Sunday, November 19, 2006

Pimlico

Ok, I admit it. I gave up on the F&F shawl. The yarn is in a puffy envelope, winging its way across the ocean in that yarn-for-coffee trade I suggested a few days back. May it behave better for T. than it did for me.

I've been eyeing the Pimlico Shrug from Knit2Together since I first saw the book. I'm not really a shapless cardi kind of girl (that I'm aware of, anyway), but I love the innovative construction. It's a big square folded over to make holes for attached sleeves, and a ribbed edging all the way around the outside.

So I grabbed myself a ball of Lamb's Pride, in black, and swatched away. The eyelet is very odd, but as Tracey says in the book, once you get the hang of it, it goes swimmingly.

I found the yarn/tension in the book a hair confusing... it calls for Koigu Kersti which claims to be a DK but looks for all the world like a worsted. And the tension of the actual swatch is closer to aran...

So I threw caution to the wind and picked a yarn I love instead. The good news is that for this design, it really doesn't matter. You knit a big rectangle -- so it was easy enough to calculate the tension of my swatch (18 sts) vs. what the pattern calls for (19 sts), and reduce the number of cast-on stitches appropriately.

And then you knit tubes for the sleeves in k2p2, so I figure I'll cut out a repeat, since I have little arms anyway... and then the edging all around is k2p2 again, so I'll just eyeball it. Easy peasy!

Looking good so far...

1 comment:

CraftyCarole said...

nothing to do with your WIP, but a question from your mitten patterns that Spun published:
IN the convertible mittens, could the length of the men's mitten part be incorrect. I'm making them for my brother for Christmas and the mitt part seemed very short. We have big hands, but it was even short on me! The decrease in the women's size is decrease 1 round knit 2 rounds, but the men's size is alternate between decrease rows and knit rows... is this where the problem lies?

OK... sorry to be a pain, but if you have any answers, I'd surely appreciate it!