Pattern: Tappan Zee by Amy King
Yarn: Yarn School Corriedale Cross, ~675 yds.
Needles: US 5/3.75 mm bamboo circulars
Start/finish: 26 March - 26 April 2010
Gauge: 20 sts/32 rows in 4 inches
Comments/modifications: What a lovely and quick (despite my time line) knit! A top down circular yoke is not a sweater style I've knit before, but it was really fun. The lace pattern in the yoke keeps it from getting too monotonous, and the yarn colors helped with the monotany on the body. I made one major modification: instead of binding off the sleeve stitches when I got to them, I put them on holders. My thinking was that I wanted to put sleeves on when I was done with the body, and make them as long as the yarn held out. Once I was done with the body, I decided to keep the cap sleeves for the moment, so I bound off in knit from the wrong side. That way, in the fall when it starts getting cooler, I can pick out that bound off edge and knit the sleeves down.

I love the diamond detail at the bottom,

which matches the diamonds in the yoke.

Now for the yarn. I blogged about the spinning last spring/summer, but discovered when I started swatching, that the yarn need a bit of TLC. As you can see,

I was a wee bit tense when I did the plying. Perhaps I was a bit overplied myself, what with the move and all, but there is some serious skew in that stockinette. Add to that the fact that the yarn was not so pleasant to knit with (read: wiry, stiff and scratchy) and I decided that I needed to do something to take out some of the plying twist.

I took the three skeins I'd planned to use for the sweater (based on relatively similar grists) and ran them back through the wheel to take out some of the plying twist. I basically put the brake band on tightly, and re-plied the yarn with the wheel spinning in the same direction as when I spun the singles. I more or less let the yarn run onto the bobbin with only a little bit of tension, but if I came across a section that was really over-plied I held on a bit longer. Reskeined, rewashed, redried, and reswatched.

Much softer, much less noticeable bias, much more pleasant to work with. I've gotten a wee bit obsessed with grist recently, so I noted what these skeins came in at: 253 yds at 1094 ypp, 285 yds at 1140 ypp and 225 yds at 973 ypp. I started with the heaviest grist on the top, since the skein I have left for the arms is also around 975 ypp, and I wanted the lighter fluffier stuff in the body.

So all in all a great success. I desperately need to find the right buttons for it, but that may have to wait for a bit, since we've now entered The Month of Nonstop Houseguests. We currently have four parents and four girl children, aged five and under, in our house. As soon as the extra parents and children leave, we get an old friend from Tucson and his SO for a few days, and then a couple weeks later, Nana arrives. So forgive me if the blogging is a bit hit or miss for the next few weeks. Maybe I'll be able to get back here regularly when we finally have a functioning government!

Porpoise Fur