What’s on my Needles

My blog has been pretty Coat & Tailoring heavy the past few weeks, I decided that I was going to change it up and talk about my current knitting projects instead.

Last weekend I commenced picking up stitches and doing the short row shaping for the second sleeve cap on my Accessory to your Spring Suit Jumper.  This means that I do have the first sleeve all done, after having to frog it 3/4 of the way back since I realized that I had made it too snug for my arm.  (There’s nothing so worse as having my arms feel like sausages stuffed in meat casings!)

I’m very happy I did that since it fits perfectly and I am using that one sleeve as the template for my second sleeve.  Plus it seemed to go really speedy the second time around.

I worked my sleeves differently than the original pattern.  Instead of working straight stockinette I added in the same cable-lace insert as the bodice, down from the shoulder to the wrist.  I’m actually not 100% that I did the right thing by having this pattern going all the way to my wrist, but Felix was the only person on hand to help me figure out the styling of it and he thought it should go all the way there.

I’ve left the stitches live at the one wrist, in case I decide to frog it back after completing the second sleeve to change it up again.

Additionally I want to check the final length once I get the other sleeve finished as well as block them both.

Now… I’m not sure if I chatted about my yarn conundrum on here with this jumper.  But I went through an online, frenzied search looking for more of this yarn in the same dyelot & colorway since I thought I was going to run out of it.  I was never able to find more in the same dyelot but I did buy 2 additional skeins of it from my LYS that seemed to match just fine to what I already had on hand.

After completing the first sleeve, I still have 1 full skein plus some extra yarn from the scarf which I think will be *just enough* to finish.  This has left me with 2 skeins of the same colorway that I could return or use somehow.

Surprisingly, this yarn is a 100% perfect match with my Gertie Coat contrast trim color, a wool charcoal grey.  Soooo, I’ve decided to put these two skeins to good use and am knitting myself up a vintage turban to match.

I’m making the moss-stitch turban on the left.

It’s not much yet, but here’s what I got done over the past 2-3 days:

Cast on edge is at the bottom, Left is the front edge, Right is the center back of my head

The construction of this hat is completely wonky!  You knit only 1 half of it at a time (which is the first strange thing) and then it’s knit from the nape of the neck towards the crown (the second strange thing).  If I didn’t have Ravelry to read everyone’s notes and see additional images, I would have NO IDEA what is going on with this pattern.  Luckily there are 137 completed or WIP’s that I can view and mull over.

Most of the comments about this pattern have been about how large it is.  Knowing this from the get-go, I decided to knit mine two inches smaller than indicated.  I swatched like a good knitter and proceeded to knit this up.  But when I went to compare to my work-in-progress gauge I realized that it’s still too large for what I had intended.  But seeing it in front of me, I don’t think it will be too bad.  I’ve decided to just plug ahead and I’ll check the fit when I get to a more complete point where my hat actually looks like a hat.  heh  So far it’s a quick knit and as long as I get it done by the time my coat is finished, I’ll be a happy camper.

Once I’m more confident that the hat fits and that I did adequate changes to the pattern, I’ll post up my modifications if anyone else is interested to knit this one.  I nearly forgot to mention that this is a free pattern from the archives at the Victoria & Albert Museum.  (There are other vintage knit patterns/goodies posted there as well.)

Be sure to stop back here tomorrow.  I just got (aka won on ebay) some new stitchcraft magazines from the late 30’s and mid 40’s and I intend to post one of them up here tomorrow for you all.

In: Knitting

Blogger for 6 years and counting, I am a passionate creator who loves to tinker.

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