My profuse apologies for the problems with Knitting Chatters last night. My host’s server kept crashing (I guess - I don’t really know) and it would come up at widely spaced intervals for a few minutes at a time and then crash again. As of 12:15 AM, it came up - again briefly - and promptly died. Again. I hope none of you wasted too much time or got too frustrated. I keep telling myself that these things happen - but it doesn’t help much…
I intended to start another Avalanche vest but you all know how it is with good intentions. Road to hell and all that… See, I was looking through the Knitty archives and ran across Coronet which I have long admired. What had stopped me was the picking up of all those stitches along the edge of the cable band. However, since I had picked up lots of stitches for the ribbing on the little vest, this didn’t seem quite so daunting. So I decided to give it a try.
And I keep thinking about using that lovely cable for socks :)
Have a great weekend!
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LOVE the Coronet, especially the color. But then again, I may be biased since Coronet is one of my favorite hat patterns and pink lemonade is one of my favorite drinks!
A couple of years ago, I knit two Coronets, one with a mistake and one the “right” way--and I discovered that I much preferred the version with the mistake.
In the “wrong version,” I didn’t make the cabled band so that it would fold up. When I picked up the stitches, instead of facing it inwards the way the pattern says, I positioned the band so that it was already facing out. This meant I had to make the top of the hat longer but, in the end, it all worked out. Ultimately, not folding the cable band up, made the hat look a little more tailored, IMHO.
I love the hat. You may feel the need to master the technical part of even dye. But esthetically that colour variation is gorgeous. To me it says “handmade”.
Chat told me about twenty times last night that I had entered the room, but would not let me chat. So maybe next week.
The “mystery” looks to me as if you are trying a Faroese shape in crochet. Lovely colour. Is that the yarn Abi sent?
Have a great weekend.
i like the variation in the hat coloring-
there is another knitty pattern that i find works wonderfully for what we consider winter down here in the sweltering south- it’s ‘nakiska’
http://www.knitty.com/issuewinter03/PATTnakiska.html
i’ve made variations on it for all the cold ears in my family-
i’m glad to see you are making something for yourself- the wool-ease socks will be just right for keeping your feet warm- couldn’t you do some of your famous ‘robbyn swatching’ by first knitting a few inches using the cable pattern and then a few inches using your standard sock numbers and then comparing the two to get an idea of how much the cable will pull in?
your ‘mystery item’ is moving along nicely- can’t wait to see the finished product-
stay happy- 
So, your crocheted project looks to me like a top-down sweater. Did I ruin the surprise? I made my first top-down sweater in crochet, mainly b/c crochet is so much faster, and I wanted to see if the top-down concept really works. It does. And now I’m in the middle of making three top-down knit sweaters.
There was one problem, though. I did my sweater in double crochet, and although I knew I needed to change the rate of my increases, I didn’t change it enough. I increased on every round, but the double crochets were so long that by the time the sweater was big enough around, it was really long! My underarms are really low! I think I should’ve increased every round, and maybe every second or third round should’ve had an EXTRA increase. I think maybe half-double crochet increased every round, or alternating double and single rounds increased every round would work. My next crocheted sweater will be alternating single and double crochet rounds in a sport weight yarn from Barlett’s yarns. And this time the underarms won’t be dragging the ground. :-)
Ryan - Thanks a bunch :) If I hadn’t had your little vest to show me that picking up more than a few sock gusset stitches wouldn’t kill me, I might never have tried it! That would have been a shame because it’s a beautiful hat and a nice pattern. I had a lot of fun working this.
Amaryllis - Wow - what a nice spin you put on that! To me it looks kind of blotchy but the way I see things isn’t absolute. I like the way you see thing :)
Sorry about the chat; that was a bummer…
Barb - Funny you should mention it - I looked at “Nakiska” too :) Great minds think alike!
Clever girl - that’s exactly what I did last night. Cast one the number of stitches for one repeat and did a couple on inches in stockinette - then switched to the cable pattern and did a couple of repeats of that. Measured them both and figured out what I’d need to add in stitches to make up for the cable-constriction :) I started the sock this morning!
Marcy - Oh forgive me, please, but I am just rolling on the floor at the mental image of a sweater, the armpits of which drag on the ground. Thanks for the giggle :)
I think Coronet has come out just loverly> I think I will have to make one for our little Scootie too, but I don’t know if I have any pink stash yarn… hmm… will have to go check ;)
My guess on the mystery is that it is a shawl of some kind :)
Nat - Oooh - Scootie would look wonderful in a wee Coronet! Do post pictures!
Is that color of Wool-Ease Blue Heather by chance? If so, I think you will like the way it comes out with cables. I made a sampler afghan with this color, and although it’s kind of dark, cables look lovely in it.
Mary - The ball band calls it Blue Bell but it certainly heathery. It’s a strong, medium blue with some white or light grey added to it.
You’re right; I started cabling last night and they look fantastic!
