Presenting Betty...

... at long last!

This post is actually a couple of weeks overdue as I failed miserably to get a photo of Betty in the mirror, then tried to wait for a happy conjuction between the weather, the time and the resident radiologist's photographic skills (eventually gave up on the weather, this is Glasgow!).


The details are as follows:

Pattern - Betty from Rowan 38.
Yarn - Rowanspun DK in colourway Thorn (this was a bit thinner than the Yorkshire Tweed recommended for this project so I had to knit 50% more rows to get the correct length).
Needles - 3.25mm and 3.75mm straights and DPNs.


I knit the bodyflat and used three needle bind off at the shoulders and mattress stitch on the sides. I then knit the sleeves in the round and whipstitched them into place. I'm still not completely happy with how the sleeve caps have gone in, and I might take them out and try again at some point.
The stitches at the neck were left live on stitch holders, then put back on needles to knit the collar. I much prefer this option to picking up stitches, especially when the stitch pattern is not simple.

In the two weeks since I finished Betty, she's been worn many times and is fast becoming a staple of my wardrobe. I may even need another one some time...

Back to socks

It's ages since I last knitted a pair of socks and, as I've acquired a few new sock yarns lately, the time seemed right to cast on another pair.

These are for the resident radiologist. The yarn is Lana Grossa Mega Boots Stretch. It's the first time I've used this yarn and I really like it. It's slightly hairy, but not in an itchy way, rather a will-wear-well kind of way. I'm knitting it on 2.5mm needles, with the heels and toes done on 2mm needles to toughen them up a bit (the RR can be a bit of a sock monster). The pattern is a basic sock pattern with 68 stitches that I've adapted to have an afterthought heel (hence the yellow stripe of waste yarn).

I feel that there may be more socks in my near future as I'm remembering how satisfying, non-attention-requiring and portable they are to knit. The pair of this sock will be accompanying my on my travels to Italy for a conference next week.

And for anyone who's noticed that Betty has slipped below the radar recently, I've developed a new Betty-finishing strategy... before I pick up any of my more appealing projects of an evening, I knit an hour of Betty first. In this way I can add just under two inches of sleeve per session and should make steady progress.

Betty is Jinxed

Just as I get my knitting mojo back and resolve to get Betty off the needles, this happens...


...Nooooooooooo!

I'm taking Brittany Needles up on the 5 year guarantee they offer on their website. I suspect that they only meant it for US customers but you never know... In the mean time, Tendrils is extending again and starting to look really good.

Modelling Dog...

I've been trying to persuade my sister to model the hat and scarf I crocheted for her for ages (...somewhere in the region of 5 months...) and she has consistently held out on me. However, last weekend, while my Dad was stoking up the barbeque (with the aid of heat beads and a blow torch as engineers do...) she graciously volunteered her dog Gus for said modelling task.

He was remarkably sanguine about the whole thing and sat there quite happily while he was wrapped up in the scarf. He even managed to keep the hat on long enough to be photographed (not an easy task when your head is the wrong shape and you've got long dangly ears!).


The only problem was when the resident radiologist passed by and Gus, suspecting that there might be food involved (he lives eternally in hope), turned quickly in the hope of using his huge brown eyes to elicit a treat and knocked the hat off.

Betty is once more underway after a brief hiatus during which I didn't touch the needles for a week. I've only got a few more rows left of the first sleeve cap, then I can start the second sleeve. Unfortunately I feel a bout of second-sleeve-syndrom coming on and am hoping that a bit of tendrils in between times might stave it off.

Birthday Blog...

... I seem to have lost my knitting mojo a bit lately so Betty's first sleeve is growing very slowly. I'm almost at the sleeve cap decreases and it's getting a bit tricky on the DPN's with the number of stitches now on them. I've only got 4 needles in this set and 5 would definitely be more comfortable. You can see from my row marker / counter how much this fabric is biasing again, I'm hoping the sleeves will block out OK given that they're knitted in the round.



Today is my 30th birthday - something which doesn't bother me too much as the resident radiologist reached this particular milepost a couple of years ago now and didn't seem too badly shaken by the experience. This is what that lovely man gave me...


... from one of my favorite shops in Glasgow...


I'm also planning a stash addition as a treat for myself. I've got my eyes on some Koigu KPPPM, some Colinette Jitterbug and some Fyberspates Scrumptious. I haven't decided on colourways yet - I'm going to have a browse tomorrow and decide then. Details next week...

