Savannahchik Knits

alternatively entitled, the post that took 3 years to write

It's finally done, and I find myself at a loss for words. I've been done for a full week now, and I still can't quite believe that it's true.

I knit St. Brigid

There were many false starts (including one I never documented). I'm not quite sure why this time did the trick. The color? Maybe. The deadline? Maybe. The encouraging comments? Most definitely.

I have so many people to thank, and I'm positive I'm going to forget some of them. Thanks to Katy for hosting the KAL, Vicki for finishing hers almost 3 years ago and being an awesome cheerleader for my own, Marnie for encouraging me to consider retaining the saddle shoulder, Christy for knowing the right amount of good-natured ribbing to keep me on course (because she knows how fickle I can be!), Jessica and Kristy for enduring our Thursday night get togethers with endless whining about my boredom, EZ because without her I may not have had the courage to consider modifying this sweater as much as I did, and to Maggie Righetti because her chapter on sleeve shapes kicks ass.

I knit this sweater in under 10 weeks, and I don't recommend it. My hands hurt. I was bored. I was hyper-focused every weekend and I was up until 2am the Sunday of Rhinebeck just so I could wear it in 75° heat. In my ideal world I would have taken a break after the body was done, but maybe in my ideal world I never would have finished at all.

specs

pattern St. Brigid by Alice Starmore from Aran Knitting
yarn Cascade 220 Aporto. 9.5 skeins
needles Knit Picks options size 6
mods tons, read my archive for a full list

sleeves and hood

The sleeves came out rather nicely and pretty much as planned (thankyouverymuch Maggie Righetti). There's a lot to share on the sleeves so I'll write that up as a separate post. The quick scoop is that I changed them to a set-in style (but retained the saddles) and knit them 2 at a time because I was afraid I wouldn't take good enough notes to knit them individually.

The hood worked out pretty well too. I knit 4 repeats of the chart up each side and then grafted the 2 sides together (they're mirror images of each other so they grafted together perfectly). My grafting is a bit tight in a couple places so I may go back and loosen that up a tad.

thoughts on the sweater

I never expected this to be a shapely sweater. Having said that, it's still a bit more bulk-adding than I expected. I probably could have gone down an inch or two more in the body and still have been OK, but I wasn't sure because bulkier sweaters need more circumference to fit right.

I love wearing it and love the fact that I finally made it. I've hit a milestone in my knitting that I thought I might never hit, and in doing so I've learned a few new things about why I knit and what it means to me. It's going to take some time to gather my thoughts, so I'll leave that to my next post.

For now, will you excuse me while I pop around town in my new sweater!

Posted by Jody at 10:10 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (100)

After a marathon knitting session yesterday, and a marathon seaming session this morning, all that's left is the hood.

I'm feeling a big relief now that:

• the sleeves are knit
• the sleeve caps fit
• the saddles are knit and look good
• i've tried it on without the use of pins and it still fits!
• i have almost 3 hanks left so i can't possibly run out of yarn
• the only finishing work that remains is to graft the hood -- and I like grafting!

Someone must be on my side because I finished knitting the sleeves at 11:30 last night. By the time they soaked and got rung out and on the blocking board it was midnight. I left the ceiling fan on high overnight, and by 6 am they were bone dry. No kidding, they were completely dry.

I'm looking forward to knitting the hood -- two "small" cables and a huge span of stockinette. My hands will certainly thank me (I think cabling without a cable needle is harder on my hands).

I have lots more to share about how I calculated the sleeves, but I've already taken a 2.5 hour break. I'm still hopeful I'll finish the hood tonight, and since I still have some shopping to do as well as getting a hair cut, buying a pair of prescription sunglasses, laundry and dyeing my hair myself, I best finish tonight or I'll have to start crossing things off my list. We leave for Rhinebeck Thursday after work, so there's not much time left.

The payoff though -- a full day on Friday at the cottage with the girls.

