Peter Pan - Chart 3 / Skein 2 Done - Side 1

As I mentioned, I'm breaking up my work on the Evenstar Cape with a couple of other projects, including this one.  This is actually Chart 3 and the first 13 rows of Chart 4, which is where I am switching to the next skein.   Now I'm trying to decide if I want to work the other side and finish off skein 2 or continue working side one.

Pattern:  Peter Pan by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tinkerbell
Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm) and US 6 (4 mm)

Evenstar Cape - Chart 2 Done

I finished up Chart 2 yesterday afternoon and figured out the increase for Chart 3.  The beauty of my modification to Chart 2 meant that I didn't have to shift Chart 3 to get things to line up (in the original pattern the beginning of round marker is shifted 10 stitches before beginning Chart 3).  It really makes me wonder about the original design process.  At this point there really isn't any more figuring to do until I get to the border, but at 567 stitches per row, that is going to take a little while.

Once again, I have an extra stitch at the end of the row because there are seven rows where the motif wraps across the beginning of the round.  On the other rows I work the last stitch the same as I work the first stitch to maintain the symmetry.  The increase row was a little bit different - I knit 3, then (k1, yo) to the last 4 stitches, knit 4.

I switched to my second skein towards the end of this chart, using up all of my first skein before switching.

Chart 3 is a long slog, so I'm breaking it up by working on some of my other works in progress.

Pattern:  Evenstar Shawl by Susan Pandorf, converted into a cape
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Midnight Delight
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Once and Future King - Finished!

The final clue came out this past Friday so the finished shawls are starting to appear on Ravelry.  This is the part that I love the most - seeing the same pattern knit up in all the different colorways.  That is something that I think is unique to our Mystery Knit Alongs.

This shawl was my first time grafting lace weight yarn.  I did okay, although I need to work on the consistency of my tension - it was a little loose, but that is probably better than being too tight.

Here is a blocking picture.

And another beauty shot.

You could add length by repeating the motif in the center, and I think it would be interesting to knit it from the center out using a provisional cast on.  I have created reversed charts, just in case I feel like doing that sometime.


Pattern:  The Once and Future King by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Roi Soleil
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Andromeda Cape - Finished!

I finished this last weekend, but was waiting for some good weather to try to get some outdoor shots in attempt to more accurately capture the colors.  While this shawl was actually very easy to convert into a cape, it was a little challenging to block.

Because of the asymmetrical increases there is a spiral element which introduces a bias into the finished fabric (similar to a skirt cut on the bias).  The front edges are always a little tricky because they have a tendency to stretch radially.  When I knit my Treasure Island and Snow Queen capes I was able to match up the front edges and make sure that I didn't stretch them more than the spines in the body of the shawl.  Of course once you start to wear them, they will tend to stretch.

Pattern:  Andromeda Shawl by Janine le Cras (converted into a cape)
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Verve in Magic Mirror
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Evenstar Cape - Figuring out Chart 2

Chart 2 presented the first challenge in my conversion.  I remember when I was knitting this shawl the first time I was frustrated by this chart because the motifs don't line up with the motifs in chart 1.  Chart 1 is worked over a 16 stitch repeat and chart 2 is worked over a 20 stitch repeat and they only line up at 2 points.  I spent a fair bit of time trying to modify the charts to make them line up, but in the end I gave up and knit the pattern as written.  The other frustrating aspect of this chart is that the pattern is not symmetrical as it is charted, although it is symmetrical when knitted.  This project gave me the chance to revisit that chart and see what I could make of it the second time around.

The first thing I noticed was the decrease row between the two charts.  First you knit a regular increase row, than a plain knit row, then a decrease row where you decrease 8 stitches, another knit row and then start knitting chart 2.  As I started working the math, the first thing I noticed was that if I did my increase row I would end up with 291 body stitches, while the chart needs 280 for the circular version and 281 for the flat version - remembering that extra stitch at the end of the row.  That meant that I would have 10 extra stitches.  My first thought was to take advantage of the fact that I could work an extra half repeat of the chart.  I fired up my charting software and first entered the chart as written, then I started adding columns and copying and pasting, expanding the chart in both directions.  As I worked I pondered the implications if I were to keep those 291 stitches on working the rest of the shawl and decided that the best course of action would be to maintain the stitch count as nearly as possible.  I also noted that there was a very simple way of making this chart work perfectly for knitting flat.

