Monday, February 18, 2008

I can has sinusoid? No, I can not has.

This is what Sweater Wizard 3.0 does to your sleeve cap design when you change the chest size from 30" (see the sleeve cap on the left) to 34" (see the sleeve cap on the right).



I understand why there are more stitches bound off in that initial bindoff row, I do. The number matches the bindoffs done in the body pieces. It makes sense. Why the second one is so much taller, though, I don't know, and neither one of them is a very nice sinusoid (as I complained about last time; but actually, the first one is better in that regard).

I'm sure this sweater will wind up looking okay -- I'll finish the front so that I can see which sleeve cap better matches the armscye, and redo one or the other -- but I can tell already that I'll probably crunch all my own numbers for this next time around.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

More Hild progress

I think it's more than half done, yo!



And this doesn't even count the tiny line of progress on the sweater back, which I started so that I'd have something mindless to knit during 1.5 hr lectures. (In the class I'm taking, I'm much better off trying to listen and understand than I would be trying to take notes). I've quickly gotten past the ugly-worm stage that so depressed me on the sweater front; six rows is just enough for the ribbing to start looking like ribbing. At home I plan to finish up that second sleeve cap and then get back to the front (no pun intended), which is not mindless at all anymore because it's all cables, all the time.

Knitting is really my first experience with natural fibers, with the exception of a black wool coat that, as a yuppie Cambridge citizen, I am required to own. I have to admit, what I'm not loving about natural fibers so far is the little bits of nature you get for free with the fibers. The little bits of straw (or whatever it is) in the Silky Wool I'm knitting with are annoying, and they're not nearly as bad as the things I got in a merino-blend sweater I ordered from L.L Bean lately. I can only call them micro-tumbleweeds, and their diameter is so close to the yarn ply diameter that I've near-destroyed the yarn in a few places trying to get them out. Out they must come, though, if the garment is going to be wearable.