I promised better pictures of the sweater, worn by my husband. Here they are!

A more ‘natural’ pose:

The back of the sweater:

And just to see if he would do it:

:)

He’s wearing it to work today. I refrained from telling him to not spill anything on it, be careful when he took it off and to not leave it where someone could take it.  Of course him wearing it means we’ll have to wash it again. I think I might try a trip through the washer on gentle this next time.  I am also planning on wrapping it up and putting it under the Christmas tree when the time comes!

Tada!

Ok, so it’s not a great picture. You can see the patterning in the lower right corner. It desperately needed blocking, so here it is in for it’s Eucalan bath. It’s drying right now on a sweater rack. I tried to take a picture of that, but for some reason it came out looking green, which was unacceptable for the final final picture. I will get my husband to model it for a real blog picture when it’s dry (which will apparently take about 10 years given how heavy it is).

Now that I’ve finished Hardangervidda. I want to do put down some thoughts on it.

Specs

Pattern: Hardangervidda, in Dale book 126
Yarn: Falk, Heathered Navy, Heathered Grey, Deep Red
Needles: Don’t ASK!

Gauge

As everyone reading this blog knows I had serious gauge issues with this project. To me, working on a tiny little swatch does not equal knowing what your gauge will be like when working on a large object in the round. In this case, casting on, and seeing where I was a few inches into it was the best way to go. Now I can use this information when I knit other sweaters with this same yarn (like Bjerk, which I cast on Saturday night!)

My sleeve gauge was different than my body gauge. I was using totally different needles, because you have to use smaller ’round needles (or DPNs even) on the sleeve. I had to compensate also for my row gauge (which is usually tighter than what the pattern calls for) and increase less often, or I would have had a gargantuan sleeve.

What was my gauge? 5.75 stitches/inch

The pattern called for 6 stitches/inch. Doesn’t seem like a lot, but when you’ve got 250 plus stitches, that extra .25 stitch adds up.

Body vs. Sleeves

It made sense for me to do the body first because I needed to find out how far down the body would go in order for me to make the sleeves the right length. I believe I ended up making the sleeves the same length as called for in the pattern size I was working on, however the body measurements around did NOT jive with what the pattern said. What do I learn from this? Hmm…. use common sense and all will come out fine. I also ended up making a smaller size than I thought made sense from looking at the pattern measurements.

Pattern

Pattern could apply to two things – the fair isle patterning or the written directions. We’ll deal first with the written directions.

This was not the clearest pattern I’ve ever followed. There are still parts of it I’m fuzzy about what they mean. The formatting sucks. Everything is all squished together. Thank god for the charts! I do like using the chart for the colorwork. Could you imagine? “K1 with Mc1, k3 with cc2…” Bleah!

As for fair isle patterning. I really liked it. It wasn’t hard to do, and I’ve gotten much better at knitting two handed fair isle. There is a bit of draw in for me, but not too much, and I’m sure that blocking will take care of most of it. (Can’t you tell in the picture above? :-P)

Color & Yarn

This sweater wasn’t made with the most exciting colors. Black (really dark blue) for the body and grey with some red for the accents. But it’s for my hubby, and it’s what he’ll like and wear, and that’s the most important thing isn’t it? I did try to substitute a heathered green for the red, because hubby said he didn’t like the red in the picture. He was wrong. It didn’t show any contrast at all, and the red is really what helps the pattern “pop”.

How much yarn did I use? How did it compare with the pattern specs?

MC body: 9 balls MC sleeves: 6 (bought 20. returned 4. keeping one for emergencies)
Not sure on the Contrasting Colors, but I think 2-3 of the grey and only 1 of the red.

New Techniques I Learned

Back stitch to put sleeves in. Putting a zipper into a sweater. Two handed Fair Isle. (I actually learned that for Ingeborg, but didn’t end up making the sweater) Steeks! (Both Sleeve and Neck steeks).

What Worked, and What Didn’t

What, you mean the sweater isn’t perfect? Ha!

There is a visible error in the pattern on the back. I will never tell my husband this, and will never point it out, but I know it’s there. That’s the mistake that was meant to be in it, so as to show God I’m not perfect. (I’m not religious, but find the Amish theory on this amusing).

