Men’s Grey Shawl Collar Jumper

Here it is – at long last! The ‘pouch’ is still missing, but I cannot resist showing this off already. I started on this jumper for Patrick in August, inspired by this picture (below).                                             I am pleased with the result! A few words about the collar:

I picked up the stitches along the V-neck and knitted in purl st, increasing  1 st at the beginning and end of every 2nd row. I also increased the needle size from an initial 3.5mm, then 4.5mm to a 5.5mm to widen the edge of the shawl as much as possible. Finished with a 3 st i-cord.

And here a few technical remarks about the “set in top down fitted sleeves” a la Elizabeth Zimmermann:For demonstration purposes I left the invisible cast on thread (maroon) in the work: shoulder sts are cast on (A in picture below) and front and back pieces (incl neck and armhole shaping) are worked up to the point that the sleeve head stitches can be picked up (B in picture below).

Section A – B: The picture above has been taken just before the sleeve head sts were picked up (2st for each 3 rows knitted). In this section I performed some short row shaping in the middle of the sleeve head (twice) to give the sleeve head some roundness.

Section B – C: In this section I increased the sleeve by M1 on the sleeve side every 2nd row; so front, back and both sleeves were all knitted at once in the round (back an forth until front V- neck shaping was completed).

Section C – D: Here sts are increased on the sleeve as well as on the body (front and back) to shape the scye of both armhole and sleeve.

At D: The remaining body sts are cast on and the sleeve sts are left alone… from here the body is knitted in the round. When the body is completed, the sleeve sts (under arm sts) are picked up (same amount as cast on at D for the body) and the sleeve is worked in the round.

Proudly Presenting the Joey

Fits like a glove, itches like hell (gotta find a skivvy and quick!) and looks spectacular!

I am very pleased with this one, let alone with whats on the inside :)!

We had a great morning walk with the dogs, Patrick discovered a baby eel in a little waterfall, and I enjoyed the moss graffiti on the rocks.

For the record:   The Joey

• inspired by Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Kangaroo Pouch Jumper
• turned hem with name and date
• knitted with 500gr left over yarn (assorted Bendigo Woollen Mills) on 3.5mm needles
• steeked armholes
• top down fitted sleeves
• to fit child (approx age 10 – 12 yrs)

Peace at Last!

I have worked out all the issues… and I think now I can anticipate a calm and quiet weekend! I jumped out of bed early this morning and felt like screaming Eureka! In my sweet half slumber, while the birds were tuning up, it came to me how the sleeve heads are done! Much unraveling has occurred to get to this stage of this project and there are two things I’d really like to go on record: (1) I am not one for easily giving myself credit, but I am almighty proud of this jumper, having solved all the issues and problems with the design, matching the stripes to the size and design and so forth… (2) Even when the going got tough and I was in states of frustration, exultation, passion or flow – I did write a comprehensive pattern of those sections, this is a first! I usually get carried away and just get it done somehow and then cannot remember how on earth I did it.

Neckline challenge: I wasn’t sure if the neck really was going to sit nicely, being so square… I altered the Kangaroo Pouch Jumper pattern by starting the neckline of the front a stripe lower than the beginning of the shoulder.

Shoulder challenge: Uh, I didn’t take a picture of the back shoulder, hm. Well, in the above picture you can see a red stripe finishing the back piece. That stripe has got short rows on the side to shape the shoulder – and it was tricky to match the short rows with the stripes.

Armhole challenge 1: This picture illustrates  the name Kangaroo Pouch Jumper fairly well – an unusually big amount of stitches is put on hold (they look like kangaroo pouches, eh?); then one knits around the entire armhole (picking up stitches along the steek and along the ‘pouch stitches’) and then the top down set in sleeves are worked, starting up at the shoulder. A steek, YIKES! I did have a good look on google for steek information, but then decided to take Elizabeth Zimmermann’s instructions on face value: I stitched two rows of short zig zag along the opening, which I had basted carefully and then….

… I cut it open!

Armhole challenge 2: I followed EZ’s instructions to the dot here, picking up the ‘pouch’ stitches that were on hold and then picking up around the armhole 2 stitches to every 3 rows, which resulted in a really nice and smooth finish.

Sleeve head challenge: I tried and tried, followed the instruction to the dot but couldn’t get it to work. EZ’s method is starting the sleeve head at the shoulder seam and then increasing the one st at the end of each row (short row shaping) as well as decreasing the armhole stitches. I couldn’t get the decrease to look neat with the stripes and all… so I hoped for the best that a solution may come to me.