Posted by Jody at 03:34 PM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (50)

I did it! I got through the front!

i'm a little curvy since i'm still unblocked

And damn if it doesn't feel good. For the first time on this project, I feel like it's completely doable. Not just if-I-hope-and-pray-and-don't-have-to-rip-back-too-much-or-f-up-the-armholes-or-the-front-split.

A couple details:

front split

I'm giving enough detail so someone else could copy me if that's of any interest. I'm sure I won't remember this in a few months.

The front consists of 8 repeats of the main cables. I split the front at the start of repeat 6. Instead of continuing with the Chart D (the big center chart) I split them into Chart E (split) Chart C.

Then, to make a smooth edge, I did an attached 3-stitch i-cord edge flanked by a single purl stitch as follows:

row 3 Follow Chart C. You'll have one extra purl stitch in the middle before you start to follow Chart E. Increase 1 using a lifted increase, knit f&b into the center purl stitch (these 2 sts split to form each of the i-cord edges), increase 1 using a lifted increase, and then follow Chart E.

row 4 When you get to the area with the new increases, slip the first increase purlwise wyif, m1 knitwise, slip the next st purlwise wyif. Attach a new ball of yarn, slip next st purlwise wyif, m1 knitwise, slip next st purlwise wyif, knit Chart C.

At this point, your attached i-cord has been setup. Next step is to add in the purl stitch between the i-cord and the cables.

row 5 Knit in pattern until you reach the i-cord. M1 purlwise, k1, slip 1 purlwise wyif, k1. With other ball of yarn, k1, slip 1 purlwise wyif, k1, m1 purlwise, cont with Chart E.

All following WS rows Cont in patt to purl st before i-cord, k1, slip 1 purlwise wyif, k1, slip 1 purlwise wyif. With other ball of yarn, slip 1 purlwise wyif, k1, slip 1 purlwise wyif, k1, cont in patt.

You've now split the neck and have an i-cord on each edge.

setup for hood

As you can probably guess by now, I'm going to continue the cables flanking the i-cord all the way around the hood. To give the hood a comfortable fit, I stopped knitting the center cable one repeat before the end (in other words, I knit 7 repeats instead of 8). Those stitches are on some waste yarn and I'll pick them back up and continue once I start knitting the hood.

armhole decreases

I find that armholes can often distort in the curved area, misshaping it and creating a larger armhole than I wanted. To address this, I slipped the first stitch of each row.

For aesthetics, I also decreased into the armhole. So, at the start of rows I did a k2tog, and at the end of rows, I did a ssk. I did these decreases one stitch in from the edge.

So, decrease rows went as follows (always on a RS row):

Slip 1, k2tog, cont in patt until 3 sts rem, ssk, k1.

All WS rows were:

Slip 1, cont in patt until end

Once the decreases were finished, I stopped slipping the first stitch because I didn't want the armhole to bind. I just wanted to give it some extra support.

shoulder bindoff with cables

This is the place where I winged it the most. If I just bound off I would have had too much cable splay -- the bound off edge would have been wider than the garment itself.

After a little experimentation, the solution that worked in most cases was to decrease whenever 2 cables would have eventually crossed. Occasionally, I'd notice there was still a bit of splay, so I'd tink back, decrease another stitch, and continue on.

staging the front

What would a St Brigid post be without showing you how I took the pics? With autumn's arrival, morning light is getting less abundant. Lolly's post this morning reminded me of my own light tent. So, I took it out of the back of the closet so I could get some decent pics early enough this morning.

Thank you!

If you've made it this far then you deserve a huge thank you! All your comments have really motivated me to keep on going. And while I haven't personally responded to each one, I want you to know how much they're really appreciated. Thank you thank you thank you!

Posted by Jody at 08:01 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (39)

At some point with every sweater project, I lose interest. The same old color and stitch pattern just does me in. I find myself daydreaming about something new -- lace! smaller needles! a scarf! bamboo needles! pink!

If it wasn't for Rhinebeck I'm sure I'd have put aside St Brigid for a timeout -- inevitably to be finished another year. But since I've publicly declared I'll be wearing St Brigid, and since I really want to, I'm not quitting.

But I did need to pump myself up about this sweater again.