I think I picked up too many stitches for the neckline. It’s a very wiiiide neck. This works out well, as my husband has a pretty wide neck. We’ll see how it fits him when I block it. I also did a funny thing with the turning edge on the neckline. The ‘right’ side of the neck is the block rib pattern. Then it tells you to knit two rows for a turning row and proceed to use stockinette on the back so it’s a double-thick collar. Where I ended up in the block-rib pattern there’s a short non-ribbed area on top before the turn. I decided it wasn’t horrible, and it was OK and did not rip it out to redo it. Amazing, I know.

The zipper I ordered was a full one inch too long. I measured before I was done with the facing because I was impatient and decided to mail order the zipper. Luckily I know how to shorten a zipper, and you probably can’t tell unless you grab the sweater off my husband and really really look. Again, this passes the galloping horse theory so I left it alone and did not order another zipper.

This is all really picky stuff. What worked? The rest of the sweater. The two handed Fair isle was easier than I thought it would be before I tried it. By the time I did the sweater I was comfortable enough with it that it didn’t draw in very much. (I did switch to a larger needle size during the color work as the pattern suggested). Steeks were a non-issue for me. Although next sweater for hubby, I’ll make the armholes about 1/2 to 1 full inch deeper (we’ll see how it fits him after blocking).

I’m really very very pleased with this sweater overall. If my husband does anything to wreck it, I will flog him. :)

Better pictures later. Remember you can re-read the whole Hardangervidda saga here.

I have made stellar progress on Hardangervidda. I present to you a photo record of "How I steeked an armhole on Hardangervidda and survived":

"A" points to the outline around the steek marked with some pearl cotton. It’s a 4 stitch wide steek.  The "B" points to the satin ribbon I used to mark the center of the steek. I wanted it clearly marked where I was going to sew and then cut.  Measure 12 times, sew twice, cut once.

As I was machine stitching I realized it wasn’t really the cutting that was the big deal. It was the sewing those eensy teensy tiny stitches with the machine.  There was no way I was going to try and rip those out after putting them in. 

The view from the inside of the sweater from top to bottom: Pearl Cotton delineating steek area, two lines of tiny machine stitches, ribbon marking the center, and so on.

Just starting to cut…

And all finished cutting the steek.

I wanted to make sure it was going to fit. After doing a three needle bind off on the shoulders, I had Mike try it on:

He’s smiling! Does that mean he likes it, or he’s just humoring his wife?  I also wanted to check to make sure the sleeves were going to work:

I did a quick backstitch basting of the sleeve in and WOW. Talk about the perfect length on those sleeves.  I was a bit concerned that the depth of the armhole wasn’t quite big enough, so I had him hold his arm out:

He’s so tolerant :)  By this time there was no way he’d stay still for any more pictures. I managed to get both sleeves really sewn in (ripped out the basting on the first one. I had the facing showing on the outside a bit, so I moved where I was sewing it) and have picked up stitches for the neck.  There was one more steek I sewed & cut. That’s the scary one that is only 3 stitches wide down the center front. After knitting some facings, there will be a zipper there. I got it sewn & cut, no problems.

I had never backstitched a sleeve in before.  It was much easier than I thought it should be.  One thing I was concerned about is I was focusing on where the stitches were catching the sleeve so that the facing didn’t show. I was using my machine stitches on the steek to keep the stitches in the body a consistent depth.  However, it was difficult to tell exactly where the stitching was catching on the body. It came out pretty straight, but not perfectly straight.  It will pass the galloping horse test though, so I’m not redoing them.  Any hints/advice on how to do this better in the future?

Left to do:

• Knit collar
• Knit facings
• Find zipper close to the correct length & color
• Put in zipper
• Weave in ends (yes, those are yarn ends dangling down from his wrist) and whip stitch sleeve facings in
• Celebrate!

I have progress to report!

Sleeve:

Sock:

I had to rip back a tiny bit on the sleeve. I thought I needed to finish the current ball of yarn before moving on to the pattern in the upper sleeve area. When I rechecked the length I had gone about 4 rows too far.

