WolfWeave

So, how did it get to be the second half of summer already? Okay, so we went on a week’s vacation to Telluride and then we took my son to his college orientation (Case Western in Cleveland)(with accompanying very thorough parent orientation) and then my dad fell and bruised his ribs, and now I’m surrounded by mountains of laundry and facing more doctors’ appointments and it’s once again time to pay bills and now we have to start buying paraphernalia for college and I raced through a month’s worth of newspapers yesterday and I haven’t even bothered to see what’s piled up on the TIVO and Stitches Midwest is coming up in about 3 weeks and I still haven’t even knit myself 1 summer top to wear!!

I did manage to order the new Knitpicks needles this morning because I had started knitting my new gauge size 5 Green Gable top on Addi Turbos (which I’d always been afraid of, feeling I wasn’t experienced enough for such slippery needles) and I LOVED using them, except for the fact that the blunt points drive me crazy (being used to using Bryspun straights). So, after reading every online review I could find (and they’re pretty much all raves), I ordered a set of the interchangeables and am looking forward to organizing them all in their little pockets. No, also looking forward to knitting with them and their sharp narrow points and their way flexible cables. I had always loved Addi Naturas bamboo needles and I’m sure I will still use them for some types of yarns that are too slippery for the metal needles (and my skills) but, seriously, rubbing the bamboo with waxed paper every few rows does get way tedious after a while. And it sure would be nice to use a cable right out of the package without having to soak it in hot water in the sink first to get out the kinks (if you even CAN get them out!). So, I’m up for trying out the Knitpicks ones and hope they live up to all their reviews. They’ll take a while to get here, as some are backordered and they warn that shipping can take up to 2-3 weeks. I’ll wait; I’m patient. I have a lot of other things to do and just a few knitting projects already on other sets of needles!

You might have noted in my last post that I was going away on vacation with 2 projects: Green Gable KAL (Debbie Bliss Cathay in purple) and CeCe (KnitPicks Shine in red) and only size 6 needles. You might have noticed a fatal flaw in my thinking. I didn’t. I managed to knit nearly 1 ball of the Cathay, 16 rows or halfway through the lace yoke before noticing that the lace yoke looked rather open (to say the least). I pulled it off the needles and tried it on, only to find that the lace yoke (and, mind, I was only halfway through) already came to the top of my bra. This means that the entire lace yoke, had I continued, would have reached to the bottom of my bra at least. Not quite what I had in mind. Hmmm…what could be wrong? I had done a gauge swatch. I had done a gauge swatch…on regular straight needles. But I was knitting on circulars. Could this make a difference? Guess what–EVERYONE says that it does make a difference and that one should swatch on circulars if knitting with circulars!! So, who knew?! Put this project aside.

Then I tried CeCe for a while, though it was doomed from the start, as the Knitpicks Shine is the same WPI as Cathay and CeCe the same desired gauge as GG. But this didn’t even register with my vacation-addled brain (I’m blaming it on the altitude–we were in Telluride at 9500 ft.). Nice try, same gauge problem; knitting WAY too loose but I still had the edging problem (see 6/21 post). No matter how many different ways I could think of to try it, one side of the edging looked perfect and the other side still looked like crap. As soon as I can figure out how to properly phrase this, I’m writing Bonne Marie to ask for her help.

Anyway, here are a few photos of Telluride:

And when we returned, I re-knit Green Gable on size 5 circulars (I’m up to row 21–needed something to do while sitting with my parents yesterday). Let’s see the difference in sizing:

The yoke only half completed (16 rows) done on size 6 needles:

The yoke more than half completed (21 rows) done on size 5 needles:

By the way, I’ve made a couple of mistakes in the lace part at the edge where it meets the raglan but have decided to just keep going. I won’t tell if you won’t!