit top down but do like to decrease stitches MUCH better than increase them for the raglan lines plus i find the neckline shaping with short rows much easier bottom up. so… i give it a go this way round:) More guessing with the length of the sleeves though and increasing the stitches there but in a much less visible place.

A bit late to join the party, but I will enter the ColourMart contest and hope it works out and I can finish it….

Love the yarn, so soft, no itch, nice drape - beautiful:) It is somewhat splitty which is a bit of pain when crossing stitches without a cable needle, but I can put up with that…

28 Apr, 23:39 Have CO, 360sts, 20 mins, abt 4m long tailend

02 May: I have been knitting a lot the last three days, but that’s the easier part anyway, no increases (sleeves) or decreases (raglan)… I will use my momentum which is always there at the beginning of a project hoping to carry some through to the end. The weekend is my sons birthday party, so no not too much knitting happening there.

05 May: Nearly a week into it and am happy with the progress. But now comes the part where decisions have to be made…

The work has progressed to about where the sleeves have to be knitted and incorporated. I have never knitted any raglan where sleeve and body de-/increases are wildely different which they would be if I take very little stitches for the sleeves, so I guess I have to find the golden middle and do some ‘uneven’ increases for the sleeves (little from the hand upwards to more towards the underarm area) which is pretty normal anyway. Sounds like batwings with raglan…

The other thing is with which part of the aran pattern I want to arrive at the neckline…

Need to do some more maths and charting, but not within the next two days… kids bday party with a bouncy castle and lots of kids that need to be feed and stuff tomorrow. Keeping my fingers crossed for the weather which looks good at the moment :)))

07 May: The bouncy castle was a great success, the weather played along, and the kids were like a bunch of hungry wolves once the food came… almost didn’t have enough!

I did knit on the weekend one little sample with a raglan line decreasing on one side double as fast as on the other (Pic 9) and it looks good enough to me and the decreases will not be that different as in the pic:) I did knit it with another 100% merino yarn as I did not want to cut the yarn from the cone with the the body already as I may knit a bit more before incorporating the sleeves.

I will have a different set of decreases for sleeves and body and am going to find out at the end how it looks… maybe should put a life line if I want to frog the raglan part and re-decide on a different finish…

09 May: Today I have been trying around on how to start the sleeve to more or less match the edge of the body though it starts at the different row of the pattern repeat. I think I am good to go:)

11 May: I am a fair bit into the first sleeve and keep second guessing myself if I should have started with a couple of more stitches… I think I may knit until it needs to be connected with the body and wash it to see better.

12 May: :) I am happy with my first sleeve.

14 May - The grand finale?: I am very excited to join my parts and start with the raglan hoping to make the deadline on Sunday and seeing how it turns out! Some 600 stitches just after joining but I enjoy it much more than the sleeves which in the end had to many sts for DPNS and not really enough for this small circular…

And just half into the first round the first mistake to repair…

The washed sleeve lost about 1 cm on lenght. I find the width very difficult to compare as the unwashed pattern is like a rib, one can pull it to any width…

15 May - 5 days and hours…: I am a fair bit into the raglan yoke and am fairly confident now I can finish until Sun afternoon:) Plus, so far I am very happy how it’s turning out:)))

16 May - 4 days and hours…: cm/inch-wise I am a little more than halfway through the raglan yoke, but as the number of stitches is going down I am coming really close to the end:) I really would like to see it not only done but washed and blocked and ready…

17 May - 3 days and a bit…: I am where I start in my chart the short rows for the front neckline.

18 May: It is done! It’s in its first wash bath:))) I should have a blocked and ready to wear sweater with photo by Sundday’s deadline. It’s entered into the contest already as washing and blocking isn’t a requirement:)