The right arm  is almost finished despite not knitting for a few days while recovering from an awful cold.

I don’t get very many unsolicited comments about items in progress from my husband but yesterday he asked if the arms of this sweater are suppose to be so different. Befuddled and not sure how to respond, I think I answered, “Why does it look odd?” He responded, “One of the sleeves has more orange than the other.”

Unlike the body, I didn’t think much about how the colors combinations on the sleeves would turn out. I just started the left sleeve with yarn from where I left off with the shoulders. Of course his comment started to haunt me and I soon started jotting down possible color combinations with the yarn left after doing the body (assuming I hadn’t started the sleeves).

The follow questions and responses came to mind.

• Can I knit both the sleeves with the same color combos?
  Nope, there’s not enough yarn with those colors.
• Should I start with new color combos, like purple and yellow?
  Maybe, but I don’t think I want to take that route.
• Is there a way to either lessen the orange or balance each sleeve with a bit of orange?
  This could be possible.

So as I consider my options I’m finishing the right sleeve and will possibly reknitting the left one so that there will be less orange in that one.

Responses to questions

Karen asked about teaching my niece to knit and her reaction to the yarn/toy store.

Teaching her went quite well considering she’s six years old. Her mother and father were amazed to see her sit and concentrate on one thing for a couple of hours. I casted on the stitches, showed her the movements a few times and then gave her the needles. At first I guided her hands but it wasn’t long before she was knitting by herself. I don’t think this was the first time she had done this because she mentioned that her friend has knitted with her before.

I’m not sure whether she’ll keep it up because the next day she didn’t ask about doing it again. I think six might be a little young to start.

I also forgot to mention that we drove to the Frio in a different car so she wasn’t with me when I bought the yarn and needles. That’s probably a good thing. Not sure what would have happened if we took the two children into that shop. Actually it was lunch time and Grandpa was really hungry so it was a very quick stop. The guy ringing up my purchases suggested a great BBQ joint a few blocks down at the junction of highway 46 and 87. It’s a combo meat market, BBQ restaurant and Shell gas station called Riverside Supermarket! We ate our lunch at one of the tables between the produce and meat case and enjoyed watching the locals line up to place orders. The sliced beef sandwich was so excellent taht we stopped by again on the way back to Austin.

Deborah asked, “How would you compare the length of color change in Kauni with, say, Noro Kureyon or Silk Garden?”

Kauni color changes are much longer than Kureyon or Silk Garden. I don’t know how much longer because I haven’t yet attempted to measure one of the colors in my skein. I’d guess at the length but I don’t think I’d be very accurate. Since the colors gradually change from one to the next, it would be hard figure out where one colors begins and ends.

Last weekend was the family outing to the Frio river. The weather was mostly overcast with light rain. That’s OK because even though the sun wasn’t out, it was about 10 – 15 degrees warmer than the previous week back home. With the weather being a bit cooler than anticipated I was able to continue working on the cardigan and even finished the left arm.

Just as I arrived I found out that my niece was ready to try knitting and wanted me to teach her. On the way from Austin to the Frio we kept an eye out for a yarn store and were lucky to find Ewe & Eye along the way. It’s a nice little store that’s also has a rather large toy section.

While I was there to quickly grab some needles and yarn for a beginner I couldn’t help but take a quick look at all the yarn. This Jojoland Melody popped out at me. It’s a variegated yarn in rainbow colors similar to Kauni. While the colors are similar, I’m not sure how long the color changes are. Also this yarn is plied with three different colored strands that  form a noticeable barber pool affect. Not sure how it would look knitted up or if it would work as a replacement for Kauni.

So, here’s what I got done. Please ignore the wrinkles. It was rolled and stuffed into my carry on bag.

I’m not so sure I like all that orange and green towards the bottom half of the sleeve but I’ll leave it for now.

I wasn’t sure about the sleeve length so I cut the extra stitches on the front and back neck to make it easier to try on the cardigan.

As you can see I lined up all the yarn that’s left – 240 grams worth. That’s what’s left of the 520 grams I had when I started. Not sure if I mentioned this but I’m making the medium sized one with the body shortened a few centimeters. Should be plenty to finish the other sleeve and the rest of the ribbing.

One of the next steps after finishing the body of the cardigan is to use a sewing machine to sew two lines zig-zag stitches on either side of the middle stitch of each steek.

Use my sewing machine?

Can’t remember the last time it’s been used. Considering the pile of stuff that’s accumulated around it, I’m sure it hasn’t been used for a couple of years – maybe even since I took up knitting in earnest. Instead of clearing my sewing area, I started spinning and got so caught up that I didn’t stop until I filled two bobbins.

It’s that roving I pulled out of storage last month. It was purchased from Woolgatherings at the Black Sheep Gathering a few years ago. I love the colors but have been too intimidated  to dive right in. Handling the colorful Kuani yarn has inspired me to give it a try. I’m hoping that splitting the roving lengthwise – one piece for each bobbin – will work out OK.

