January 2024 Round-Up – Busy with Secrets

Rebecca

January 31

Here it is, already the last day of January! I have been hard at work, but... mostly with stuff I can't show you. It's been a massive month of finishing and testing new designs, and working ahead on cool stuff for the Wool Circle.

Sampling my way through the drafts for January, February, and March.

The Wool Circle episodes, if you're interested, were an initial discussion of twist (Episode 109) and a discussion of default yarn (Episode 110). This is the big kick-off for our two-year study of The Spinner's Book of Yarn Designs by Sarah Anderson. I keep comparing this study to the 51 Yarns book study we did years ago, but this is a bit of a different animal. More choose-your-own-adventure, this is going to evolve as it goes.

The hexie blanket is done! But I'm not going to show it to you for realsies yet. The Wool Circle has hung in there for months upon months of hearing me wax poetic about these hexagons, so they get to see it first, in March. I know I promised for ages that I would do posts about each hexagon here, but when I sat down to do it, it felt like repeating my work. I think when I post about the blanket here finally, we'll be able to look at them in context on the blanket, and figure out what overarching lessons I learned about combo drafting.

I guess that's the down side of having outlets for sharing your art. Regular monthly updates only get the leftovers. Let's see, what can I say?

I reached a milestone with my Solaris vest/cardigan. This is a free pattern that Rachel made many moons ago, and I've long had it in my sights for use with my black rainbow sparkle handspun. It's an interesting pattern, as you knit two wide fronts and a deep shawl collar in one big piece.

After I finished the Attune shawl, I figured I would make Solaris my new project for those moments when I was in between hexagons and test knits. Knitting on it one day and another, the two fronts are finished.

I have been altering this pattern as I go to try to fit the yarn I have. The original rainbow sparkle batt I purchased was about 3 oz, and I bought about 1 lb of black Corriedale from Louet, thinking I'd have enough for a sweater. However, the worsted-spun three-ply worsted-weight yarn that I made was on the dense side - good for durability, not good for stretching your wool.

So I made a plan that will allow me to adapt the pattern as I go. I made the fronts-and-collar piece first. By the time I was up to the first armhole, I knew I would not have enough rainbow yarn to knit the fronts as wide as I had planned. There's a lot of overlap in the pattern; I'd just have to reduce that. So I bound off twice as much for the armholes, and the fronts will stretch around to the back.

I've cast on for the back now, minus the extra stitches appropriated from the front. When I get to the armholes I'll just skip the initial bind-off and go straight to the gradual decreases. I've used this technique before to change sizes on a pieced sweater when the gauge wasn't quite going my way.

When I'm done the back, I'll re-engineer the sleeves to knit them two-at-a-time, top down. And I'll knit 'till I run out of yarn. I expect to get some kind of cap sleeve length, and I'll evaluate when I'm done whether that actually looks good.

I would rather have had a full-size cardigan, but I'm also glad to be using up all the yarn!

The other little in-between project I've been picking away at is these crochet pillow covers. I started by crocheting a granny square, and just kept going until I ran out of yarn, not knowing what I was going to make. When I finished the first one, I realized I could fold it like an envelope to cover my small couch cushions, and turn a simple square into something really cute!

I finished them the other night. The dogs have been enjoying lying on them so far, and I have to keep telling the kids not to pick them up by the netting to throw them around. We'll see how long they last. These pillows had a handwoven cover on them, and it had gotten pretty beat up. This is a fresh look, at least. The yarn was two balls of Bernat "Pop!" given to me by a fellow knitter and quilter who moved away from Rankin when she retired this year.

Dooner was gifted some Paw Patrol fabric for Christmas from her grandma, and we cut out pieces this week to make a log cabin quilt top.

Um... what else? I haven't gotten out much. Monday night crafting group has been meeting at the library, which is awesome. Hockey is still going, though I'm not sure Mini Mighty always enjoy sit very much. The car is in and out of the shop, as per usual. The church's AGM went well. I've lost 5 lbs and I'm liking Noom still. Dooner is home in the mornings now, and we're on a morning screen detox, so we do things like cut fabric and have logic puzzle school for her MapleLea dolls.

This is a time of year when we tend to be home a lot, and I tend to be very productive with my crafts. I'm trying to take advantage of that by front-loading all my "content" work for the year. (Isn't "content" the worst word?) I am really enjoying it, and you'll get to see it all eventually, don't you worry. Thanks very much to those of you who come and read. I hope you are having your own cozy winter hibernations!