The solution was so simple that I wondered why the designer didn't adjust the chart during the design process.  All it requires is a little arts and crafts.  First, print the chart, then cut the chart vertically between stitches 15 and 16.  Also trim away the "no stitch" in column 21, cutting carefully around the 3 stitches in rows 47, 48, 49.  Now take that strip of stitches and place them to the right of stitch 1, carefully lining things up and placing those 3 stitches into the no stitch section of column 1.  Apply tape to secure.  When you knit the chart, there will still be an extra stitch at the end/beginning of the right side/wrong side rows.  Just knit/purl that stitch as appropriate.  On rows 33 and 53 that stitch is needed to handle the s1k2togpsso stitch as it was handled in chart 1.

Pattern:  Evenstar Shawl by Susan Pandorf, converted into a cape
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Midnight Delight
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Once and Future King - Clue 6 Done

And of course, the Mystery Knit Along is still going, although we're getting close to the end.  Clue 6 came out yesterday and here is mine.  Clue 7, the final clue, comes out next Friday.  I suppose I should try to get some beauty shots of my shawl this weekend.  I also need to get some beauty shots of my Andromeda Shawl and see if I can capture the colors.

Pattern:  The Once and Future King by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Roi Soleil
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Evenstar Cape - Chart 1

I will be starting my Evenstar Cape Knit Along in two weeks, but I wanted to work out the details of the conversion to make sure that I wouldn't lead anyone down the wrong road so I cast my cape on this past week.  Readers of my blog will get a look ahead at what I will be covering in the Knit Along as I capture my process.

When making a conversion like this the first thing that you have to do is carefully review the pattern.  The main things to look for are stitches that cross the end of round marker (also denoted in patterns by "dancing markers") and asymmetries in the pattern that might not lend themselves to being split into a cape (or semi-circular) shawl.  This kind of pattern review is most easily done by looking at the charts, so for the non-chart knitters I strongly recommend that you take the plunge and learn how to read charts.  It really isn't that hard.  I recommend J. C. Briar's book Charts Made Simple:  understanding knitting charts visually.  You can still spot these things by looking at the written directions, provided that they are well written - just look for the pattern repeats and then look at what other stitches you have to do that are not included in the pattern repeats.

For Chart 1 of Evenstar we are very fortunate in that the motif is symmetrical, although it does wrap across the end of round marker on rows 7, 13 and 27.  Row 7 begins with a special stitch - increase 7 in a k3tog.  The other two rows begin with a slip 1, k2tog, pass slipped stitch over (s1k2togpsso).  That special stitch is going to take a little careful thought (and some experimentation), so lets look at the easy stitch first.  The s1k2togpsso stitch is a type of double decrease, we're taking 3 stitches and turning them into one.  If you split that stitch apart by converting  from knitting in the round to knitting flat and you still want to retain symmetry in the design you would need to start those rows with a k2tog, yo and end those rows with a yo, ssk.  That takes care of the double decrease, but we need 4 stitches, not two.  What to do?  Easy, add an extra stitch at the end of the row.  When you're not knitting one of those 3 rows you just knit or purl that stitch as appropriate.

Now lets go back and look at the special stitch.  This one is easier to decipher if you look at the chart.  You will note that in row 6 there are 3 "no stitch" spots, so you know you need to increase 3 stitches.  After a little trial and error (and you have to be willing to experiment) I decided that an increase 4 in a k2tog is the way to treat this special stitch at the beginning and end of the row.  A word about the increase stitch.  Susan Pandorf offers 3 different ways to work this stitch and recommends that knitters try out each of the methods while working the swatch to determine which one they like best.  I prefer the method that uses the yarn overs.  It results in a nicely symmetrical Evenstar, with an open center, and is also easy to work.  There is just one small problem with using yarn overs, you have to do an odd number of increases because the yarn over has to be worked between two regular knit stitches and at the beginning and end of the row we need to work 4 increases.  To handle that I did the knit, yo, knit, and ended with a knit into the back of the stitch.

