I started swatching for my mother's cardigan this week. I started with a sleeve , because I need to get used to doing stranded colourwork. I'm making a mix between Kaffe Fassett's Zig Zag cardigan and Elizabeth Zimmermann's Ski Sweater with Colour Patterns. There are a number of things about this project that are starting to worry me. First of all, it's an epic project. A full jumper of colourwork and, compared with all the other knitting techniques I'm inexperienced in this one. Secondly, the pattern has some eight stitch floats, and I was under the impression that colourwork should never have longer than five stitch floats. I thought I was leaving really long floats, but they are not long enough - it's funny but Elizabeth Zimmermann said this would happen! Still it feel good to rise to a challenge, particularly since, when I went to put this on Ravelry I discovered it's my three hundredth project.
Stephen West released the first MKAL clue on Thursday night. I started knitting it without looking at spoilers. When I got up on Friday he had sent through an "alternative" clue one. I then went and had a look at the spoiler thread to try to work out what was going on. Which was that some people thought the pattern looked like a "German hate symbol". I knit on anyway, since I was half-way through. Then he took down the original clue, replacing it with a mitred square in garter stitch. The Ravelry forums and Instagram are a complete shit-show, even though Rav is being moderated. It's been a bit disheartening, having something that is usually quite light and fun weighed down with all this. I admire Stephen's quick and sensitive response to this drama. I also feel that anything can look like anything if you squint. To me this looks like a Celtic knot. I think mine is pretty, and I'll knit on through all crises.
It looks amazing already!
ReplyDelete