I pinned together the front-in-progress and the back so I could try it on.

There were a few nagging concerns I had about sizing:

• Would it be wide enough? I made it a little wider than most of my sweaters to compensate for the thick cables, but would it be enough? I want a well-fitting sweater, not a hug-my-curves sweater.
• Was the length good?
• Did I choose a good armhole depth?

I'm happy to report Yes! Yes! and Looking Good!

The width and length are great. The armholes look good (the armhole goes higher than my bra), but until I have the front done it's hard to know for sure. I had to guess where the back would sit on my body to compensate for the to-be-knit saddles.

While I'd be lying if I told you I still wasn't yearning to knit something lacy, pink and on smaller bamboo needles, I can say I'm ready to tackle the rest of the front. Wish me luck? Hopefully I'll be back soon with a finished front.

Posted by Jody at 08:59 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (29)

I finally cast off the back yesterday.

It took longer than I expected because I had to decide how I wanted to do the hood on the front in order to determine how many stitches to allocate to each shoulder. I think I've come up with a great plan -- I'm really excited and can't wait to see how the front hood transition works.

I wanted to block the back before I cast on for the front. I needed to make sure it blocked out to the measurements I expected -- and if not, come up with a plan for the front that would take that into account. Fortunately, it blocked out well and I'm good to go without any further mods to the front.

You may be wondering why I didn't do any neck shaping. This is because the saddle will create that neck shaping. So, all I had to do was slope the shoulders a bit. I'm still a little concerned with how I'm going to attach the saddles to the pieces, but I have a long way to go before I get to try that out.

oops

I only had 8 rows left on the back when I looked down and realized I missed crossing the center cable about 10 rows down. I knew if I didn't fix it right away I might end up avoiding it for a while, so I knit to that point and dropped down that section and re-knit it. After a wet block I can't tell (phew!)

pictures are hard

Getting pics of something as big and textured as the back wasn't easy.

First, I placed it on my coffee table and propped it up with one of my all-time favorite cookbooks*. I got good lighting but I couldn't keep the camera steady enough.

Of course, I couldn't tell that in my viewfinder, so it wasn't until I saw them on my screen that I realized I needed more pics.

Finally, the one that worked was propping it on the side of the coffee table and resting my camera on the step stool. It's still not perfect though. You might be wondering why I didn't just use the tripod. I'm wondering the same thing.

* My favorite cookbook -- CookWise by Shirley Corriher. It's no wonder this book got a James Beard Award for 1998 Cookbook of the Year. She doesn't just give you good recipes, she explains why things work and don't. In 1970 she divorced her husband and had to find a way to support her three boys. She's a biochemist by training and was the cook at the boys' school she and her husband founded, so she tuned to cooking. After 30 years in the food profession, she wrote Cookwise -- teaching you things like how to determine if a recipe is appropriately leavened, and why you need to do things like cream butter and sugar a lot -- it's the bubbles! I love her approach. She gives us the knowledge we need to create great food on our own, and includes recipes for lots of staples like breadbaking, pie crust, cookies and cakes, cooking proteins (meats), and making non-lumpy sauces. And since it was published exactly 10 years ago today, I thought it was a sign that I should give her a little plug.

Posted by Jody at 09:00 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (32)

Who knew my sleeve discussion would elicit so many differing opinions. I really didn't anticipate that. But, I'm glad it happened -- it really got me thinking about what I wanted to do, and what defined "St Brigid" to me.

In the end, I've decided to do a set-in sleeve with a saddle shoulder. Marnie was the first to suggest this, and I think it's going to work well.

I didn't come to this decision lightly. I sketched and sketched, and poured over pics of sweaters online to find something similar to each that I was considering.

What finally got me was when I stumbled upon a few pics of Demi from Rowan Vintage Knits. The button band works very much like a shoulder saddle and it was all I needed to convince myself that this option can work with a set-in sleeve aran sweater. Here's a pic of Kate's Demi to show you what I mean.

