Slipped September - Take Two

I really should know better by now.  I had joined this Artyarns knitalong almost a year ago.  I do love their yarn, mostly I love their colors, but am not so much a fan of their knitalongs.  You have to keep up to get the next part of the pattern, and if you don’t you are out of luck getting the final pattern, and getting them afterwards can be a real challenge.  For this one I did manage to keep up and get the complete pattern, but then I never finished it.  I had finished the front - which was as far as I needed to get - but I just wasn’t sure about where this was going and if I wanted to go there. 

First, there is the gauge.  The patterns tend to be worked at a pretty loose gauge, and you don’t even need to do that to get a nice drape in the fabric, the yarns will do that on their own, and you know how I feel about working at a loose gauge.  I did use the smaller of the two recommended needle sizes (US 7 as opposed to a US 9!) but it is still pretty loose.  The bias knit is okay.  It does interesting things to the drape and the way the pattern pieces stretch under the influence of gravity.  I finally knit up the back this past month.  It was a quick and easy knit, but I should have paid more attention to the pattern instructions and gone down a needle size.  The pattern states that the back is supposed to be 2-3 inches larger than the front, and that the garment is supposed to be oversized, but I didn’t really take that in and consider what that meant for the final garment.  When I pinned the two pieces together and tried it on it was definitely oversized, a bit too oversized.

I was a bit disappointed, but wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, so I decided to go look at the finished projects on Ravelry, hoping to find some inspiration and I did.  One knitter decided to turn the top in to a tunic.  Now this is something that I can get behind.  I love tunics because I wear tunics and leggings to work, and I had bought two skeins of each of the colors, so I should have plenty of yarn to work with.  I dug the other two skeins out of my stash and caked them up and cast on again, with some changes.  The first change was to go down to a US 5 needle.  I considered going even smaller, but did some quick math - comparing the percentage change in size of the needle diameter and using that to guess the resulting size change.  Originally I started knitting the smallest size but quickly realized that it would be a bit too small around the neck area, so I decided to cast on for the largest size, figuring I could always adjust the final stitch count by working few increase rows.

I really love the colors, and the effect of the slipped stitch pattern, and the whole thing has a sort of Egyptian collar vibe for me, which I also love.  I’m not sure how far I will extend the patterning, but I will work the front and back the same.  I’m thinking that I want to get down to the bottom of the armholes, and then maybe join the front and back and work in the round.  I may then continue on with just the solid color (Golden Hours, a lovely yellow/gold) and work a lace pattern, and then work a different lace pattern with the multicolored yarn, maybe something a bit flouncy.  I’m also not sure if I will continue the bias fabric.  We’ll see when we get there.  I will have to frog the original knitting and reclaim that yarn when I want to start working on the back.

Pattern:  Improvised, based upon Slipped September by Iris Schreier

Yarn:  Artyarns Merino Cloud

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)