Collar challenge: I wasn’t sure if the collar was going to sit nicely, being so square – but hey – looks good to me! I used the same method as for the hem, just in reverse (knitting lining last and then hand sewing it down.

I saved the best for last – the Eureka Moment. Instead of decreasing the armhole stitches, I decreased stitches within the sleeve cap! I thus had no issues with stripe colors from the sleeve head colliding with the light grey stripe of the armhole and making a mess. And an additional bonus was (which I didn’t know until I did it!) that my sleeve head stripes match the ones on the body!

Have a great weekend!

Cliffhanger Knitting

You all know the feeling – ‘who dunnit?’, ‘what next?’, ‘how on earth?’, ‘can’t wait to see how this will have a happy ending?’. That’s about summing up what this project has been about…

I have started such a project last Saturday. Since I am really keen to explore sleeve heads, once and for all I want to understand the rationale behind a well fitting and nicely knitted top down sleeve head AND I want to explore all of Elizabeth Zimmermann’s patterns  in which she just gives the idea and the principles (and percentages!) to work it out for yourself – her Kangaroo-Pouch Sweater (it’s in her book Knitting without Tears) had been on my list of ‘must knits’ for some time. Added to that – I have accumulated a number of leftover yarns from all my Bendigo Woollen Mills projects, all 8 ply and somehow the colors work together well.

Knitting the hem was an adventure in itself, look at this. As I knitted during Esther’s soccer game, all the mums were wondering why I had knitted the name and date on the inside of the hem… I wonder now myself, this is a great feature to include in a future project (to leave it on the outside!).

For the lining of the hem, I chose a slightly thinner yarn, so it wouldn’t be such a thick hem, and I also chose 1/2 needle size smaller for this section. I worked the lining of the hem back and forth, so I could knit the name and date in. After the name section was completed, I skipped one return (purl) row and knitted it, to achieve the ‘ridge’ for the turn. Then I changed to my actual needle size and started working the body in the round until I completed as many rows as the hem lining was deep. (This might have been a row or so more than the hem lining, since that was knitted in a thinner yarn and a thinner needle, remember?) In the following row, I picked up every second cast on stitch from the hem and knitted it together with every second stitch of that row – bingo!

And the best is yet to come (working the shoulders, steeking the armhole, knitting the sleeve heads and the collar)! Talk about ‘adrenalin rush knitting’!

A perfect location for the Shellseeker

I have been working on Heidi Kirrmaier’s Shellseeker (call this part of my pattern writing research…) and now that I am in the final throws of knitting the sleeves, I had the longing to smell the sea! Nobody wanted to come with me to one of our lovely surf beaches… so this is where we ended up, for more than one reason…

Call it serenity…

Call it safe…

Call it heavenly for dogs… who were not sure which part of the beach they were allowed to roam off-leash and had fun trying to score some of the fishermen’s bait…

But let’s look at my Shellseeker… here it is. It is such a wonderful classic shape!

I have performed a few changes: first of all, I used different yarn, some lovely natural stuff I bought in Tasmania in January. I had 450gr of light, 250 gr of dark – and thus I changed the stripe pattern (it is supposed to be 2 rows light, 2 rows dark – I have 4 rows light, 2 rows dark). I added a rib at the neck and at the edge of the pocket, I felt that gives it a bit more of a finished look. I also used a stripy rib (k2 dark, p2 light) – so the interplay of different stripes adds another dimension to the jumper. Finally, I shaped the waist, though I am a tomboy who lives is jeans and doc martins throughout the year… I start to discover a feeble feminine side in my personality and thought this may help to bring it out.
As part of my serious research into knitting set- in top down sleeves I had ordered Barbara Walker’s ‘Knitting from the Top’ which now has arrived.

Oh what a wonderful book! Just like Elizabeth Zimmermann and Maggie Righetti – she talks about principles, proportions and relations, it all makes sense to me. Now what?
Well, I have started something very feminine for myself – I firmly believe of starting a new project before finishing and existing one… Why? Well, because that gives me time to carefully swatch, plan, design a new project. If I wait until the old one is finished, I am too tempted to rush to get something new on the needles.

Here is a sneaky preview, this is a Japanese adventure which warrants a lot more explanation another day…