Accessorize your sweater

The time is nearing to add buttons to the dancing elephant sweater. I met up with my friend today to go over the buttons and decide number, placement, etc. aren't the buttons she picked out great?

Right now the sweater is in the following state:

It's being used to cover my lap while i knit. Spring is coming slowly this year, and the extra warmth from the cardigan is very much appreciated. I finished the yoke decreases last night and prepared to start the ribbing. I'm quite excited as there is a new tool I'll use to make the ribbing slightly easier - it's an interchangable circular needle extender!

I can connect my long interchangable cords in the middle and have an even longer cord to go around the entire neck/button holes of the cardigan! They are Knitters Pride interchangables, and I'm loving them! I rarely use needles larger than a US 6. Buying an entire set of interchangables was never a worthwhile idea. Knitters Pride now sells them individually. So I can buy lots of cords, and only the size needles I need! Right now I have US 4 in wood and US 3 in carbon with metal tips. I wish they carried more sizes in cubics, but maybe someday. Right now it's worth it to use the super long cords.

Now I'm off to dunk my hands in some frigid ice water. My wrist is aching in a warm way, the first signs of a flare up.

Be excellent to each other!

 

Spring break

This week is spring break at school. In Minnesota it is possible to tell that spring break has arrived by two things:

1. Nothing really productive gets done as one is taking a break.

2. Spring is taking a break because a blizzard hits the state.

My break today involved a two hour nap with the cat. And ignoring the snow that needed shoveling outside.

The real work today that I've been avoiding is heading down to the coffee shop to start (continue) writing these sweater patterns so hopefully they can be tested someday. I'm chugging along with the elephant sweater and really trying to make an effort to finish the sleeves for cloudberry.

The sleeves move slowly. The positive part is that I learned how to do magic loop - I hereby pledge that I will never make just one sleeve at a time ever again! Plus that sock thing for holding the yarn (one in the calf end and the other put in the inverted toe end)a nifty trick!

Now the elephant sweater ...

I probably have 10 rows left of the elephant colorwork and then an edging. After that I make the yoke and decide whether to do the collar and button band at the same time ... I think yes. I like mitered corners.

The heft and sock yarn weight are taking their toll on my hand. I had to ice yesterday, twice. Today I did the ice bath dunking - which I will repeat for the next few days to ensure that all this knitting doesn't inflame the tendon sheath. Thank goodness for that ice bath. I knit for several hours yesterday and more today. Yes my wrist is tired. But there were times in the past that much knitting would have me pouting for a week.

The current ice bath recipe:

5 gallon bucket filled with two cooler sized ice packs and water.

Dunk hands (past wrists) for 10 seconds every 10 minutes for an hour and a half or six times, whichever comes first.

After each dunking dry hands on microfiber cloth and apply lotion to prevent hands from clapping unduly.

 

And I will knit another day!

Be excellent to each other!

 

Your senses lie to you

The elephant sweater is seamed and ready to start knitting the yoke!

With things progressing it was only a matter of time before some minor issue arose. I first thought I hit a glitch when seaming. I couldn't get the back and right front to line up correctly. Which is utterly perplexing as I did the front and backs on the knitting machine which counts the rows for you! Of course it did line up and everything seamed just fine.

So, no problems with seaming. Oh no, the problem came later.

The needle on my circulars BROKE OFF!

Do you see the gap there?! That gap occurred in the middle of working across the sleeve and tons of stitches fell off. Luckily I had the needle that I'd used to knit the sleeves and could salvage the slight catastrophe.

See the wood needle and the metal needle there? Two different needles to hold everything together. Now that wood needle will be replaced by my new interchangables and the metal needle will remain. Except ... I will make a big change. I will split the stitches for the sleeve and put half on one needle with the two front pieces and 1/2 the stitches for the other sleeves. Then 1/2 the sleeve stitches, back panel and the other half on another needle. Which would look like ...

It's working, which is better than having things break. Oh well. It's been an adventure, and now I have to count and make sure I have the right number of stitches for the charts.

 

Be excellent to each other!