Update

I've finally got round to getting the camera out and taking some pictures so here's how my knitting and garden are going...


The vast expanse of grey monotony that was Betty has suddenly taken shape now she's sewn up. All she needs now are some sleeves, the first of which is already on the DPN's, and a brooch for fastening (I'm using a darning needle in the photo). I learned a new technique during knitting Betty that I'm so pleased with, I'm still grinning about it. Spit splicing has been mentioned on quite a few blogs lately so I thought I'd give it a go. Never again will I have to weave in ends on 'felting' wools! I was a bit squeamish and used water instead of spit though, the scientist in me kept thinking about the sugars, bacteria etc in spit and just couldn't do it!

All the mild weather and rain we've been having lately have brought on the garden beautifully...


...the broad beans are now about 4 feet high...


...and there are small green strawberries developing already!

The clematis in the back garden which is always a few weeks behind the one at the front due to aspect etc is also in full flow.

Ugly Seaming

I've had really very little time for anything lately - including knitting, so when I allowed myself a little time last night to sit and seam up Betty, it felt a bit like a treat. Sadly, in the cold light of day, it seams that it wasn't worth it (appologies for the pun). I used a crochet seam which has gone all lumpy round the waist shaping and is going to have to be ripped out and redone. I think I may try mattress stitch this time (I'm pretty adverse to making the same mess twice).

On a happier note, the three needle bind-off I used for the shoulders worked beautifully as always so some progress was made.

If I could just get this seaming done, I could treat myself with another section of tendrils...

Tendrils has begun...

I spent some time on Friday evening stringing beads onto the HipKnits silk - not the simplest task in the world of knitting as the beads were a snug fit on the yarn and moving them along wore out the silk and it became a bit splitty. I've strung 500 onto the first skein just to make sure I've got enough so fingers crossed that there were no knots in the yarn that I didn't spot!

The pattern looked a bit daunting at first, but once I got into it, it wasn't too bad and was fairly easy to memorise. The silk has absolutely no 'give' so I'm being careful not to knit too tight. I've already had one incident when attempting to k2tog in a slightly tighter region when the yarn broke so I'm going fairly gingerly now.


I like longish wraps and I'm not entirely sure I've got enough yarn (though I have more yardage that the pattern asks for, I think the silk is behaving differently from the yarn in the pattern). I've decided to knit up the first skein and see what length I've got to - if I'm past 12 inches then I'll keep going, as five feet is an acceptable length for a wrap. If not then I think I'll rip it out and reknit it with one fewer pattern repeat in the width.

The fabric created is wonderfully soft and has a beautiful drape to it. The beads don't show too well at the moment but I think they should show better after blocking.


I'm going to allow myself to knit a ball-worth of this project every time I finish a piece of Betty. The fact that I have now cast on for this project means that Betty now has a left front. Here's a picture of the back and left front blocking. The sizing has come up pretty well and the bias seems to have been rectified.

More Grey Stuff

Well, Betty has a back and a bit of a left front. The fabric created by increasing in every stitch on the right side, then decreasing while ribbing on the wrong side has biased alarmingly to one side. To the extent that the armholes, although both the same length in rows, appear to be squint. I'm hoping like mad that it will all straighten up in the blocking.


I've left the shoulder stitches on holders so that I can do a three needle bind off instead of seaming, and I've left the neck stitches on holders so that I can knit the collar. The pattern recommends binding off, then picking up the same number of stitches again which I don't think will give such a smooth finish, so as usual I've played with the pattern a bit!

No other progress to report on. I've not got round to winding yarn and stringing beads before casting on Tendrils and I've actually got very little knitting done lately (too much tennis and gardening getting in the way). Two of my friends are re-discovering knitting (with a little help from me) at the moment. They are both surgeons and it is an absolute joy to teach people with such superb spacial awareness and manual dexterity. Within a week, they had compared and contrasted the British style with the German and Portuguese styles of knitting and developed preferences. Now they're asking about concepts that hadn't even occurred to me existed until I'd been knitting regularly for about 6 months. It's going to be interesting watching them - if they're trying cables 10 days after picking up the needles (after already mastering knit, purl, seed stitch, double seed stitch, rib and twisted rib, as well as increases and decreases etc), I can't imagine where they'll be after a few months!

Happy Sunny Day...

...It's another beautiful day here in Glasgow. The sun has been shining now for a week and it just makes me happy to be here.



