If you can’t be with the sweater you love, honey…

It turns out I can’t rip back my mermaid sweater to reshape it. The hairy single is just too sticky now that it’s been washed and I can’t unravel it without utterly destroying the yarn. So I must learn to live with the pooch. Pooches.  I can’t figure out a way to take it in that won’t look just as lumpy in another way. So there it is. I’m a calling it.

January Sweater: Mermaid.

Pattern: Modified Faux Fair Isle from Spin to Knit by Shannon Okey. Imperfect waist shaping added.

Yarn: 1 hank Spincycle Yarns Mermaid Hair (merino/kid mohair novelty) + 4 balls Diamond Carioca

Notes: The hips are exactly where they should be and fit perfectly (I used raglan-style increases), but I started the waist decreases way too late, resulting in an annoying pooch above the waist on either side. If I could rip it back, I’d start the waist a 3 inches sooner and taper it more gradually.

What I learned: Don’t wash a hairy single until you’re sure it’s how you want it, because you won’t be able to frog it later. I guess I knew that in theory; I’d just never actually needed to try it. But I’ve already benefited from this mistake. I went ahead and frogged the hip shaping in my Wooly Stripes raglan, instead of trying to see how the shaping fared after a wash, my instinct.

I’ve ripped it back to before the shaping and I’m just going to knit it straight down. The overall fit is relaxed enough that the increases aren’t necessary.

This is the second time I’ve ripped increases. The first time, I made it even wider, 8 increase rows (the top one only has 3–it just looks wider from the angle), which, when I actually  took it off the needles, looked like I was expecting to wear a bustle with it. So I ripped that back to just 3 increases, but those aren’t even necessary, even though they only add about 3″ overall. I’m going to knit it almost straight down, adding 3 increase rows very gradually–but each row will only increase one stitch at either side instead of 2, so it will add just a little over an inch.

Yesterday, we had a big Spinsters’ Club group, 15 people altogether! We all brought fiber and divvied it up into 15 little  piles and everyone made pot luck batts. We’re all going to spin them up and see what kinds of different yarn we get.

Here’s mine:

And here’s the carding in progress:

Jennifer’s batt turned out really cool, very muted and subtle on one side & super bright on the other.

And Marilyn brought cupcakes from Daddy Cakes:

And Jennifer brought homemade marshmallows dipped in chocolate, which were amazing, but I was so hopped up on sugar and coffee, I forgot to get a picture.

6 Replies to “If you can’t be with the sweater you love, honey…”

  1. I’ve got a quick fix for that Mermaid sweater. Machine sew on the seam you want, then cut those pooches off. No one will know.

    Spinning, carding, Daddy Cakes, and marshmallows…you guys know how to party!

  2. The sweaters are lovely, but if the pooches really annoy you, then try wearing a skinny belt with the sweater. It may help to eliminate the “pooches”

  3. I was going to suggest the same thing as Felicia. It may be knitting heresy, *insert home alone gasp here* but if it makes a sweater that you are happy with, go for it.

  4. I’m at work 3:30 PM and just looked at your blog. Needless to say I will be haveing a cupcake on my break. Beautiful wool and sweaters. Can you just machine zig zag stitch up side seems to take out excess bulk.

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