FO: Gyre Cardigan

This is the Gyre Cardigan knitted with Valley Yarns Stockbridge, a merino and alpaca blend. I liked this pattern when I first saw it because it has a hippy-dippy 70s vibe to it. After I looked at some of the finished ones on ravelry I decided that perhaps it was a bit too much hippy-dippy. Also, several knitters said that the garment is really voluminous. The back sections looked a little too lumpy to me because of the changing gauge with the different stitch patterns and the large number of stitches increased after the dropped stitches. I decided to simplify things by not doing any increases after the dropped stitch section and just do stockinette. I used a border of broken rib at the bottom and also for the armhole bands. I shortened the dropped stitch section to 5 inches from 7 which reduces some of the hippy-dippyness. Finally, I made it at least 4 inches shorter than the pattern's length. The finished sweater is still a bit too large but the shawl pin holds it in really nicely, so I'm very happy with it.

To give the front edges a more finished look, I added a couple of stitches to each side and slipped the first and last 2 knit stitches on every knit row to give it a quasi I-cord look.

FO: Effervescence cardigan

This is the Effervescence cardigan, knitted with Araucania Ranco solid, a merino/nylon blend. I really like this yarn and I'm sad that it's been discontinued. I bought this pattern because I liked the front stitch design. The rest of it is a basic fitted cardigan, so I sized and shaped it to my liking. I made bracelet length sleeves and I think my shoulder section is a bit wider.

I converted this to knit as flat pieces, and I'm glad I did. The stitch pattern pulls in and narrows the gauge. After knitting about 3/4 of the first front piece, I discovered that it was just too narrow at the bust line. I re-knitted it about an inch wider. I normally like to knit the fronts of a cardigan wider than the back anyway, but this pattern needs even more extra width. If I had knitted in the round, I would have needed to re-do all or most of the cardigan in order to add in that extra width.

I knitted the front button bands using needles three sizes smaller in order to get a denser fabric. The gauge of the front button bands is 8 stitches/inch and the rest of the sweater is 6 stitches/inch. Here's my tip for the K1-P1 band: I knit the first and last stitches of the band as K2. That way, the edge knit stitches roll under a bit and you get a nice edge on the band.

Sewing FO; Vogue Patterns V1382

This is a dress from Vogue Patterns V1382 and it's going to be a fun dress for spring and summer. The pattern is shown as a color-blocked dress, but I just used one fabric. In fact, I think I've sewn at least two other color-blocked patterns recently using one fabric only. I used a stretch cotton sateen but the stretch was not necessary because the pattern has plenty of ease. The lining is a lawn cotton. I wanted to do something that would show some of the lines of the dress, so I sewed on twill ribbon at the base of the yoke. I also used the ribbon on the pockets to give them more emphasis. I lined the pockets and top stitched them on instead of just folding in and slip stitching. The dress has a vague retro vibe to it which I love.

Scenes from a flower show

On Friday, I visited the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show. I had never been before but I've always wanted to check it out. It was an amusing way to spend a couple of hours. Here's the first scene that I saw upon entry.

This was one of my favorite vendors. This guy sells these distressed looking metal letters of varying sizes. I so wanted to buy something but I just couldn't think of a use for them. He doesn't sell online, unfortunately.

I did buy a rectangular basket made in Morocco from my favorite basket vendor. The shop is named "Asylum Down" (love the name) and it's located in Nevada City, CA. I bought one these last year when she came to the Sunset Magazine Celebration Weekend, and the basket is great for grocery shopping. She also does not sell online.

The best part of this show are all display gardens done by various landscape architects. The show is only on for five days, and I wonder how long it takes some of them to set their gardens up. This one included The Nautilove as its centerpiece.

I'm not sure what the pink "tent" is, but it's eye-catching

The round center area is made of overturned empty wine bottles

This is a water feature made of a tightly wound hose or two that has lit sections. It's hard to see, but there's water squirting out of two ends.

This garden has a pre-historic vibe.

I'm not sure this is my style.

Every garden needs a water wheel.

I sort of like this. It's the dome above the wine bottle pathway shown above.

And every garden show has to have a bonsai exhibit.

Sewing FO: V1387 Hipster shirt

This is a shirt sewn from Vogue Patterns V1387. It's sewn in a lightweight cotton plaid, and I absolutely love it. One big reason why I love it is because it doesn't have a traditional shirt collar, which I never wear. It has a really nice detailed collar and yoke design. There's a narrow bias band that separates the yoke from the main bodice piece which is not obvious from the pattern envelope. The top of the bodice also has a nice pleating detail. I probably could have done a better job matching my plaid on the collar and some other bits of the pattern, but I'm still happy with it.

The back of this shirt is longer than the front. I like the back better without a belt, but it looks too loose and a bit sloppy in the front without a belt, so a belt it is.

The one detail I didn't like about the pattern was the weak method used to stabilize the corner at the junction of the front band and the collar. I'm going to be making another one of these shirts in a white striped lawn cotton and I'll try to do something that makes that corner a little less fragile.

I call this my hipster shirt because of the plaid. In San Francisco, it seems like many of the hipsters wear plaid. In fact, I gauge the hipster level of a restaurant by how much plaid I see among the diners.

FO: basic cardigan

I finally finished this more or less basic cardigan from an improvised pattern. I felt like this took f.o.r.e.v.e.r because (1) the gauge is 6.33 stitches/inch (2) the yarn is little bit splitty and (3) it's a really dark color. I purchased the yarn at Stitches West a couple of years ago. It's from Newton's Yarn Country and is a washable blend of mostly merino with a bit of nylon. It's actually a marled yarn composed of very dark blue and very dark maroon plies and the result is a purple-black yarn. I took this photo in bright light to show the stitch pattern on the fronts but in bright light the yarn looks too light in color.

Now that I've finished the sweater, I really like it. It's a perfect weight for spring and fall. I really like this style of cardigan where the body is simple stockinette and the front bands have some sort of interesting pattern which just continues onward beyond the shoulders and gets sewn on to the back neckline. In this case, I also used the same stitch pattern for the sleeve cuffs and hem. For the front edges, I slipped 3 knit stitches purl-wise at the start of the right front and at the end of the left front. This gives the front edges a quasi I-cord look and keeps them from stretching in length with wear. For the back neckline, I used 3-needle bind-off to join the front bands.

I like this sweater enough that I'm thinking of knitting another but in a bigger gauge yarn and also in a lighter color. That should go faster and the stitch pattern will be more visible.

On the usefulness of childhood toys

I recently needed some sort of stand for this TV antenna. I wanted something small and unobtrusive but didn't want to have to buy anything. I thought of using pieces from my old Lego set. For nostalgic reasons, I've kept my childhood Lego set. I had a very small set, and this was way back in the day before Lego made these fancy kits that you can now buy. My bricks were red or white or clear. I ended up making this little stand.

I used most of the set some time ago to build a little house which sits on a bookcase. It seems so primitive compared to the stuff you can build today.