The Schedule

I am a bit behind on my schedule. I've been doing a lot of work on the house and garden, and didn't even knit 2 weekends ago at all. I'm almost caught up, and have knit until my thumb started to hurt. I should be back to knitting tonight, and if I finish the back by Friday I think I'll be OK -- I'll still have 2 weekends left to knit on the front, and that's really the bulk of my knitting time.

The Next Question

Once I start the front, I'm going to have to decide:

• Where to split the front for the start of the hood split?
• What to do with the cables once the split starts?
• What, if anything, do I want to do with the edge of the hood?

All these decisions are slowing me down, but they're necessary if I'm going to get the sweater I want in the end.

Posted by Jody at 01:28 PM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (26)

As I've been knitting I've been giving a lot of thought to how I want to tackle the sleeves. As I see it, I have three options, each with their pros and cons.

1. Modified drop shoulder
2. Set-in sleeves
3. Raglan

If you recall, I'm modifying the sleeves so I can reduce some of the bulk. Drop shoulders always add bulk. But, on someone who has a torso that's much bigger than their shoulders the drop shoulder is even less flattering. Why? As people get larger, their shoulders get larger at a much slower rate than their torsos.

A quick check at the CYC's Women's Size Charts shows that for women whose bust measurements range from 28 - 42 inches, their shoulder width only ranges from 14 - 17.5 inches. That means, while the body of their garments increased 7 inches (7 inches for one half of the body, say, just the front), their shoulders only increased half of that. The amount of additional fabric in the underarm area has doubled!!

What this means is that the larger your torso is, the more difficult it's going to be for a drop shoulder silhouette to look good on you.

The drop shoulder has got to go.

Shoulder Shaping

In addition to modifying the sleeve, I'm also adding in some shoulder shaping. This will also help with the extra underarm fabric. Shoulder shaping mimics the actual slope of our shoulders. You're going to get a better fit any time you can make the garment mimic your shape more closely.

OK, on to the sleeves.

Modified drop shoulder

Pros

• Most similar to the original design. I could even keep the shoulder saddles, which I consider a real plus.
• Least disruptive to the cable patterning.
• Easiest modification to execute.

Cons

• Will still leave some extra fabric under the arm.
• Hardest to estimate the true look of because I don't have any sweaters that fit this way.

Set-in Sleeve

Pros

• Best fit -- will eliminate the most bulk.

Cons

• I couldn't retain the shoulder saddles. Well, technically I could but I think they'd look very awkward.
• While I like the way this sleeve fits, I'm afraid it might change the overall look of the sweater.

Raglan Sleeve

Pros

• Will eliminate some bulk
• Fun to knit -- each row gets shorter!

Cons

• Since it's knitted from the bottom up, I'd have to figure out how to knit the sleeves so the cables match up. While not impossible, cursing and hissy fits will certainly be likely.
• If set-in sleeves would change the look, raglans will change the look even more.

Given all that, which way do you think I should go? Before I drew up the sketches I was strongly leaning toward the modified drop. But after looking at the sketches, I'm seriously reconsidering the set-in sleeve. Although, I keep getting stuck on that saddle shoulder. Hmm...

Posted by Jody at 10:41 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (25)

Kathleen and Vicki hit the nail on the head. It was the old guard article with the pic of Alice wearing her very own St Brigid that did me in. The moment I turned the page and saw that it was all over. I even picked a shade similar to hers.

I find it interesting that my St Brigid KAL buddies were the only ones to note that Alice was wearing St Brigid in the pic. Once that sweater is in your blood it's there for good. I've considered knitting it several times a year and have cast on for it no less than 4 times -- you can see 2 shades of green here in December 05, natural in December 04, and dark gray in August 04. I also remember a purple/black shade of Cascade 220 called Rainier Heather, but it doesn't look like I blogged about it.

So in this case 6th time is a charm because I am 100% sold on this color.

stop laughing Christy i'm serious here

It's no surprise either, given that it very closely matches one of my all-time favorite sweaters.

So are you curious who won?

Six of you guessed St Brigid out of 45 votes, and....

Kathleen won!

Congratulations Kathleen! It seems fitting that you won since you're a big part of the reason I started and have continued to be obsessed with this sweater for so long.

