Once upon a time, there were three sweaters. I knitted them all. All names of sweaters are Ravelry project names, but I didn't link them. You'll see why soon.
There was "Tappan Zealand"
and "My Casual Red Cardigan"
Here they are in a pile on the dining table on the evening of Friday, August 2, 2013.
And this is their state on the morning of Saturday, August 3, 3013.
Tappan Zealand
Cosima in Lime
And My Casual Red Cardigan.
And just for fun, the lovely Lindsay, AKA Shnoodle, wearing My Casual Red Cardigan as a bouffant. She earned it; she's the one who broke that sweater down. I did the other two.
For some reason, knitters tend to like to break themselves into smaller groups. Continental versus English style (or pickers versus throwers and then you have to take out the "flickers" and the lever knitters). Only natural fibers versus only man-made fibers. Wool versus cotton. Linen versus silk.
And don't get me started on knitting versus crochet. As you know, I'm firmly in the knitting camp. I can crochet, but I'm not a fan of the look of the fabric, so I only use my ability to crochet as a tool, sometimes to put an edge on a knitted garment, etc.
Anyway, one of the larger divides in knitting tribes, at least from what I can tell, is product versus process. A product knitter wants the finished product, and she wants it to fit well, and to be wearable (or useful if it's not a garment). A process knitter doesn't care about the finished object; it's all about the actual knitting. The journey as opposed to the destination. Personally, I think it's kind of bullshit. Every knitter has a bit of both tendencies.
That said, I'm primarily a product knitter. Spending all the time (and the money) that I do on a project, I want it to be useful, to fit me properly, and to be flattering. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the process immensely. I find it very soothing and meditative, and I really like watching my hands as they form the stitches. But, when I'm done, if that thing that I've worked so hard making isn't what I want, then I'm pissed. Usually mostly at myself, but sometimes also at the yarn and the pattern. These three sweaters are prime examples of projects that didn't work out the way I wanted them to. Essentially, they represented a drawer full of yarn that I couldn't use because it was already sweaters.
The Tappan Zealand was finished more than 3 years ago in July 2010. I wore it more than I wore the other 2, but less than a dozen times. It didn't fit quite right through the armhole (armscye if you're being all snooty), and I found I fiddled with it a lot to get it to lie properly as I was wearing it. Also, I seem to have poorly executed a spit splice, and it developed a hole that I couldn't fix. I love the yarn, which Shnoodle brought back from New Zealand for me after I allowed Maggie and The Pickle to come live with us while she was on the trip. It's really, really special yarn, and I want the project that it's made of to be one that I'm proud to wear/display. It really was a pretty easy choice to frog this once to reuse the yarn.
Cosima in Lime is a prime example of yarn substitution gone wrong. I actually chose the correct thickness of yarn and the same alpaca/wool blend that the pattern called for, but I chose (unknowingly) a very dense single ply yarn when the yarn specified in the pattern was a multi-plied much lighter yarn. I got the specified gauge and I liked the fabric while I was knitting it, but when I put it on, the sweater was stiff and heavy. It was like wearing lime green armor. I wore it out once and then it went into the drawer, never to be worn again.
My Casual Red Cardigan was a new sort of construction, top down contiguous set-in sleeves. The contiguous method of construction is really interesting, but it didn't work for me. I'm narrow through the shoulders and busty at the same time, and this sweater really didn't allow for my body type. I tried to wear it once, and didn't like it. I never even bothered to put buttons on it. I think I always knew it was destined for Friday Night's Main Event.
Friday night came around, and I got out the swift, the niddy-noddy, and some sharp scissors plus I had a nice bottle of red wine open, and we got to work. It took about 4-1/2 hours total with me doing Tappan Zealand and Cosima In Lime and Shnoodle doing My Casual Red Cardigan, and by the end my back hurt, but the job was done. The lovely, lovely yarn had been released from it's (mostly) wrongful imprisonment and is again free to be knit.
I know that there are knitters out there who are horrified by the thought of doing this. Even Shnoodle said, "why don't you just cast on a sweater that does fit?" And I could have chosen that, but the ill fitting, not perfectly executed sweaters in that drawer were doing me no good in that drawer. The yarn for each of them is lovely and deserves to be seen. So I'm going to take the skeins that we made, soak and dekink them, and then put them in the stash and allow them to marinate until the perfect yarn/pattern combo presents itself. And then they will rise again.
No comments:
Post a Comment