Finally finished!

After too many months, I finally finished my mohair Spring Twilight Pullover with a few minor errors and modifications....

- The V-neck was not turning out as lovely as it does in the pattern's photos, so I decided to change it so that it looked more like a bow. I sewed a running stitch through the two overlapping parts of the collar's BO edge and pulled them up toward the V of the neck. It makes for an even more exaggerated asymmetrical look - I actually think I like it better than what the pattern calls for. It feels more like my style anyway:

- As usual, had some trouble with the sleeves being too large for my arm holes. Why does this always happen? I re-knit the caps and shaped them as follows: BO 7 sts at beg of next two rows. BO 3 sts at beg of next 2 rows. Went on the same as for the XS until dec each side of needle every RS 8 times, which was changed from 8 times to 1 time. Then BO 2 sts beg of next 4 rows--12 sts.

- I messed up the ruching at the bottom hem. I didn't realize it was a 9-round pattern, and instead read it as a 3-round 3x repeat (9 rounds total). Duh. It looks OK, and I guess it's a bit more flattering than ruching at one's waist:

- I don't particularly enjoy this cast on. It's some strange decorative cast on that forces you to do longtail. It looks great, but I had to do it about 4 times before I had enough yarn to reach the number of stitches. I also changed Step 4 to alternating between long tail cast on (single strand from ball) and backward loop cast on (the four strands), which seems to have worked OK and was much easier.

Swatches and More Swatches

My mother is visiting me right now and the whole time she has been here, I have been swatching. She wants everyone to know that she did not raise me to be the Swatch Nazi. She made her first swatch only recently. (Of course, I told her to make the swatch.) She is a quilter much more than a knitter. But recently she accidentally made a king-sized quilt when she intended to make a queen.....What more can I say?

So here are some swatches. I am on my fifth. First I knit two stockinette swatches and ended up happy with 14.5 sts over 4 inches. Then, Wendy and I both struggled with the "Fancy Rib". The pattern says to:

"pass right needle behind first stitch on left needle, knit second stitch, then knit first stitch, drop both stitches off left needle."

This is not easy to do without knitting the stitch you reach around for through the back loop. (You are presumably supposed to knit it through the front loop, practically impossible.) I tried the back loop way and got this:

23 st over 4"

Kind of mushy and tight and the gauge is way off. Then I read in someone's blog that if you rearrange the stitches by "slipping the first st as if to purl and slip the next as if to knit and then put them back on the left needle and then complete the stitch" it would work better. I tried it and got this:

18 sts over 4"

Much better. More defined. Better gauge. Who would have thought that one twisted stitch would have such an effect. But being the SN I am, I am going to do one more with smaller needles. Just to be sure.

Vacation Knitting

I love vacation knitting. It is so fun to plan before I leave home and I try to pick something that I can finish. This time I finished two things. A cowl - Spiraluscious by Anne Hanson made out of Blue Sky Alpaca Silk. And I made the orange Gnomey Hat by Adrian Bazilla. I also finished a Gnomey hat that I had started earlier - the blue one. I am making the hats for Simma's cancer patients at Children's Hospital. She says the hat box contains really pathetic and unwearable hats. This cannot be! Simma's patients range in ages of 1-20. The real little ones don't really care that much about their hair, but the older ones do, so we need to get them something better. I am going to make this next. I have my mom knitting hats also. If anyone else wants to join in, let me know.