#4 / 2015: The Medalje Sweater

Well - I'm done, finally. Since I have already written a lot about this sweater, I will keep it short.

I love the finished result. In the end, I opted for wooden buttons instead of tin buttons, and I think it works well with this slightly modernised version of the sweater. The fit is a bit slimmer than it should have been, as I knit the 100 cm size, but I had some problems getting the gauge of 27 sts/10 cm even with thicker needles. A truer gauge is probably around 28 sts/10 cm.

The finishing and button bands were not my favourite with this sweater. It is quite long, and I felt like I worked on the button bands forever! It was actually so annoying that I thought that my next project will definitely be a pullover (and it is time for a pullover, to be honest)!




I am very happy with the yarn, it makes for a soft, bouncy not too thick sweater. I think the colours are beautiful and it can be worn with different types of clothes. I like that the fit ended up a bit slimmer, too.

The construction of the sweater with the raglan sleeves is also excellent, and I have a feeling I might adapt sweaters with steeked sleeves to raglan sweaters in the future. Anything to keep the cutting in knitting to a minimum..!




All in all, I am very happy with my new sweater and I'm happily wearing it right now.

And guess what - my next pullover will not be in stranded knitting! So stay tuned.

WIP Wednesday #2: Finishing touches, knitting backwards and It's Starting To Look Like a Sweater!

Saturday I finally got to the point I had been waiting for on my Medalje sweater, namely joining the body and sleeves. Because I never learn, when this happens I always think "oh, this means it's soon finished!", but I quickly get back to reality; raglan decreases take a long time. When I had joined the sleeves to the body, I had roughly 400 stitches. Four hundred stitches. In stranded knitting. Oh boy...

With eight stitches decreased every other row it took me a while to get to an acceptable level of stitches. My sweater in size M/L has around 250 stitches in the body. I think that when it starts getting close to 300 stitches, it is too much. Did I mention stranded knitting all the way? I probably did. (By now, I know the pattern by heart, which is nice.)

With the help of Downton Abbey and Drop Dead Diva (I have somehow gotten quite invested in the latter!)  I managed to get to this point Monday evening:

I put it on two circular needles, tried it on and posed in front of the bathroom mirror:



(Yes, there is a Norwegian flag in the bathroom, why shouldn't there be?)

Some things struck me: It fits really well! The yarn, a superwash wool/nylon blend, is really bouncy and soft. The other thing was that it would probably look really good as a pullover, too. (Also, pullovers don't have button bands - but more on that later...) As a result I have decided to make a pullover from another pattern-heavy sweater in the book. More on that .... sometime.

 Tuesday evening I had gotten to the neckline. The neckline is deeper in the front, so stitches are put aside and the shoulders are worked back and forth. If you are anything like me, you know that stranded purling is the worst. Not only is there a lot of purling, which of course is a hassle - but you have to keep the floats in front of the knitting and how does one assert Yarn Dominance when purling anyway? Who knows? Normally, I just cast on for a new steek and continue my merry way, but I would like to minimise steekage on this sweater, so I decided to try something completely new to me: knitting backwards, or from left to right.

A few weeks ago I discussed this technique with a fellow member in my sewing group. Essentially, it is just like normal knitting, only left-handed. Unfortunately I am extremely right-handed and it proved difficult. I tried both continental (my preferred) and English (because then I would have the yarn in my left hand), but it was so difficult. Granted, I did not try so hard. I am very impatient. Instead, I put the stitch from the right needle to the left needle, and knit it normally, with the right needle. Then I transferred it back to the left needle. It actually went quite well.

There are many tutorials on how to knit backwards on youtube, whether you knit continental or English (or combined, but that's a style I do not know!); I'm definitely not good at explaining.

This leaves the last part of the finishing, which is most tedious one, by far: making the button bands.

Most of the sweater patterns I have knit in the past usually have you pick up the stitches along front of the body, making the button bands perpendicular to the knitting overall, but on this one you knit the button bands like this:




And sewing it onto the sweater as it gets finished. It does look very nice and clean, but it takes a long time. Right now I am a bit over halfway on the first button band, but hopefully I will get done soon-ish.

Maybe I will be done by next Wednesday ;)

WIP Wednesday #1 and yarn diet

So, what's on the needles?

Well, right now I have one project that has been ongoing since December 27th. December 27th because that is the day the shops opened after Christmas and I could buy yarn for my new sweater. 

The pattern is, as my lately finished Veme sweater, from the book Kofteboken. It's taking some time - not only because it's knitted at a gauge of 27sts/10 cm, or because it's patterned all over, but because I have been distracted in the meantime. I had to knit the baby onesies, and then I just "had" to knit the Veme sweater. 

This is not the most up-to-date picture, as I am closing in on 30 cm knitted on the body! The sleeves were finished before the body, which is just great (I may need to do that more often). My ravelry page is here, by the way, but the pattern itself is not yet on ravelry. Overall, it's quite a slow going project, but I have learned the pattern now; good thing about these types of patterns is that they are often quite intuitive.

For the interested, this updated version of the cardigan will have raglan sleeves (the earlier version had steeked set-in sleeves). Although I'm thankful I don't have to cut and sew, I can't say I am looking forward to having a trillion pattern stitches. Whew. But that won't be yet...

The yarn I am using is Sisu by Sandnes yarn, a superwash/nylon blend, and it's creating a nice and elastic fabric. I think I bought 13 skeins in total for this, and I still have 8 left, so I'm concerned there might be a lot left...

Which brings me to the next project - the Otto Mittens (link to ravelry pattern page). On Saturday I came across the book "Votter og pulsvanter til alle årstider" or "Mittens and mitts for all seasons". It's a very pretty book that caught my eye, and it had a lot of nice patterns.

The thing is this - I am on a self imposed yarn diet. Compared to many others my stash is probably very cute and little, but to me, there is a lot, and I don't live in the largest place, either. My goal is to knit up as much as possible before the summer, and I have lots and lots of yarn in mitten friendly quantities. So my plan is to always have a little project on the side of a larger project - and this time the choice fell on these mittens.




There are a lot of other mittens I want to knit from that book, not to mention I can knit hats and other things. If I can knit many small things during the year, maybe I won't be in so much trouble come Christmas? ;) Anyway, these mittens are for my boyfriend, to whom I have not knitted many things. Somehow it feels a bit scary, still, but he really likes these mittens, and I get to reduce my stash by a smidgeon. Win-win.

That's all for today - happy Wednesday to everyone and I hope I have something else to show for next WIP Wednesday!