KarenJoSeattle

@!#*@ Guage

I haven't posted for a few days, but I have been knitting and happily making progress on my project. The body of my center-cable EZ EPS sweater was close to the needed length to join to the sleeves.

Note that 'was' is the operative word here.

I knit a decent-sized swatch - in the round, with the same needles, in a ball of yarn from the same dye lot. I'm a good swatcher, usually going overboard, if anything. I figured my stitches needed for the various dimensions. Then I started with the sleeves so I could double-check that everything was going OK on smaller pieces.

I actually ended up speeding up my increases on the forearm of the sleeves so they wouldn't feel tight around the elbow. The gauge came out spot on in the first sleeve. The second sleeve fit just the same. Everything looked good.

Yesterday, after a couple of days of some good knitting commute time, I'd reached a point on my sweater body where enough hung off my 32" needle to stop looking like a steroidal ruffle and start looking like the sweater it would be. Last night it occurred to me that it seemed a bit larger than I'd expect.

I measured my gauge. Can you see a difference in the stitches between the sleeve on the left and the body on the right? Neither can I.

But, rather than my original 21 stitches in four inches, I had knit the body at 19. Over the 212 stitches that became 4.3 inches. Added to that, I'd forgotten to do the few stitches of shaping I'd allowed for when figuring out how much ease I wanted - a hazard of doing a design-your-own project without specific written instruction, but who actually writes themselves instructions for one of these? I should have at least left myself a sticky-note reminder.

This is merino yarn, so cutting and steeking the sides is not really a good option. Plus I'd expected a visible difference in gauge, though I will admit I don't seem to have that issue. So, maaaaybe I could steek? But, then there's the ribbing that really needs to be a bit tighter in gauge.

Personally, I know I won't be happy unless I redo it. But I haven't actually ripped yet. I will, I will. Give me a a day or two to mourn first.

And to think about whether I need to wash all of the yarn if I rinse the kinks out of the frogged stuff, given that the swatch didn't change gauge when washed except over the cable pattern. And think about what to do about the gauge difference. The sleeves and the swatch are smaller tubes than the body and knit on two circulars rather than one. Do I try the body on two circulars? Go down a needle size? Just refigure based on the new gauge and go with it since I can't see a g*!!#-@&* difference between the two?

To console myself I bought some new yarn for a scarf I had decided I needed. I've worn my neutral ivory and beiges Silken scarf so much that the silk is starting to show wear along the edges. I need another in similar colors. Plus, I had a full Yarn Card so spent only $4 + tax for a new Silk Garden scarf I 'need' and for a good diversion.

I may utilize some stash for another diversionary scarf, too. I actually have a tendon in the base of my right thumb that would appreciate a few days or more break from cables. Tomorrow I'll try to get up a post on last weekend's workshops and the origin of the tendinitis - right after I rip 18,656 stitches.

And the Winners Are...

Regular commenter Robin H won first pick in my Blogiversary drawing. Second choice goes to apparently blogless April.

Thanks to everyone who commented. It was good to see so many people. And I will make an effort to spend more time with the groups I've joined on Ravelry - at least some of them.

In the meantime, I have gotten some of the body of my EPS sweater knit.

Look, it's a cable! And the color came out pretty accurate, too.

And, Ryan, I actually bought cotton for my ribbon washcloth. And I believe I have appropriate needles in the same place I am.

E as in Elizabeth Zimmerman and her EPS

I don't purl, I knit back backwards when I knit flat. Really, it's Elizabeth Zimmerman's fault.

Mostly I knit in the round, which comes from various influences: my main knitting instructor Karen Alfke, a feeling that there's a body logic to it, my laziness about finishing work, and having bought a few of Elizabeth Zimmerman's books early on when I took up knitting seriously several years ago.

But when I knit flat, my purl rows run much looser than my knit rows. To get gauge I usually go down two or three needle sizes from the one called for in a pattern.

After reading several of EZ's books, I bought a set of the Knitting Around videos and watched all three over a couple of days. I rewound the bit about knitting back backwards a couple of times. It fascinated me, this technique that eliminated flopping the whole thing over at the end of every row.