The sock was done last night, except for grafting, but I decided to have Mike try it on first. It was TOO short. This yarn doesn’t stretch as much lengthwise as the other sock I was using as my "model" sized sock. So ripped the toe back and am adding another inch and a bit before restarting the toe.

Mike wore last years Christmas socks this morning, which he calls "happy socks". I guess it’s worth making sure they fit. :)

Sometimes you just need to get a little momentum. (I’m still looking for more)

As I lose interest (momentum) in one project; I seem to pick up in another. Small sock projects are hard to lose momentum in because they are done so quickly. By the time you’d be bored with it, voila – you’re done! Right now I’m making good progress on Mike’s secret-socks. Mike’s not-so-secret sweater, Hardangervidda, is languishing in my knitting basket. I haven’t even opened it in a week or so. The poor thing.

I’m trying to get Mike’s secret-socks done pretty quickly, because I’m pretty bored with them. Compared to Lorna’s Laces, the yarn is pedestrian. It does have some great subtle tweedy colors in it (which don’t photograph at all because it’s such a dark yarn), but it’s definately not as soft. I got past the sticky-bit on the gussett. I decided to decrease to 55 stitches, (Cast on was 52, decrease to 50 for the cuff pattern, both in a larger needle size) tried the sock on him (ignoring that he said "neat!" since he wasn’t supposed be looking at them at all) and stopped the instep patterning as soon as possible. I did an inch or so of progress at lunch during a lively discussion about different types of fiber (Bunnies, Alpaca, Wool, Rayon).

Here’s the sock progress:

Hardangervidda was shouting at me for some progress. So Sleeve #2 aspires to be like Sleeve #1:

What is with this Sleeve Island I keep reading about on other blogs? Am I on Sleeve Island? If you have to ask, doesn’t that mean you aren’t? Or am I just deluded and I took a left turn instead of a right and I think I’m at Disneyland, but I’m really not? I don’t think I understand the metaphor, and I obviously missed the beginnings of this concept. Must do more thinking on this topic after getting more sleep. I’ll let you know in 18 years what I come up with.

Oh yeah
I actually got to wear Flashy Lace yesterday! Wooohooo!

I finished a sleeve last night. Can you believe it? I stayed up late to bind it off and be done done done! I also committed a sin, because I did not immediately cast on for the 2nd sleeve. (Gimme a break, it was 11pm, and I was tired! Luckily Alex only woke up once last night. First time in a long while.)

I promise I will cast on for the 2nd sleeve as soon as I can have a spare moment to sit down tonite.

I think :)

I bet you’d like to see the sleeve too.

Are you sure?

Ok. Here it is.

Today at lunch I did cast on for a sock in some really yummy sherberty-colored Lorna’s Laces yarn for Katie’s next pair of socks. The color is "Child’s Play" and I have two full skeins of it. I probably will only use barely 1/2 skein for this one pair of socks.

Growing Up

Alex is growing up so fast! His first tooth broke through the bottom gums! It’s just a teeny tiny bit of white, but you can definately feel it with your finger (as he tries to gnaw your finger off).

A dance revolution that is. We just picked up Dance Dance Revolution Ultramix for our Xbox. We got the dance pad/game pack combo; and so far it’s a hit! Katie loves to jump up and down on it; and it’s a great workout. See?

In an effort to lose some of the post-pregnancy weight without really trying too hard at it, I thought playing this game might be fun. So far so good! Yet you don’t really realize how uncoordinated your feet are until you try this game. I’m all left feet, and there is no way I’d ever play this in "public" at an arcade unless I was much much much better at it. A friend today told me about his friend that was waiting in line to play at Dave & Busters (basically an arcade for those of you not from this area) with a bunch of nine year old girls. Heh. Luckily I can play in the privacy of my own basement.

What about knitting?

Well, I’ve actually been making progress on some stuff.

Hardangervidda’s sleeve:

The Shhh don’t tell my husband this is for him sock:

On this one the pattern calls for a moss/seed stitch heel. I did about an inch of it, and decided I didn’t like it because it didn’t draw in and get thick like a Sl1, k1 heel does. So I ripped it out and started over. (Gee, can I knit anything without ripping part of it out?) I’m much happier with my "standard" garter-stitch edged Sl1, k1 heel.