Now that we have all of those things worked out (and hopefully you've annotated your pattern appropriately) take a look at the pattern again and ask yourself if there are any other modifications that you would like to make.  For example, in rows 11 and 25 there are k4tog stitches.  I decided to work the first k4tog in row 11 as a ssssk and the second k4tog in row 25 as a ssssk, so that they would both slant away from the central petal.  The other thing to consider before you begin is whether you want to add beads, and where you would like to add them.  I decided to add beads to the points of the Evenstar.

Okay, we're now ready to figure out how many stitches to cast on.  Looking at the pattern we note that this is a traditional "Pi" shawl so it starts out with a number of rounds of knitting followed by increase rounds.  The last increase round before Chart 1 gets us to the stitch count for that round, which is 144 stitches.  But wait, we need an extra stitch to work this flat, so we need 145 stitches when we complete that increase round.  Obviously we don't want to start the shawl with 145 stitches, so go back to the stitch count before the increase round, which is 72 stitches.  We also have to consider edge stitches.  I like to work a 3 stitch garter stitch border, which would bring the cast on stitch count up to 78.  I cast on 78 stitches and knit 4 rows and then worked the increase row.  When you work one of these yo, k1 increase rows in a circular shawl you double the number of stitches, but when you work one of these yo, k1 increase rows while knitting flat you wind up at the end of the row and you've just knit a stitch and there are 3 edge stitches left.  If you do one more yarn over before you knit those 3 edge stitches you will actually increase by 73 stitches instead of 72, which gets us that extra stitch that we wanted for Chart 1.  Pretty cool, huh.

Pattern:  Evenstar Shawl by Susan Pandorf, converted into a cape
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Midnight Delight
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Peter Pan - Chart 2 Done

Not the best picture, but you get the idea.  I finished up the center motif (charts 1 and 2) late this afternoon and started working on Chart 3.  The sides are on waste yarn and I have a needle in the stitches on each end that I'll be knitting from.  I switched from a US 6 to a US 5 when I started working in the flat.  I'm using knitCompanion and have all of my charts set up.  The charts for the wings have those fun instructions, work so many rows, so many times.  I actually created sub-charts of the rows being knit and am using smart counters so I don't have to remember how many times I have to knit each section of a given chart.

I knit the entire center motif using Skein 1, and ended up with 8 grams left.  Not bad.  I started with 52 grams.  I am planning on using skeins 2-4 on the wings and skeins 5 and 6 for the edging.


Pattern:  Peter Pan by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tinkerbell
Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm) and US 6 (4 mm)

Peter Pan - Decisions, Decisions

The way this shawl is designed is interesting.  The graphic below shows how the skeins are used as you knit the shawl.

After you knit the body of the shawl, an edging is knit along the long edges, changing skeins to match the skein usage in the body.  I've been busy this morning running numbers in my spreadsheet and thinking about possible options.  I also looked at all of the finished projects to see how it all comes together and I have figured out several different schemes.  Given the yarn requirements I have a lot of options.  The one I'm leaning toward would use skeins 1-4 in the body and skeins 5 and 6 for the edging.  I've laid out my yarn to see how that would look.

I really like the contrast of the greens against the yellow and especially the pink.  I'm also thinking that I will use skein 1 for the entire center motif instead of switching to skein 2 towards the end of the second chart.

