Give

***Warning: camera happy person post.***

Another FO that, pathetically enough, was finished August 18th! I'm amazed that I haven't gotten around to posting about it until now. This sweater only took me about 2 weeks from cast-on to blocking and cleared up a whopping 800 grams of yarn out of the stash. I forgot how fast worsted yarn flies off the needles after Icarus, MS3 and months worth of socks.

I now present Rosedale United or Rosedale Redux as I call her. Redux because I completely rewrote the pattern down to a 35" bust, I modified the waist shaping, added length on the body, used a different rib stitch and learned the stretchy-est cast-on I've ever come across.

Amy Swenson’s Rosedale United (Fall 2003 Knitty) free pattern available here
Yarn: Noro Kuryeon in colour 207
Amount: 7.75 skeins
Left over: about 25 grams
Size: 36" bust measurement to fit a 35" bust.
Started: July 29, 2007
Finished: August 17, 2007

Since this sweater is knit from the bottom up in the round the cast-off edge ended up at my neck. Right about the time I finished the raglan decreases, I started to realize that the neck opening looked pretty small. Since I have been known to have difficulties fitting my hefty cranium through shirt necks, there was a small amount of panic.

Luckily, I found the stretchiest bind off I've ever seen here and the pending crisis was averted.

Since it's been a comfortable 8 months since my last attempt at any sort of tutorial, I figured I'd share the-bind-off-that-saved-the-day since someone is always looking for a stretchy (but not sloppy bind-off).

Best thing about this technique is that you don't have to worry about making your BO row stitches abnormally loose. It's already perfect, no need to compensate.

As with most bind-off techniques, you begin by knitting the first two stitches in the regular fashion.

Next, insert the left-hand needle as you would to SSK (just the K part not the SS).

Wrap the working yarn counterclockwise around the right-hand needle.

Pull the yarn through the two stitches and then drop the two stitches that have been worked off the left-hand needle.

Knit the next stitch on the left-hand needle and repeat from Step 2 until all of the stitches have been cast-off.

Break the working yarn and pull the tail through the last remaining stitch. Admire your work.

Stretch your work and notice how the bind-off does not restrict the stretch of your fabric at all.

Hopefully that is easy to understand. Thanks to a very productive and amazingly relaxing long weekend, I should have another FO for you later this week.

Cheating decreases

Feast your eyes on these puppies. Four months of committed sock knitting to produce an exquisite lacey (subtle mesh patterned) anklet. Both yarn and pattern came to me in my July Blue Moon Fiber Arts Rockin' Sock Club kit.















Yarn: Socks That Rock Lightweight in Peaseblossom (1 skein)
Pattern: Hippy Crunchy
Needles: 2.25mm Clover Takumi DPNs

Perhaps the only reason I ever finished these socks was that I found a way to cheat the K3tog and SSSK decreases about 10 rounds in. To encourage other knitters that feel a little woozy when see they a pattern with muti-stitch decreases, I thought I'd put a quick tutorial together on how to accomplish the aforementioned without breaking a sweat or a dpn. Note that basic information on these two decreases can be found here.


The Majestic SSSK

First you need to slip 3 stitches as if to knit from the left to the right-hand needle, just like you were doing a regular SSK.














Next you SSK the two stitches closest to the tip of your right hand needle as you normally would (if you're really struggling you can just SSK the first stitch, and use the leap-frog technique described below to deal with the other two later.)














Here's the cheating part. Lift or leap-frog the unworked-but-previously-slipped-stitch on the right-hand needle (now the second one from the tip) over the SSK that you just worked.














Et Voila! A lovely, angst-free, and slightly blurry SSSK.















The Regal K3tog

This one follows the same principles as the SSSK but with one extra (easy) step. First you'll knit the first two stitches on the left hand needle together (K2tog) same as always (again if worst comes to worse you can just knit the first stitch and repeat the leap-frogging described below twice for the same effect.)














Now you have your worked decrease on the right-hand needle and your left over stitch on the left-hand needle (see picture).














Here's the extra step part. Slip the worked K2tog decrease purlwise from the right to left-hand needle so that it looks like this.














Then you just lift or leap-frog the remaining stitch to be worked over your decrease.














Now slip the whole thing purlwise back onto to the right-hand needle and you're done another beautiful decrease.