This is the best bit of my daily walk to work - crossing the Forth and Clyde canal between locks 26 and 27. The canals in Scotland were all overhauled as part of a year 2000 project and ever since, they've been really well maintained and are great to walk along or lounge beside.

Here are a couple of photos of my pride and joy - my garden. This year I'm growing broad beans, lettuce, spinach, strawberries, spring onions and leaks in containers and tumbler tomatoes in a hanging basket. I've also got a rockery full of useful kitchen herbs. I've always loved growing my own food but this house has quite a small garden so I've had to be a bit inventive about how to get the most from it. Last year I grew potatoes in sacks against the back fence which was a huge sucess but as we're hoping to be moving house later in the summer, I didn't want to risk potatoes this year. I get very excited at this time of the year when everything starts growing quickly - the broad beans have grown about 4 inches in a week and the lilies have shot up about a foot in three weeks.


Finally we have a bit of yarn content. This is some Hipknits aran weight silk I found in the reduced bin here (the last few skeins of this colour in stock) which is destined for this pattern. Finally I feel like I've found my summer project and now I have to track down some 4/0 silver-lined seed beads so I can get started. I'm normally fairly monogamous in my knitting - I rarely have more than one major project on the needles at once but Betty is getting to me (though more progress has been made - I'm nearly at the arm-hole decreases on the back) and I need something to feed my desire for something a bit more glamourous! I think this pattern will hit the spot. I think I may even have enough yarn left over to crochet an evening bag to go with the stole.

Limited Progress

Some progress has been made on Betty over the weekend. Not much I hasten to add - the weather was wonderful and things like painting my garden fence and working in the garden seemed much more appealing than slogging on Betty.


While the physical progress has been modest - I've reached the end of the waist decreases on the back (65 rows and only 7 inches of fabric!) and am about to start the bust increases, the mental progress has been more substantial. Before the weekend, I was seriously doubting my ability to stay the course on Betty - the progress seemed so slow and the pattern never-ending. Now I've turned a corner and she seems more manageable. I think I'm going to knit a piece, put her to the side and work on something else, then knit another piece and so on. In this way, I'm hoping to have her done by the autumn. A major source of inspiration to get her done has been looking at Rebecca's finished version (scroll down a few entries) - it just looks so soft and wearable.

This does mean that I need a summer project - preferably something using Sea Silk. I've only got woolly projects on my list and need a lightweight cardi for summer. I need to have a browse about for pattern for 4-ply.

Not up to much.

It's all gone a bit quiet on the Glaswegian front I'm afraid. Tuesday night was our 'Knit out at the Movies' night - we saw Amazing Grace at the Grosvenor on Ashton Lane. Lovely film - really good to knit to. I took along Betty, but managed to pull several stitches off the needle just taking her out of my bag, so I slid them back on and decided that a darkened cinema wasn't the place to check that they were all still there. Luckily, I'd also taken along a pair of the resident radiologist's socks that he'd put his toe through. The cinema is definitely the place for putting a new toe on a sock, just pick up stitches from below the hole, rip back to there and keep going round and round, remembering to decrease as necessary.

Betty is going to be slow progress and hard work. The pattern requires that on the right side, each stitch is knitted front and back, then on the wrong side, its k2tog, p2tog all the way along. To add to this very slow knitting, for some reason, my row gauge is way off. My stitch gauge is spot on, which is why I've not changed needles, but the row gauge requires 23 rows to 4 inches and I'm getting 32 rows to 4 inches. Not a trivial difference, it meants that I will be knitting one third more rows to get the required length! I've decided to keep going but I'm altering the pattern to take account of the row difference; I've worked out at what length the increases and decreases should occur and am placing them accordingly. This is going fine at the moment, but she's got set-in sleeves so I'm going to have to learn how to recalculate these... I'm lead to believe it involves graph paper... I'm a scientist, how hard can it be???

I'm starting to suspect that the row gauge problem might be due to my yarn substitution. The pattern calls for Yorkshire Tweed DK which is discontinued, and Rowan recommends Scottish Tweed DK as an alternative. The thing is I've got Rowanspun DK and I don't think it has as much 'body' as the other two. Can anyone tell me if this is definitely the case? In the meantime, I'll slog away on Betty and try to take some photos over the weekend.

Other plans for the weekend involve painting the garden fence (shhhh - not that the resident radiologist know this yet) - hope the weather stays as nice as it's meant to be.