Pattern:  Peter Pan by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tinkerbell
Needle:  US 6 (4 mm)

Peter Pan - Chart 1 Done

I blocked my test knit this morning, and then finished up my Andromeda Cape, but I can't block it until my test knit dries, so I picked Peter Pan back up.  I had knit the swatch back in January of 2014, and then hadn't done anything else.  This shawl has an interesting construction.  The center motif is knit in the round, and then it is knit from 2 sides out, and then a knit on border is added to the long edges.  I'm not a big fan of knitting shawls in the round - the start is always so annoying.  I have figured out a good method though.  I used two 24 inch circular needles and did Eunny Jang's circular cast on using this video.  I work one row after the cast on, then split the stitches between the two circular needles and started working the first chart.  Here is a picture about half way through the first chart.

The needles are a bit floppy until you get some stitches on them, but it doesn't take long for things to stabilize and it is a lot easier than juggling double pointed needles - at least you don't have to worry about these slipping out of the stitches (been there, done that).  I did my usual spreadsheet of stitch counts to calculate where to switch skeins, but I still haven't decided if I will deviate from the pattern especially with regard to the knit on border.  I want to get a sense of my yarn usage, and I need to wind the rest of my skeins so I know how much yarn I have to work with.

Pattern:  Peter Pan by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Tinkerbell
Needle:  US 6 (4 mm)

Once and Future King - Clue 5 Done

As I have mentioned a couple of times, I forgot to take a picture of Clue 5, so I cropped a picture of the first half of the shawl to get this picture.  It took me a couple of tries to get it right.  I finished up my test knit this week, but I still need to block it, take photos, and tech edit the pattern.  It is a pretty cool design, but I am glad to get it done.  I'll be sending off my test knit to the Unique Sheep as it is the pattern sample.  I'm in the club so I'll be getting the kit.

I am so glad that it is Friday.  I've already worked 41.5 hours this week.  We both went in for a half day last Sunday and I had an evening meeting on Monday (the reality of working with people in different time zones) and I've had to stay late a couple of evenings because of other meetings.  I could take today off, but I have to put together a status brief and one of my first mentors is coming by to chat and I haven't seen him in ages, and I have yet another meeting.


Pattern:  The Once and Future King by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Roi Soleil
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Once and Future King - Clue 4 Done

It is Friday, so Clue 4 of the Unique Sheep Mystery Knit Along, Once and Future King, is out and I can reveal mine.  Somehow when I was knitting this shawl I did not get a picture of Clue 5.  I'm not sure what I'll do.  I might try cropping my Clue 6 picture...This week has been crazy at work, and I am so glad that it is Friday.  I've been dealing with a migraine all week, mostly managed with Excedrine Migraine, but it has definitely impacted my mood and ability to cope with stress.  Thank goodness for knitting!  Sometimes it is the only thing that keeps me sane.  I've been working away on my test knit and should have it done soon.  I'm almost to the last chart.  Come Labor Day weekend I'll be starting my Evenstar Cape Knit Along.  I have my beads and my yarn and I've already set up the pattern in KnitCompanion.  This will be my first time running a knit along, and I'm really excited about it.


Pattern:  The Once and Future King by Janine le Cras
Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Eos in Roi Soleil
Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Knitting for Anarchists - Book Review

This past week I picked up a slim volume by Anna Zilbourg called Knitting for Anarchists - The What, Why and How of Knitting.  The goal of this work is to help people see and understand what they are doing when they are knitting because understanding and knowledge is power.  If you can look at a pattern and understand the fundamentals of it you can modify it to suit yourself, or figure out poorly written directions, or find mistakes that have slipped by the tech editors.  The style of writing is fun and breezy and it is a quick and easy read.  Most of the advice I had already figured out for myself, but there were a couple of gems that I hadn't. 

The book is divided into two parts with 10 chapters.  An introductory chapter (Knitting for Anarchists) lays our Anna Zilbourg's knitting philosophy and provides an overview of the chapters that follow.

Part I covers the craft of knitting and Part II covers the creation of your own unique patterns and provides individual chapters on three different sweater designs - the all-purpose strip-knit anarchist sweater, a pullover and a cardigan.

