Ever swatching

G'day all!

After my swatching fest the other day, I decided to do some more swatches in a larger size to givew me more idea about how the yarn works up in the different patterns.

Normally I use a sleeve or the front of a cardi as my swatch but in this case I do not have a pattern. This makes things considerably more exciting and swatches are absolutely necessary.

I grabbed the four favourites from my last post and eliminated one pretty quickly in the larger swatch. The leafy type pattern - she gone!

I have to say the ribby cables look absolutely fantastic.
bigswatch_ribs
The problem with such a fitted cardi is that I don't have many fitted tshirts/etc to wear underneath it and I absolutely must have something between me and the wool on my body and any part of my neck that it touches. My arms are made of tougher stuff though if the cuffs grabbed around my wrists or rubs the crease of my elbow, they will complain too.

bigswatch_daisy
I still like the daisy pattern, no idea why, it just appeals to me. This would be a looser, still fitted but looser jacket. You can almost see the pattern in the stockinette section in the bigger photos.

bidswatch_razor
Razor shell still looks pretty good to me as well. It would make a very classy jacket but not so fitted as shaping the shell is a bit harder to do.

bidswatch_feb
Finally, I looked up the February Lady Sweater and did a bit of the lace out of that. Of course I am showing it upside down I realise. I think the colourway might be a bit busy for that sort of lacework. However it would be relatively easy to modify the gauge to go from worsted to fingering.

I am still humming and harring over which design to go with. I like aspects of each. I think I shall let them marinate for a while and work on some other stuff that I need to finish, like the scarf for the lovely person who randomly sent me "A Fine Fleece."

I hooked out all my sock yarn tonight with the idea of pairing up some of it for projects other than socks, maybe a flowerbasket shawl or something. I have some that will go together ok but I am surprised by how much doesn't go together. Then there are the colourways that match beautifully but some of the yarn is Casbah or Posh Emily and it is so squooshy and yummy that I just want to knit socks or mitts or hats out of it all by itself rather than putting it with say Colonial wool, which is lovely but just not the same class. Then there is the yarn that would play well with others but is almost monotone = great for all those fancy-pants patterns I want to try out.

After all the "special" yarn is put aside, I am left with a hodge podge of colours of which about three skeins sorta go together. The rest well to put it together would be taking a huge punt. I love my colours but some of these combos are plain scary. Also the textures are all over the place along with the, to be blunt, quality of the yarn.

I always thought that I go for the same colours over and over but apparently I don't anywhere as much as I though I do. At least not in socks. It is sorta peeving cos I thought a shawl would be good and stash busting, for lord knows I have plenty of sock stash. I guess I could use up the one pound skeins of Wildfoote I got at the Brown Sheep outlet in a shawl - that would get rid of some yarn but I don't really want to just get rid of stuff willy nilly, I want to make stuff I want to make.

The real problem is that I have startitis but have nothing to start! I guess I'll have to convert it to finishitis and do this scarf and the other sock to match my self-striping sock. Then I will have a pair of socks for the current month and can think about other things, like jackets and maybe one day finishing that curtain I was making months ago before commissions and stuff got in the way.

BTW, I am thinking of advertising my little Etsy shop on Ravelry. I have not sold one item so far. I have quite a bit more to list but I obviously am dyeing all the wrong colours or offering stuff noone else is interested in. Plus I am a very small fish in a very big pond and have very bad timimg. It's rather disappointing. I'll do a little more dyeing in colourways that have sold well in the past in Oz and if that doesn't go with the help of a Ravelry ad, I will pull the plug. There's only so much effort and money that I want to throw at this. It is sorta difficult cos I am trying to fund it from my earnings doing knitting for my LYS, and I don't have a huge budget. I thought if I started small then I could add more types of yarn and bigger quantities, but currently I am not even going to recoup the money I've already put into this microventure. I really enjoy dyeing yarn and fibre and always dye too much for me to use on my lonesome. Ah well, live and learn.

anon!

Comments

  1. Hmm - well I would promote your yarn on my blog... I get so little traffic I'm not sure how much benefit it would be. However the self-striping yarn I bought from you is lovely...it's a sock in progress at the moment.

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  2. I've hooked a few nice string bags from sock yarn. I tend to like to use a wool/cotton blend - sturdy but with some fiber memory.

    BTW, I love your Jungly colorway but I'm also awash in sock yarns here already.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oh, I do love those ribs.... you are a swatching machine I must say, I would have taken a week to do all those.

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