What did Kathleen win? Well, I'm not sure yet. We're in talks now :)

St Brigid in 10 weeks?

Yeah, it'll be tight. And, just like you'd expect, I have a few mods planned.

Firstly, I'm going to adjust the sleeves. I'm not sure yet if I'm going to do a modified drop sleeve or a set-in sleeve. I hadn't considered a set-in sleeve for an aran, but the Phildar Hoodie has set-in sleeves and it looks pretty good.

I'm also planning to adjust the neckline. While I love the look, a round neck is not a good shape for me. I'm considering a hood but I need to give some more thought to how the transition from front cables to hood can work.

Here's my rough schedule in order to stay finish on time:

• back: 2 weeks through Aug 26th
• front: 2 weeks through Sept 9th
• sleeve 1: 1.5 weeks through Sept 19th
• sleeve 2: 1.5 weeks through Sept 30th
• hood: 1 week through Oct 7th
• finishing: 1 week through Oct 14th

That takes up every weekend from now through Rhinebeck. I probably don't need 2 weeks total for the hood and finishing, but a little slack in a schedule is always a good thing.

For you, my dear readers, this may not be very exciting. This leaves very little room for me to knit anything other than St Brigid. This also means that my festival stash won't get any smaller.

But, if I can walk around Rhinebeck wearing St Brigid, I'll be just fine with that.

just in case you're thinking of warning me about indian summer and how Rhinebeck was really warm 2 years ago -- i don't care. it's not that i'm denying that it can happen, but Rhinebeck is all about celebrating fall knitting to me. if it's too warm to wear a sweater like St Brigid then i'll walk around in a tshirt, with my st brigid tied around my waist i'm sure ;)

Posted by Jody at 04:42 PM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (28)

The past couple weeks have been great -- busy, lots of family and friends, and some plain ol hanging out and knitting. I hope you all had wonderful holidays. It seems that I'm quite predictable this time of year. Looking back on my postings last December I see I didn't post for two weeks around Christmas last year as well. Guess I'm more of a creature of habit than I'd like to admit.

Christmas did bring a few new knitting things (including one really special one). Maybe you'll be able to pick it out:

I have had countless copies of Aran Knitting on my watch list on eBay for well over a year. I had set a price ceilling that was quite unreasonable and I knew I'd never actually get a copy -- on my own.

I've never actually seen a copy in person. I know I could have gotten a copy from a library, but I sorta enjoyed the waiting.

Now that I've gotten a chance to look through the book I know what all the fuss is about. The first few chapters are chock full of history. Reading through I've learned how the aran evolved and why it was created. Reading those chapters gave me just the boost I needed to do this:

Yup, I've cast on (yet again) for St Brigid. I've actually cast on twice this past week (there's more of that habit again. Christy I know you're laughing right now). I started out with Black Water Abbey yarn in Moss(the bottom one). I love the yarn. The depth of color cannot be beat. But, even knit on US 5 it was still a bigger than what the pattern called for. After a full repeat I admitted to myself that the yarn was just not right (Mary Beth you were SO right!).

So I headed down to Rosie's yesterday and found a beautiful shade of Araucania. My mom (not a knitter) says it looks like velvet. The shadings in this batch are quite subtle. The cables are popping beautifully. Araucania is a little lighter weight so I went with US 6s instead of 7s. I'm knitting the larger size and it's coming out somewhere between the two -- just what I was hoping for.

Now if you'll excuse me it's time for me to get back to my Christmas knitting.

Posted by Jody at 01:06 PM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (12)

Ahhhhhh! That's how I can best sum up my feeling this week. I survived the craziness that work brought on right before Christmas and I'm now enjoying a week+ off work.

Christmas was wonderful! My Mom, brother and sil came over Christmas day. I cooked and baked like crazy and things went off smoothly.

As for gifts, I couldn't be luckier! I got a new digital camera* (I've been coveting one for months), some accessories for it (including a tripod for some solo picture taking sessions), a blocking board, the knitter's purse, a new crock pot, some candles and a few other smaller items. The blocking board is backordered so I'm still waiting to see it.