Mid-week my sewing machine emerged from the clutter and I managed to sew the zig-zag stitches as the pattern mentions. I’m not sure if this is necessary. My past two FI patterns didn’t mention doing this, but I though I’d give it a try. Kauni doesn’t seem to be as “sticky” as the VY wool I used for the Firebirds cardigan and the Roscalie vest so it’s probably a good idea.

After sewing the zig-zag stitches on each section of extra stitches (front, back and armholes), I grafted the shoulders together with a piece of orange yarn.

Next, I cut the extra stitches (steek) on the upper left side before picking up stitches for the left sleeve.

This time I came up with a quirky calculation to figure out how to pick up the stitches evenly.

1. Measure the row gauge from the start of the armhole to the shoulder. Turns out I’m getting 8.5 rounds per inch.

2. Since 8.5 is a fraction I doubled it to get 17. That is, 17 rows for every two inches.

3. The stitch gauge is 6 stitches to the inch so I doubled that to get 12 stitches for every two inches.

4. From the last two steps I now know my pick up rate – 12 stitches within every 17 rows.

5. After sifting through several number combinations to find a pattern that will match my rate of 12 stitches in 17 rows, I settled on the following.

Following the rows on the body, *pick up 2 sts in every row, skip 1 row, pick up 3 sts in every row, skip 1 row, pick up 2 sts in every row, skip 1 row, pick up 3 sts in every row, skip 1 row, pick up 2 sts in every row, skip 1 row*. Repeat from * to * until 114 stitches have been picked up around the armhole

By the way, there’s another online shop that will ship Kauni to North America. It’s Astrid’s Dutch Obessions and the website is in English. I haven’t ordered from her before so I can’t vouch for the service but I have seen her postings on Knitter’s Review under “Sales and Shop News”. I’m glad that there’s one more source out there for us on the other side of the pond.

Sorry that I have no review of Jean’s DVD. I finished watching it this weekend and started a post but couldn’t get back to the computer tonight to finish it. I should have it ready Wednesday.

Answers to comments:

Frances, I don’t consider myself a fast knitter, especially since I’m quick to rip out anything I don’t like. I might seem fast because I tend to work on one thing at a time and try to fit it into my schedule whenever possible.

KarenJo, I haven’t taken Peg McNair’s class but it sounds interesting. I’ll have to check into that. Thanks.

Confused about how to work the decreases and extra stitches near the front neckline? Here’s what I did.

Work until knitting measures one row short of 44-48-52 cm.

First Round: Assuming that the beginning of the round starts at the middle of the extra stitches (steeks) on the front; bind off the left half of the extra stitches on the front and continue following the pattern as set until the last half of the extra stitches. Bind off those stitches. Once this round is finished all extra stitches at the front have been bound off. Break working yarns.

Second Round: Place first 15-17-17 stitches on holder. Cast on six extra stitches (first half of extra stitches) alternating colors as needed. Now following the pattern as set continue knitting until 15-17-17 pattern stitches remain in this round. Place these stitches on a holder. Cast on seven extra stitches (remaining extra stitches) alternating colors as needed. There are now seven extra stitches on the right needle and six on the left.

Next Round: Knit the first six extra stitches as set. Next, knit the first two pattern stitches together  (k2tog). Continue knitting the round, following the pattern as set until two pattern stitches remain. With these two stitches work a SSK decrease. Now knit the last seven extra stitches as set.

Following rounds: Continue working decreases every other round, until a total of 7 stitches have been decreased on each side of the extra stitches.

Sorry I didn’t have time to finish watching Jean’s DVD this week so, no review as promised. Maybe I’ll find time to work on it this coming week.

I kept thinking I’ve seen these squares before. It finally hit me. They’re on the  cover of a book about color theory. It’s been a while since I’ve looked at the book so I can’t quite remember what it’s all about – probably color relationships.

It’s been a quick knit once I stopped trying to control the colors. Just started the extra stitches for the armholes.

Good thing it’s going quickly because I need to move on to Anne-Evilla so I can finish that by the end of May. Looks like the certificate course with Jean Wong is a go. It starts the first weekend in June and from then until next year it promises to keep me quite busy. I look forward to meeting up with knitter’s I know from Madrona’s winter retreat.

I did start over again.

I tried to get the green/purple to stop at the end of the ribbing but didn’t quite make it. The purple spills over into the red section. That’s the charm of this sweater; seeing the colors morph from one to the next.

Doesn’t it look much darker this time?

Yet again I started fretting about the color combinations. To satisfy my curiosity I did a sketch with several starting points.

Each of these sets of blocks represents three different color combinations with two yarns at different starting points. Right now I’m knitting the one on the far right and the one in the middle was my previous start. Notice that the middle one makes three unique color combinations while the one on the right has six. Of course, this is assuming that the color sequences are all the same lengths.

Here’s Evilla all wound up.

Nice colors but I think the yarn is even more rough than Kauni.