Yes, it’s been a while. Things were happening in my life at warp speed…and now they’ve slowed down. I’ve now got time (and the mental energy – long story) to come back to my beloved blog and actually feel as though I have something to say again. So hello again, to my old friends, and welcome! to any new ones who happen to discover this by typing “gauge” into a search engine while cursing under their breath!
Generally, gauge and I get along pretty well. I make large gauge swatches in the technique I plan to use for the garment, wash and dry before measuring, and things work out fairly well. But every once in a while, gauge (thanks, Yarn Harlot, for the curse!) will bite me – and it’s always my own fault!
Enter a lovely, farm-grown, hight Cestari wool yarn in a soft gray. My LYS (Clinch River Yarn Company, Clinton, TN) started stocking this stuff not long ago, and I fell in love with the wool version of their yarn…DK weight, 5 sts/inch, softens nicely when washed, holds a cable beautifully and a lace pattern just as well. My favorite type of woolen yarn, and one I can add to my “workhorse” list for the knitting classes I teach with such verve. I’d been longing for a cabled cardigan to wear during the winter – even though this particular winter has been pretty much non-existent – to keep myself warm while the thermostat is at 67 degrees F. at my house.
I started looking at patterns (yes, I know I don’t usually use patterns, but I was looking for cable stitches and got seduced into a pattern book that wound up on my shelves because it was a gift) and found a cable that I loved. All right, the sweater shown was a boat-necked, top-down, pull-over tunic that would make me look like a barn – I still loved the 4-stitch cable swimming in a sea of reverse stockinette. So, taking that pattern as my starting point, I resumed my right mind and started swatching…sort of. The pattern recommended a swatch in stockinette stitch, even though the cabling was obvious, and for some insane reason (how many glasses of wine DID I have with supper that night? I thought I stopped at one…) I swatched for my cardigan, which I’d already decided would have a *6-stitch cable, purl 2, 2-stitch cable, purl 2* patterning in stockinette and be knit in the round with steeks. I told you, I don’t know what I was thinking…well, I obviously wasn’t – not at all!
I got a gauge of 4 stitches and 5 rows per inch over an 8 x 6-inch flat stockinette swatch after washing. I shrugged (no, I haven’t developed a drinking problem – I just developed a blind spot with this particular yarn and pattern! Admit it, you’ve done the same thing.), plugged that gauge information into Sweater Wizard™, and tweaked to my measurements, inputting the selections for a bottom-up in the round cardigan with a round neck and steeks.
Despite a vague feeling that I might want to make another swatch, I cast on. Blocking solves a lot of problems, I loved the stitch pattern I’d devised, and I’ve been losing weight like crazy after a discovery that I have a sensitivity to some very common components of the everyday U.S. diet (can we say “gluten sensitivity?”). So I quieted my forebodings with the surety that I’d lose any needed avoirdupois by the time the cardigan was finished. After all, I’ve lost 35 pounds in the last 5 months! I’ll surely start to lose some of the “girls” mass within the next few pounds! (I haven’t, by the way…perhaps I have a bit of Parton in my genetic makeup?)
Currently, I’m finishing up the second sleeve on this cardigan. My DH, for whom I have knit little in the last couple of years, what with grandchildren (and there’s another on the way, we’ve been informed recently) and all, has been more than gracious about giving way – but has commented that he “loves” (not a word he uses to describe inanimate objects as a general rule) the cable pattern on this cardigan - more than once. After the third reiteration, I bought sufficient Cestari in a lovely dark red to make him a much-deserved cardigan vest. Meanwhile, I’m still working on the soft gray cardigan for myself. But having misgivings.
I had my suspicions early on – it just looked a little small in circumference. But at the same time, I’ve lost that sense of “this is how big I am” that I carried around for years. I had re-measured before plugging numbers into the Sweater Wizard™ program, and I knew I was quite a bit smaller than I was when I started my last sweater. On a 5-foot nothing frame, 35 pounds is a significant proportion of your total mass! So I kept knitting. Although I did increase the number of rows in both the body and the armscrye of the cardigan – mostly because the numbers obtained following the pattern just seemed way too short (and thank goodness I did!).
I DID have enough sense to go ahead and stitch and cut the steeks before I started the sleeves, and washed and blocked the main part of the sweater. Oops! It was, indeed, going to be a bit snug. It missed meeting by about 3.5-4.0 inches at the front bust line. All right, the bottom had a 1.5-inch ribbing – if I duplicated, or even expanded that, a bit on the front bands, it would be fine. Right. I can do that. I still love the yarn and the look of the sweater, and the wide front bands will be fashionable.
Meanwhile, some vicious imp persuaded me to measure my DH, then (oh, no!) measure the washed, blocked and dried portion of the gray cardigan in preparation for plugging my DH’s numbers into the computer for my DH’s cardigan vest. Dirty word, dirty word, expletive deleted, darn! The gauge (over the pattern, instead of over stockinette stitch) was 5 stitches and 6 rows per inch!
You can’t call me anything I haven’t already called myself. Yes, I’m finishing the cardigan. Even if I can’t wear it, either my mother or my daughter will be thrilled to get a beautiful garment that fits them so perfectly. I’ll decide when I’m at the 1.5-inch point on the front bands whether I’m going to try to make them 2 inches each so it will fit me, or give up and bind off…and give the cardigan to either Mother or my DD.
And, Yarn Harlot? I know I just bought your latest book (it’s wonderful, as always)…but I’m not sure I’m going to continue the RSS feed on your blog! Although I probably will…it isn’t your fault, Stephanie, that I broke all my own rules and did a flat gauge swatch in stockinette instead of an in-the-round gauge swatch in pattern. Don’t get me wrong – I’d LIKE to pin it on you…but in all honesty, it’s my own silly fault!
In closing…please do as I say, rather than as I did this time around – swatch for a project in the yarn, with the needles, in the stitch pattern and in the technique you plan to use for the project! And I promise I’ll do the same from now on! Truly!
Oh, and if the sweater does indeed end up as a gift – I’ll make myself another one! I LOVE this yarn!
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