Knitting Dragonflies

Yay! This definitely was a slog-a-long! I started it in July of 2010 and finished it in July of 2012. Sound the horns, where is my knitting tiara!! But in my defense it was a long road. I had many gauge issues, due to using a yarn that was thick and thin ( Colinette Point Five in the colorway Cardinal,) bought, of course for another pattern, then frogged, ( see this post ).  Now this yarn is a beautiful, hand painted yarn, which is why I bought it, but I detested knitting with it. It seemed to suck all of the moisture out of my hands, (this may just be me). So I had to knit in small increments of time. The skeins are only 55 yds in 100 gms, so I had a crazy strategy of using multiple circular needles to knit it with. I had one circular at the collar, and bottom, and one circular on each sleeve. ( gauge issue post here )   I had the body done, kept the live stitches on all of my circular needles and figured, due to my limited number of balls of yarn, I would knit the esse...

I am in love with top down and bottom up in the round construction for sweaters. Consequently I’m always on the look out for books that use this technique. Wendy’s Custom Knits came out around 2008. I purchased this book off of Amazon without being able to look through it. (I will buy in the round sweater books sight unseen, *grin*). I very much liked the style of the sweater shown on the front cover. I expected this book to be a bit more user friendly for beginning knitters. (like Elizabeth Zimmerman books, she takes you by the hand and leads you through the process if needed, otherwise knit on), I do like her advice of finding styles that work for you, look at the bought sweaters that you own, and flatter you. My favorite is her “reality checklist” for picking a pattern out. I am especially guilty of seeing a photo of a women in a field of flowers, who looks nothing like me, wearing a lovely sweater and have to buy this pattern and yarn. If you follow her checklist, it will elimina...

I did quite a bit of knitting on vacation. The drive there, I was trapped in the car with “the sweater”, so I had no choice but to knit. That was my strategy and it worked, but after 6 solid hours of knitting I was still on the collar! Well really the shawl collar which includes short rows and the front. Due to my yarn shortage I had taken the bottom and sleeves and put them on waste yarn. My strategy was to finish the front/collar, and then see how much I had, if I had enough, finish the bottom. I made my husband stop at a gas station and take photos so I could tell what it looked like, I was trying to tell what it looked like in the front seat of a small car. *grin* . No not there yet! I was surprised at how much knitting it took to get it long enough, basically I just knitted on the collar/front, until I was sick of it, and called it done. I then knitted a bit on the bottom, and then put a k2, p2 ribbing on it. Still knitting on the bottom ribbing here. After I was happy enou...

One of the main reasons I bought the book Custom Knits by Wendy Bernard , is due to this pattern. The model is on the beach looking free and easy, the sweater is oversized and comfortable looking yet complimentary to her figure. And we must always bear in mind that sweaters in books are worn by models, the average size now being a 2-4 US but they actually would prefer a 0. Well as we know, everything looks cute smaller! Never the less, I decided I had to have this sweater. I frogged a ill conceived hoodie from 2 years ago. Of course I had lost all of the yarn info, so I had a mystery amount of it. Slightly bulky with 6 balls I cast on without fear. Since it was top down I hoped I could alter it, if I needed to. Thank goodness for Ravelry, I read all of the helpful comments of those that had gone before me with this pattern and took note. The sweater took off at a great pace. Before I knew it I was on the sleeves! I decided to try to get it done before the week was over! ...