She spends a fair bit of time discussing the anatomy of stitches and how basic manipulation of these basic units create such a variety of finished fabrics.  In her short section on gauge I had my first "a ha" moment.  Have you ever wondered why it is so hard to get both stitch and row gauge?  Stitch gauge is governed primarily by the weight of the yarn, because the predominant factor is the thickness of the legs of your stitch.  Row gauge is governed primarily by how tight or loose you knit.  When you change needle size in your effort to get gauge you are primarily going to affect the row gauge.  Chasing gauge can be a frustrating and time-consuming and sometimes an ultimately fruitless process.  I like to find a needle size that gives me a fabric that I like, determine my gauge from that swatch, and then adjust the pattern accordingly (this is why we have spreadsheets and calculators).  Of course gauge swatches never tell the whole story, so check your gauge again once you've knit for a while on your project and adjust accordingly (this is EZ's advice as well).

In her section on casting on she has some great tips for ways of using crochet chains (which, after all, is only a single knit stitch run up over multiple rows), including using them in dolman sleeves and for knitting a sleeve from the shoulder to cuff, but not as part of a top-down set-in sleeve, where you pick up stitches around the arm hole (my favorite method).  I'm not sure why I would want to knit a sleeve from the top down separate from the body, but it is nice to know the technique is out there.

She also details a wonderful way of knitting buttonholes.  I found the explanation a bit hard to follow (actually I found all of the explanations a little hard to follow, but I am a visual person and there are pictures) but once I got what she was doing I was blown away by the brilliance.  You can only do this if you're making a faced button hole band.  When you come to where you want the button hole you knit however many stitches you need to make the button hole with some scrap yarn, not the yarn you're using for the band itself.  But how do you get to the other side?  Well, you put those stitches you just knit with the scrap yarn back onto your left hand needle and now knit them with your working yarn.  So now you have a "button hole" in waiting defined by the stitches made with the scrap yarn.  Do this for the rest of the button holes.  Now, when you're working the facing, when you get to where that button hole should be you pull out the scrap yarn and graft the stitches from the facing with the "bottom" stitches (those closest to the body) and then put the "top" stitches onto your needle to make up for the stitches you just used in the graft.  The result is a very neat, elegant, couture button hole.

There is also a nice section on knitting and designing cables and playing with color.  I still use a cable needle when knitting cables (even though I knit lace without lifelines), but I'm going to try her technique of knitting without a cable needle next time I work some.

There are two principals that she espouses that I wholeheartedly agree with:  1)  Only knit things you enjoy and 2) Learn to read your knitting.

There are so many wonderful things to knit out there, and wonderful yarns to knit with that you shouldn't knit anything that you don't enjoy.  Now, sometimes a pattern may not be fun to knit simply because of the way it is written up or constructed.  In that case, if you really want to make it, think about a better way of doing it.  If you understand the fundamentals of knitting you can decompose designs and put the pieces back together in a way that may make it more fun for you to knit.  I do this all the time, changing pullover patterns to knit them in the round, or changing a bottom up design into a top down design, bottom up sleeves to top down, or changing a circular shawl into a cape.

If you want to take your knitting to a level beyond faithfully following pattern directions, if you want to master lace knitting, or stranded knitting, or cables, one of the things you should do is learn how to read your knitting.  When I first started knitting lace I immediately went to the charts and taught myself how to read them, from there it wasn't too long before I was able to correlate what I was seeing in the chart with what I was seeing in my knitting.  I found looking at the written directions for lace knitting excruciatingly painful.  Test knitting and tech editing has since taught me to use the written directions as well as the charts as some things are easier to explain in the written directions (and I have to proof the written directions against the chart as part of my tech editing), but I still rely mostly on charts.  I remember a situation that arose in a group (not a Unique Sheep group) that I belong to where someone posted about how they "didn't think they should have to learn to read their knitting or charts" in order to knit lace.  I didn't know what to say to that, it just made me sad.

There are more detailed books on knitting technique and knitting design out there, but if you want a book that might make you look at your knitting (and the world) a little differently and may give you a couple of "a ha" moments, pick this one up and give it a read.

Knitting for Anarchists - The What, Why and How of Knitting by Anna Zilbourg, published by Dover Publications