(Note that that linked sites reverses the terms from the way EZ, Karen and I use them. What I refer to she shows as purling back.)

A couple years later, knitting back backwards came up in a conversation with Karen. I finally tried it out in a couple of small tests. Recently I finished an entire sweater using the technique.

Besides eliminating the flop, this technique also helps my hands. I've had tendinitis in my hands and wrists more than once. I pick, so mostly use my right hand, the one with the most issues. For me, KBB switches the hand that does the major part of the work and involves a very different set of moves. Each hand almost gets to rest every other row.

And it turns out I KBB slightly more tightly than I knit. Occasionally I knit back enough more tightly to get a bit of rowing out, but so far not so much that it still shows after blocking. I come much closer to pattern needle sizes - when I knit from a pattern.

Before I took Karen's Unpattern class, I'd had exposure to the idea of designing your own sweaters from basic guidelines in Elizabeth's books. It made sense to me, as I'm the kind of shopper who's alway looking for something that's not 'in' this season.

So, it came as a bit of a surprise when I realized this fall that I'd never actually knit any of EZ's ideas.

The EPS sweater I'm actually knitting for Margene's KAL is not the first one I started when I decide to knit an EPS project a few months before. It's not the second, either.

I plan on doing saddle shoulders for this sweater. I also have a three-rib braided cable on the sleeves and plans for a four-rib up the front - my first big cable project. And I want a steeked V-neckline with the ribs flowing up the sides as smaller cable. That last will be my first steek and a challenge, as I'm using a Merino though Aran-weight yarn.

That's a lot of new things to try in one sweater. But my first planned EPS sweater had trickier cable placement, a zipper, and a double-knit collar to also learn how to accomplish. The second used a sock-weight yarn in a simple hemmed stockinette body. After struggling with a provisional cast-on based on Judy's Magic Cast-on and tiny stitches that kept mysteriously increasing in number, I decided a larger gauge might be best for my first attempt at the hard-to-picture instructions for the saddle shoulders. I really want to try those saddle shoulders.

At this point I'm almost done with my sleeves, lacking an inch or two on the second. These did take a couple tries to get the cables and increases worked out the way I wanted them.

I want to try out some shaping techniques I learned at Madrona on the body - more new things in one sweater. These will fall before I connect the sleeves to the body. Though this sweater is the first where I've knit separate sleeves and body in the round, bottom-up, I think I won't feel like I'm doing an EZ sweater until I get to the point where I Unite the parts. That's really where Elizabeth's way of looking at things differently and coming up with logical and/or clever methods kicks in.

I think EZ's attitude in Knitting Without Tears that anything's possible and nothing except split yarn is really a mistake is good to pass on to new knitters. Beyond that, I think most knitters will need a bit of experience to understand and feel comfortable with her patterns. Her terseness seems to me based on an assumption of some basic knowledge that a few projects provide. How much experience is needed depends on your experience with other craft and construction techniques. Anything that gives you experience in imagining how things go together and what construction steps actually create will help you here.

So now I'll go imagine a bit more of my sweater.

Note - You know you're really tired and need to go to bed when you fall asleep not reading but while actually writing. Thus the Monday Musings tag on a Tuesday post.

New Knit Nite

At Madrona I learned that a twice-a-month Knit Nite happens at the WAC, just 8 or 9 blocks from my place. Last night I attended my first one.

Since I arrived a good hour after the start, the conversation was already in full swing. Actually, the size of the group usually resulted in more than one conversation happening at once.

I know one member from the Guild, Sue in red on the left, and I met Jenn, in the black sweater on the right, at Madrona. Otherwise, this group consists of all new-to-me knitters. Still, I felt comfortable as soon as I sat down. I hope my California real estate deals don't keep me from attending at least one of next month's meetings.

One note - even if you only have an eight-block walk home, use the restroom before you leave the bar.

This morning when I got out my EPS sleeve I noticed a little souvenir of Knit Nite. I ignored it for a few more rounds, but then had to try the thing on to see how noticeable it would be. I'm torn as to whether I want to continue to ignore this, rip back and reknit, or rip and start over. I have a couple of other minor things I'd change if I did restart. Interestingly, based on placement I did this before my red wine even arrived.

