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Knitting Friday

 

I'm always content when I knit but seldom does it rise to the excitement level, until now. I'm knitting a top in lace weight. The three key words being: knitting, top, and lace weight. I love lace weight yarn and my obsession causes me to load up on any sale lace. That's why I have the mother lode. However, knitting in lace weight is a concentrated, long haul so I almost always crochet and always make shawls or scarfs. That is until last week when I experienced an awakening and mentally said: You love the Mohair Minimalist because that showed you for the first time you don't have to work raglan in a top-down garment and that's worked in lace weight. Why don't you finally give lace a try? So, I rolled a hank of lace into a ball and out came the big store (Bates or Boye) 16" circs and I worked a neckband of about 1" and started about 3" of the yoke before I frogged.

 

OK, here are some tips I discovered from this first fiasco which I'll share.

 

1. Only use lace tip needles throughout when you knit lace weight. My old, trusty 16" circs are fine for starting a top down garment in finger weight but it was a struggle to use them on just 1" in lace weight.

 

2. Go one needle size up for your CO row.

 

3. If you don't know any of the "specialty" cast-ons, use the knitted cast on. (Make a loop on your needle, bring your needle through that loop, pick up the yarn, bring it through the loop and place this yarn as the second loop on the needle. Repeat.) Of the "simple" COs, this one is the best; even but loose. The cable CO is tighter and the thumb method is too uneven.

 

4. Don't join the first row. Leave a long tail and work the first row as straight knitting. It will be much easier to join for the second row.

 

5. If you knit as I do, wild west style (that is, no swatching), I found a CO of 90 - 100 stitches goes over an average adult head in lace weight.

 

5a. But I found this works because I made my first row as "YO, K2tog* across which gives you a stretchy first row.

 

(Mohair Minimalist has a stockinette pattern on US 6 throughout with the effect of a curling neckband/waistband. I don't like straight stockinette in lace probably because I can't knit even stockinette in lace for more than a few rows. I used: Row 1: *YO, K2tog  Row 2: K)

 

6. On my typical top down tops, I work the neck in US 8 and the body in US 10. Here, I stayed with US 7 throughout. (When I start again, I may work: CO with US 7, neckband with US 6 and body with US 7.)

 

7. At one inch, I doubled all the stitches on the K row and started working the yoke on 200 stitches. (I may only increase to 180 stitches when I restarted.

 

And, I was coming along slowly until I got cocky and took this project to the pool and sat and talked and knitted. Even I know that lace knitting is your "quiet" knitting. By the time I got back, I knew I had to tink back two rows and it looked like the stitch had dropped even further than that.

 

8. Finally, some universal lace knitting tips: 

have good lighting; 

find a comfortable place to work;

have all your necessary tools on hand;

keep your work in a secure container (tote, basket, etc.);

within your container, separate the actual project (big plastic zip lock); and

be sure your knitting is pushed down on the needles when you stop knitting.

 

So the project sits in the frog pond and I'm waiting for a delivery from Knit Picks because I realized that while I have larger cabled, (24" and 32") sharp-tipped/lace-tipped needles for the body of my project, it was time to get 16" lace tipped needles for the neck. I probably would have ordered ChiaGoo lace needles in 16" but the three attractive wood cable needles from KP which I use as shawl pins have taken a hike so I wanted to order three packages of them [the heir, the spare, and the second spare] with the needles. As soon as I get my needles, I'll start posting pictures of my first ever knitted lace garment in lace weight.

Some other stuff, I've been up to:

#1 shawl pattern from 8/10

Picture #1 shows the first shawl done in the pattern I posted on August 10. It's unblocked as pictured and just changing the Ch 5 to Ch 8 at the row ends has changed the shape of the shawl. The shawl was worked in a D crochet hook and 2 strands of cotton crochet thread.

 

#2 one end of 8/10 shawl

#3 a shawl with a "collar"

 Picture #2 shows one end of the shawl and you can see it still tapers but is much more boxy. The whole shawl now has the shape of a curved triangle (at its top) rather than a modified crescent. (In picture #1, the top of the shawl is at the bottom of the picture.) I'm hoping that blocking will make this top more elongated. If it turns out I'm going to get this curved triangle effect on the top of the shawls every time I make this modified pattern, I would rather keep enough yarn available so that I can make a frilly edging for the top edge which would look like a lace collar when it's turned over as in Picture #3. (I needed all the yarn for the length in the #1 shawl and couldn't save any yarn for an edging; though blocking may change this.)

With my older, original shawl pattern, the top of the shawl was always "tighter" than the bottom. If you put on the shawl upside down with top of the shawl by your elbows and tied it, it would feel binding if you moved your arms. With the change to a Ch 8 at the end of every row, you can wear the bottom up or down and it's still comfortable.

#4 a top which was a cardi

And finally: in my alterations last week, I found a cardi in variegated cotton which I seldom wore because of the color. It's a white/green/purple cotton which was a very short-sleeved "I couldn't possibly bring it together in the front." [that's why I love shawl pins at the neck] cardi. So I frogged it, added 8 stitches to the body (96 to 104) and it looks like I'm going to get a top with enough yarn left over for pretty long sleeves. I hope to have a picture with at least one sleeve started next week.

That's it for today. Happy knitting. Next week, I'll post a picture of the blocked shawl.