Monday I spent the day at my mom's and it was just what I needed. I sat on the couch and knitted ALL DAY! I got through 1.5 repeats on St Brigid (uhm, in a new colorway):

I think this is finally it. I was forcing it to be a dark color and it just didn't fit. The cables pop beautifully -- just what this pattern needed.

Yesterday I got together with Katy in the city. We stopped by a very crowded Purl. And can you believe it? I didn't buy a single skein of yarn! I did however get a bargain on AS's Celtic Collection -- 13 bucks! I couldn't leave it behind.

After Purl we ate lunch at a Thai place and then found a coffee shop to get in some knitting. I brought along another new project -- Clapotis:

What a great little pattern! So easy to memorize, and the dropping of the stitches makes you just want to keep knitting. I can completely understand why people say they'd want to make more than one.

I also joined Alison's sockapalooza. What could be better than getting my very own pair of handknit socks! Made just for me -- not by me!

As for the rest of the week, I have more of the same planned. More knitting, more getting together with friends, and lots more knitting.

I'm going to take off the rest of the week from blogging and come back refreshed on Monday. I just don't want to spend much time in front of the computer and I don't want to write entries just to write them.

So, I'll be back -- bright-eyed and bushy-tailed -- next week.

Have a wonderful New Year!

* the blurry pics can be blamed on the learning curve for the new fancy-schmancy camera.

Posted by Jody at 07:37 AM in Clapotis, St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (10)

Lots and lots more to go!

I finished one whole repeat on St Brigid. I'm still in love with the Silky Wool.

dark grey yarn + grey day = poor pic

That's the best pic I was able to get. The yarn and overcast skies is making for bad blog imagery.

Thanks for all your suggestions last week about the wonky single knit stitches. I've been pulling the purls REALLY REALLY tightly and it has been helping. It's not perfect but it's much improved. I'll post a pic when I can get a decent one of the stitches.

Starmore Row Gauge?

I've heard comments about it being really difficult to attain Starmore's row gauge. Does anyone know what a full repeat should measure? My row gauge is tighter than it should be. So even though I'm short I will be doing all 8 repeats. No shortcuts on this sweater!

Funny thing is, I thought people typically got fewer rows per inch than her gauge.

Posted by Jody at 08:46 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (1)

Remember my St. Brigid swatch from a few days ago?

The astute observer may have noticed that my single knit stitches are wonky. I don't know what to do to fix it. I've tried making sure I tighten the yarn when I switch from P to K and then back to P. Isn't really working. I've tried wrapping the yarn in the other direction and untwisting it on the WS row. Also didn't do the trick.

What else can I do? I'm really annoyed with the way it looks and for some reason I just can't seem to get it right! Grrrrr.....

Posted by Jody at 09:38 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (4)

I did a few more rows on St Brigid last night and I love the way the cables are showing up!

The yarn is a dream to knit. It's soft and it doesn't split. And at almost 200 yards per hank it's a good value too.

Posted by Jody at 07:47 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (2)

I was greeted by a UPS box swen I went to get the mail before we left for Cape May on Thursday. I had placed on OldNavy.com order and thought it was that. Since I ordered fall clothing I almost didn't even open it. But boy was I glad I did. It was my Webs order!!!! Amazingly, the person who took my order must have went back into the warehouse right then and there to pick my order.

So you know what came with me to Cape May, right? Yup, a cone of Donegal Tweed in grey heather.

It's a gorgeous yarn that reminds me alot of Rowan Felted Tweed. The big difference between the two is that the Donegal is a much harsher yarn. The alpaca in the FT makes for a very soft hand.

I swatched and washed on Friday morning. I got perfect stitch gauge the first time round after washing! Here's the swatch:

I'm not sure how obvious it is in the pic, but I was a little concerned about being able to distinguish texture in this yarn. The swatch is done in double seed stitch and it's not that clear. It looks sorta bubbly but you can't really see the texture clearly.

