Scrapdash: Sweater quantity, part 1. Mariella

Friday, December 30, 2016

Sweater quantity, part 1. Mariella

Today is a double-header posting here in the Scrapdash blogdom because I'm going to be showing you the sweater quantities of yarn that left Deep Stash since July.

First up, the Mariella cardigan made from ancient yarn picked up during the Mesozoic era (2008 AD). Yes, Knit Picks Palette was around then, in Rainforest Heather. Apropos.

And nigh, an epoch or so later, a human appeared whose forethought in the sweltering temperatures of the middle plains made preparations for the coming autumn...when temperatures are only slightly less sweltering because summer just doesn't know how to let go around here.

I took a class from a friend, the fabulous Chauntel of Firebrunette Knits, because there are a few bits and bobs in this pattern I would need help with, especially the part where I added sleeves one size larger than what I made the body. Oh, and I shortened the sleeves--see the aforementioned complaint about stubborn Kansas summers.

The great thing about this class was Chauntel taught us how to make this cardigan reversible. The neckband already sports a reversible cable design, and Chauntel helped us graft the top of the band and seam the part of it that rests against the back of the neck in invisible ways so the cardigan can be worn knit side or purl side out. Brilliant. With her permission, I'm sharing my progress pictures of the grafting method which can be found as Option 1 on Techknitter's blog.

Since the neck band is ribbed, I separated every other stitch at the top of the band onto four different needles/stitch holders so I could graft first one set of knits to knits and then the other set. It's not perfectly invisible, but there sure isn't a seam bump on one side, and both sides look the same.

One problem I encountered was moth damage to my yarn. The yarn has been in the stash a long time, folks, and I have been battling cloth moths for the last year or so. I sanitized my stash using mostly the freezer method found here, and everything is now in plastic bags. However, the damage was done already to this yarn, and I had to deal with it. Those pesky moth larvae neatly cut through fibers, so I had a lot of ends to weave in.