Half and Half

It's finished; maybe.  This is the shell I've been working on for a few weeks.  The design is called Fifty Fifty by Laura Cunitz and you can find it on Knitty.com.  I'm calling mine Half and Half.

If you've been following this, you'll know that I've made a few adjustments to the number of stitches to eliminate a four stitch gap in the pattern which appears where the round joins on one side.  I'm happy to report that the finished item does indeed fit, with no awkward gaps around the arms - something that is always a risk with a tank top - and that the pattern now lines up and repeats as it should.

There are some details on this that I really like, such as a really interesting stitch pattern along the arms and the neck

as well as a pretty panel at the back of the neck

I had hoped to photograph this while wearing it, but everyone else is out for the day, and I'm not good at taking self portraits.

As for the maybe at the beginning, I'm undecided if I'm going to leave this white, or if I should dye it.  I don't often wear white because I usually manage to stain it but I still have my two original swatches so I can play with colours.

So what do you think?  Dye it or leave it as it?

Modifying a Sweater, Part II - Fiddling with Ease

Back to my adjustments on the Fifty Fifty tank. We left off with a discussion of swatches. Here are the two that I did. They were machine washed and laid flat to dry. 

At that time, I liked the second one more, the one worked on 3.75 mm needles but after drying I like the look, drape and feel of the 4 mm swatch more. So that is what I'm going to use.

Now for the math. I do this using Microsoft Excel but any spreadsheet will work. So will a basic calculator. I start by seeing what my gauge is on the swatch I chose. Measure a section that is 4" wide and count the number of stitches. Then divide that number by four to get the stitches / inch. In my case, I measured 21 stitches over 4 inches so my stitches per inch count is 5.25.

Next step is to figure out a few numbers. This is where I fiddle with the ease. What is ease? It's the difference between your body measurement and the garment measurement. Zero ease means they are the same, positive ease means the garment is larger than you, while negative ease means the garment is smaller than you. I don't particularly like negative ease - I find it to be too snug for my taste and comfort but I don't want this to be a big, loose top either. So I'd ideally like something with between .25 and 1" of positive ease. I create a small grid in Excel and calculate the numbers I would need to cast on for a variety of eases from zero to one inch positive ease. This is very simply the measurement times the stitches per inch so 41 inches times 5.25 = 215.25.  

	Measurement	0.25" ease	0.5" ease	0.75" ease	1" ease
Sample size	41	41.25	41.5	41.75	42
Stitches 4mm	215.25	216.5625	217.875	219.1875	220.5

Next look at the pattern. There is actually a chart which shows me that there is a 12 stitch repeat, plus 14 stitches at the end to make up a round. Some more math gave me 12 stitches x 17 repeats + 14 stitches at the end = 218. This is right in the middle of my target numbers so I'm going to work with this. Normally, I wouldn't like an odd number of pattern repeats but remember that in this case, those 14 stitches at the end make up the 18th repeat so I'll be able to divide this evenly for front and back. So I've learned that I'll need to cast on 218 stitches which will give me about half an inch of positive ease as I am not putting any waist shaping in this top.

Now back to the pattern again. There is an unusual cast on method provided which I decided to try which required half again as many stitches as my actual stitch count. So 218/2=109.  218+109 = 327. This is workable, but I don't like uneven numbers. If I bump up the numbers to 220/2 =110. 220+110=330. It's no problem to add stitches for something like this, but you need to do something about them when you start working the pattern. After all, extra stitches in the fabric is why I'm doing this recalculation.

After working this cast-on, I did the join and worked the ribbing. Then there were two rows of stockinette stitch. This is where I took care of those two additional stitches we added to make up the numbers for the cast on. One last look at the chart shows that there are two "extra" stitches that don't really contribute to the pattern but would be necessary if you were working this pattern flat. I'm knitting this in the round so I removed those two stitches as well. This means that I have to decrease four stitches on my first round of stockinette stitch. I did this at the side seams, two at each side. So now I'm down to 216 stitches, which gives about a quarter inch of positive ease and is still within my target zone.

So all this because I didn't like how the pattern didn't meet up on the sides for my size. This was the original photo.

But you know what? I made it work. Here is the work in progress - at both sides just in case someone thinks I'm cheating. 

This isn't heavy pattern modification and I'll (maybe) complete the arms eye shaping by following the pattern as written.  Then again, maybe not.  I'll decide when I get there.

Modifying a Sweater, Part I

In my last post, I said I was going to rip out the sweater I had started because I didn't like how the pattern wasn't lining up at the sides and that I was going to play with the gauge and ease to see if I could come up with some numbers that would make this pattern work for my size. I was talking about this yesterday at a knitting group and someone expressed some surprise that you could do such a thing. With that in mind, I decided to tell you how I modify a sweater pattern.

The first thing I do once I have a pattern I like is select my yarn. I try to stick to the same weight (fingering, DK, etc) as the original but I certainly don't go out of my way to find the exact yarn that was used in the model. I prefer to "shop" from my stash and frankly, there is no shortage, but I digress.

Once I have yarn, I knit at least one gauge swatch. Yes, probably more than one. No, you can't skip this part. Really, it only takes 45 minutes for me to make one - do it while watching TV. I start with knitting a 4 inch square in plain stockinette (or whatever pattern I'm trying to measure against) in the manufacture's recommended needle size for that yarn. Then sit back and look at the swatch you just made. Do you like the density of the fabric? The drape or hand of it? If you have even a whiff of "maybe this should be lighter/denser/something other than it is" then make another swatch to correct for what you don't like. Keep doing this until you are happy with the swatch 'cause I can guarantee that if something bugs you in the swatch, it will definitely bug you in the finished item.

This is the first swatch I made on a 4 mm needle, and my initial thought was that it's too loose so I made another using a 3.75 mm needle.  This one is visibly denser and I like it more for a summer top.

If you want something denser, go down one needle size. If you want to open up the fabric a bit, then go up. When you have a selection of swatches - remember two is the minimum for this - then go ahead and wash them the way you would the final garment according to the directions on the ball band or tag. For the swatches I'm doing, the ball band says to machine wash in cold water. So I dropped the swatches in the laundry. To tell them apart, I tied one knot on the tail of the first one (4 mm), and two knots in the tail of the second (3.75 mm). I won't make a final decision about needle size or gauge until they are washed and dry but right now, I'm leaning towards the second swatch.

While these are in the wash, consider how and where you are going to wear this and then measure yourself (or better yet, get someone to measure you) according to the schematic provided in the pattern. What I mean is, if the pattern only gives a bust measurement then measure yourself there. Don't worry about hip and waist measurements - the garment won't have any shaping. If you want to put that shaping in, that's another subject. While I'm on the subject of measuring your bust, make sure you're wearing the "right" bra. If this is something you're going to wear to work, don't take a measurement in your running bra which compresses everything, or your "slop around the house bra" which really doesn't to anything at all. You need a real number so measure while wearing your good, workday bra. Don't worry about what that number is and don't go off on a tangent about how you have to lose weight before you can make anything for yourself.  You're beautiful and deserve to have nice things.

Stay tuned - when the swatches are out of the wash, I'll continue with the next steps.