Ultimately I did the logical thing - started the second sleeve. That should give me some time to come to grips with what needs to happen to Sleeve #1. And I can try the other changes.

Deborah (gray sweater on left), here's the link to the one source I know of for this discontinued yarn. For everyone else, the color is between that in the two photos; a rosy rust called Maple. The price is for a bags of ten balls.

Cables in the Round

In the last two days I've cast on nine times and knit four cuffs for my EZ EPS sweater.

I think this one works, finally.

For some reason yesterday I just couldn't getting my knitting brain to kick in. First I couldn't knit the first row and join in the round successfully. Then I didn't catch that the issue I had with my cable came from not accurately converting the pattern to circular knitting until I'd knit a second cuff.

The 'Wrong Side' rows for the 4-rib braided cable of my swatch are symmetrical so I could just convert knits to purls and purls to knits. (Ignore the unidentified error in the middle of the cable panel below for this discussion.) (K2, P2)x2, P1, (P2, K2)x2 became (P2, K2)x2, K1, (K2, P2)x2 without regard for which direction the stitches traveled.

But the 3-rib braided cable I used for the sleeves has a first row of K3, P4, K2, P2, K2. When I first converted this I forgot that I would not just knit this wrong side row from the right side, but also in the opposite direction so I needed to knit P2, K2, P2, K4, P3. (No, I didn't swatch this cable - officially. Sleeve = swatch) I'm sure I've learned this idea before but (Ssh, don't tell anyone) this is my first non-class or fooling around cable project so this time I had to learn it for real.

The other wrong side rows read Knit the Knit Stitches and Purl the Purl Stitches so no issues there. That actually lead to some confusion as I only had a problem with one row and it was the first one after the cast-on.

Then today, after spending the afternoon looking at Roman art from the Louve and panels from the Gates of Paradise with a very large number of other people, my brain tried and failed to figure out a clever way to start this cuff with a couple rows of something akin to the 2x2 ribbing before morphing into the cable.

I went back to my original plan to start the cable at the sleeve edge and am finally pleased.

While working on the swatch I had an 'Aha' moment and a 'Duh' moment simultaneously. If I intend to knit my sweater in the round, I knit my swatch in the round. Since it usually takes me a couple of needle sizes to get a good gauge, this can take a lot of time and yarn.

However, I also knit in the round on two circular needles - which are knitting opposite sides of the swatch totally independently and can be different sizes. I used a purl row to mark change in needle size on my swatch after I came to this realization.

I made sure to measure row gauge in the center of each side where it would have less influence from the change in gauge.

Note I used my new size 7US Addi Lace needles. I really, really like the way these feel and knit. I do need some shorter ones for this project.

The yarn is Jaeger Extra Fine Merino Aran in Maple. The first photo above shows the color most accurately. Jaeger no longer exists, but Cucumber Patch does still have some.

More Swatching for EPS

Today I remeasured my swatch for my EZ EPS v-neck and found rather than 3 1/2 inches I only had 2 3/4 inches. I continued on it tonight while watching TV and fiddling with photos for Ravelry (and posting a bug report). I have 3 inches now, but will continue for at least another half inch.

Tomorrow I'll take a ferry to Bainbridge and back, so that will make for some good knitting time. I want to get to the point where I can cast on the body before I fly down to California for a few days on Thursday. The body tube should make for good travel knitting. I assume that at this small gauge the body will take quite a while, but I can easily start a sleeve if I need to. These parts don't take much figuring.

Here's a quick overview from KnitPicks on EPS. EPS stands for Elizabeth's Percentage System, a sweater designing sytem from Elizabeth Zimmerman's books.

I also started to reread some sections of Knitting Workshop on the bus today. I was headed to Remedy Teas to meet with my friend, so I did manage to reschedule that meet up before my trip. We enjoyed Remedy, which has 150 teas to choose from and nice light from a wall of windows on this sunny day.

Afterward I found two silk flower arrangements at a store across the street that will work very well in the Bainbridge house in lieu of fresh flowers while it's up for sale. I even managed to get them home unscathed on the bus during rush hour. The woman who sat next to me commented one would go really well on a dining table - the one I planned for the breakfast table.