Thursday, October 04, 2007

Sleevage

Hey, it's October! How on earth did that happen? That means that there are 2 more months until December, which means less than 3 months before Christmas! And Christmas means....gift knitting.

In the past I've usually been pretty good with the Christmas stuff, last year I knit 4 scarves, 2 hats and a pair of socks, but this year the recipient list will be limited pretty much to my parents (since my sister is out of the country). I've got some pretty brown Jaeger Extra Fine Merino (Aran? Chunky? I can't remember) to make some winter accessories for my dad, and the Valley Yarns to make the Main Street Fair Isle Pullover for my mom (also by Valley Yarns).

I started knitting a sleeve on US7 needles, but discovered that my gauge seemed too tight. It was also a smidge too tight on my gauge swatch, but even tighter on the sleeve (probably because the former was knit flat, the latter in the round). So I went up to US8 needles, figuring that that should solve the problem. Here's the sleeve as it is right now:

Main Street Fair Isle sleeve_03

Sorry for the crap photo, it's hard to take pictures of yourself! The sleeve is STILL smaller than it "should" be, and I'm worried that it's still too small. I think it's fine up past the elbow, but it's the wrist circumference that I'm concerned about. It's like 6 inches around there, and while my mom does have small wrists, such a snug fit may not be comfortable. She's coming down to see me pretty soon, so I'll wait until then to have her try it on. I may have to either 1) reknit the sleeve on even larger needles, or 2) rework the pattern to start with more stitches and fewer increases. I hates the prospect of reknitting, I'm so lazy!

1 comment:

Karen said...

Re-knitting is the pits; I really don't enjoy it at all. It's amazing how switching from flat to round can throw your gauge off, huh? I agree that having your mom try it on would probably be best. That way you'll know for sure what needs to be changed; if above the elbow is good, you may not want to change the pattern at that point.

It's going to be such an awesome sweater! And Fair Isle is the in thing this year too! Haha!