I cast on and decided I'd see how it looked after a few rows. I got through about 10 rows when I finally had to concede. It just wasn't showing the texture of the cables enough. I think it's a combo of the darker yarn plus the tweed that's just too much to show off cables.

I did go into Cape May's LYS -- Fiber Arts Yarn Shop. I'll write a full review (probably tomorrow) but for now I'll tell you that while they did carry a few contenders I couldn't find a color I liked that had enough stock. This sweater takes a ton of yardage!

So yesterday I decided to stop by another LYS and purchased a yarn I never would have expected for this sweater -- Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool. I also thought this yarn felt too silky for my taste, but the store had a sweater sample and the washed yarn was beautiful! I wasn't concerned about cables showing clearly in this yarn since that's what Elsebeth is known for. I went with a medium grey (big surprise, right?). Here's my swatch:

The texture shows up much better in this yarn. In its prewashed state it felt very airy, but it bloomed alot once washed. The yarn is lightweight and spongy. I'm very happy with it.

Once I finished swatching I did cast on for it again, but I only got through a few rows. I'll post pics later in the week once there's something worth showing.

Cape May

We had a great time! I took some pics and I'll get together a mini-album of them later in the week.

Posted by Jody at 08:21 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (6)

A big thank you goes out to everyone who gave me input and advice on my yarn choice. I did some more thinking about it last night as well.

I was very tempted to order some Alice Starmore yarn. The tweeds are amazingly complex and it has a lovely spin to it. But, I've had some bad experience lately trying to choose colors over the web and I didn't want to risk spending all that money on AS yarn and being disappointed.

I do have the Leo scarf kit so I looked thru the colors to see if there was something that jumped out at me. While I did find a reddish brown and a blue that were "OK", none were quite the shade I had in mind.

So, the AS yarn will have to wait for another day.

And then Naomi's comment came through. She mentioned she ordered some Donegal Tweed from Webs. I checked out Webs and Wow! This is it. At $10/pound -- that's 15 bucks with a couple hundred extra yards -- I'm comfortable taking a chance. Heck, if I really dislike them all I can probably offload them on eBay for a profit.

I couldn't decide so I ordered 3 colors: Dark Blue Heather w/med blue nubs (#2012), Dark Grey w/med blue nubs (#2013), and Teak w/rust nubs (#3232). The woman said it can take 2-3 weeks to get the orders delivered. Ugh! I mentioned that I wanted to get started on my knitalong Sept 1st and she said she'd try to get back there and pull the yarn herself if it was possible. *fingers crossed*

So, an extra big thank you goes out to Naomi for pointing out this sale to me.

Posted by Jody at 08:38 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (10)

I was over reading Katy's blog yesterday when I saw she is co-hosting a St. Brigid along. I really shouldn't be starting another project -- especially another big cabley one. But as luck has it I finally have my hands on the pattern. I've loved this one for a long long time. I don't think I can bear to watch the St. Brigids unfolding before my eyes.

Last night I found myself here perusing yarn colors. Can you believe it though, VY doesn't seem to have a good heathery grey! I've been considering grey or a navy. I know you're thinking the navy would be too dark. Be in person I've seen some gorgeous dark cabled sweaters and they look really nice. Plus, if I'm going to be putting in all that effort it might as well be in a color I love.

So, I'm considering a few other yarn choices:

• Rowan Felted Tweed - I've always loved this yarn and its light weight is a definite plus for such a big sweater.
• Rowan Yorkshire Tweed DK - Nice color choices as well, but with a heavier hand.
• Jaegar Matchmaker Merino - Large color palette and machine washable

I've also been considering Araucania Nature Wool. I'm making one sweater from a drabby green right now and it does show up cables nicely. It would certainly be an economical choice.

So dear readers, please weigh in with your opinions. Do you like one of the ones I listed? Any bad experiences? Or, have a better yarn in mind?

I'm not concerned as much with price on this one as I am with a yarn that will be a good long-term choice. This will undoubtedly be my biggest project I've ever undertaken and I want to make sure I pick the right yarn to go with it.

Posted by Jody at 08:49 AM in St Brigid | Permalink | Comments (7)