Originally posted April 4, 2007
Well… maybe just lengthening it. Let me explain. My third sweater from Knitting in the Old Way is a gansey which I am calling Dunbar – after a fishing village on the south east tip of the Firth of Forth where my husband used to vacation with his parents when he was young.
We’ve been there many times – for me it’s a little like a Land’s End because you are so close to the open sea and the wild whims of the North Atlantic.
Well the eponymous sweater also had\has some turbulence – not finished yet. I measured – allowed for ease and cast on 90%, increased to 100% after the ribbing and began an 11 st. repeat – K 10. P1 x 20 for 220 sts. Of course half way up the main part of the sweater, I realized that an 11 st repeat was really dumb. There was no middle st in the panel of 10 knit sts so how was I going to work an interesting pattern in the second part of the sweater. More thought required here.
I finally decided to expand the P1 to P3 after the first “bar” of reverse stockinette and work a little square of purl sts in the middle of the 8 x 10 squares between the bars of reverse stockinette – seems to have worked so far. The neck had to be re-knit a number of times to have it merge with the main pattern – but most of the slog work has been done – except that it doesn’t FIT!! Even though I measured it against other sweaters followed instructions and concentrated 90% of the time.
So now I will have to cut off the bottom band, pick up stitches and knit down a few inches; stretch it like mad in the blocking and cut off his beer rations – well maybe the first two will work – we do need a balance in our lives!
I won’t mention several major rip backs for really silly mistakes (and I still have the sleeves to do). Actually I am not complaining – this is just a knitting journey and there are lots of positives. I am knitting with Fiddlesticks Knitting DK Zephyr – a wonderful 50% silk & 50% merino yarn in a fabulous Marine Blue so the more I have to knit the more I have this wonderful yarn slipping through my fingers. And I do get more time to remember “things” like the marinated Halibut we bought at the fishmongers in Dunbar – delicious, the strolls around the harbour, the walks to the ruined castle, the scent of the sea, the fishing boats….
This sweater will probably be an example of a gansey with verticle panels – I had started out with the idea that it would be one of the earlier samples that Pricilla Gibson-Roberts mentions – ganseys with all over knit and purl stitches but that didn’t happen. So that means another sweater!
Enjoy Carol