I need to stop making progress on knitting stuff for a while so I can get the binding finished on our new winter quilt. Have you seen the weather forecast lately? brr! I love it!

I’ve been working on Hardangervidda’s sleeve. Last night I had my husband try it on. He said "The cuff fits great, but it seems awfully big back here". (Back here referring to the area with the needle still in it). Harumph.

I tell him that he needs room to bend his arm, and he doesn’t want it too tight. He said "Ok, I’ll trust you". Then I fiddle with it on his arm for a few minutes, take it off measure it a few more times. Think about it some, then decide I need to compare it with a sweater he already wears to see if it really is too big.

The sweater on the bottom is one he’s had a while, which fits pretty good, but is too big around the chest. You can’t see the left side of the pic, where Hardangervidda is slightly smaller in the chest than this one. So looking at the sleeves, the cuffs start out about the same size, but Hardangervidda’s sleeve really poofs out dramatically. Part of this is that you do a lot of increases right after the block ribbing (before the 2nd colorwork portion), but part of it is that I’m just increasing way too often. Some calculations I did yesterday tell me I don’t want as many stitches at the end as they say I do. Pattern gauge is 6 st/inch, mine is between 5.5 and 5.75 st/inch on the sleeve.

I measured the amount of room between the armpit on the store sweater and the top of the shoulder where it would be on a drop shoulder and that is 9.5". Hvidda’s measurements say in this size I should be at 10 3/8". That’s not too different. So what’s wrong?! Because my gauge is different, I am increasing the width faster than if I were exactly on gauge.

So. What to do?

Well, I’ll be ripping the sleeve back to the start of the plain stockinette portion. I’m going to use my actual stitch gauge and calculate how often I should be doing my increases and to what final stitch count (aiming for somewhere between 9.5 and 10" for the armhold depth) I also know that my row gauge is 7 rows/inch (pattern calls for 7.5) so that will help figure this out as well. Luckily I haven’t really spent that much time on this part of the sleeve because it goes so fast (esp since I got my great 16" length Addi Natura circular). So re-knitting doesn’t really bother me too much. (This makes the 4th or 5th time I’ve ripped back on a sleeve for this sweater though. heh)

Michelle asked in a comment:

… Mine seems lumpy in the fair isle parts. Has that ever happened to you? Is that normal? Most important, is there a way to fix it? It’s my first fair isle so I expected a bit of lumpiness but I’m hoping it’s not permanent lumpiness.

Michelle is talking about Bjerk, which is also in the same book as Hardangervidda. Like Hardangervidda, it has a higher proportion of stockinette to it than fair isle. In Bjerk, there are quite a few three color rows, and that is a lot of yarn to be carrying along the back of your sweater. If you have a lot of twisting of your yarns, you could definately get some lumpiness.

Another thing to look out for is the tension of your floats on the back of the work. I can’t claim I’m very good at it yet, but I’m getting better with practice! If you’ll look at this picture of Hardangervidda you’ll see how the fair isle part is drawn in a bit more than the stockinette portion below it:

I’m hoping that blocking will help some of this out, as I don’t feel that the draw in is too drastic. The best advice I’ve been given on this is to spread out the stitches on your right hand needle before you switch back to the next color. This way the float is long enough. On really really long floats, you might twist your yarns to catch the long float as you go. Somtimes I do this, and sometimes I don’t. Maybe I’ll be brave and take a picture of the inside of the sweater :)

For Bjerk, I think I’ll duplicate stitch the third color. There really aren’t that many areas for that third color and the floats required to do so are really long.

Believe it or not, but Hardangervidda has become my "easy" project, at least for now. I’m on the stockinette portion of the sleeve where the only thing I have to worry about is increasing 2 sts every 4 rows. The sleeve looks fairly proportionate, although I’m keeping an eye on how wide it’s getting at the top. If it gets to the right size, I’ll stop doing decreases. Here’s how far I am now:

Slowly but surely I’m getting the sweater done. I’m really resisting starting another big sweater project right now. I almost went out and bought the Baby Ull yarn for the moo cow sweater I showed you earlier. Alex already has soooo many really cute sweaters for this winter though, I think I’ll wait and make Katie something first.