Ally Pally

I can't believe it has been more than a month since I last updated.

Things have been busy busy here, aided and abetted by my deciding last week that I wanted to finish my Circular Cardigan before The Knitting and Stitching Show at Ally Pally . It zipped along on 7mm needles (good job too considering my brink-man-ship), although my speed was slowed slightly by re-knitting the sleeves several times.

The original pattern had straight sleeves which when I tried it on slipped down my shoulders, so I had the idea that I could use short rows to make a shaped sleeve-head which would be more anatomically appropriate. Jacqueline Fee talks about this in The Sweater Workshop . The sleeves you see in the finished article are numbers 5 and 6. Number 2 was a silly mistake where I did the sleeve head upside down! 3 and 4 were good but at that point I decided it was too wide across the back, and because of the construction I needed to undo both sleeves in order to make the back narrower.

I finally cast off last night and washed and blocked after band rehearsal. I am just hoping it will be fully dry for the show tomorrow.

The yarn is Inka ,72% acrylic, 28% wool, by Garn Studio. It stood up well to the repeated undoing and redoing of the sleeves, and I am hoping will wear well.

I really enjoyed knitting this. I rarely ever knit with anything thicker than DK or perhaps Aran weight so it was nice to have something which grew so quickly. Great from the instant gratification point of view. It is a circle in 7 segments which needed some persuasion to lie flat. Also because 7 is a prime number it isn't symmetical, so you get a horizontal line caused by the increases across the right side of the body at the front, but not on the left. I would like to have another go but this time use a circle in 8 segments. I think this would help it to lie flat in the centre of the back, and also make it generally more symmetical, I love symmetry.

Better go and organise my shopping list for tomorrow. Anyone else going to Ally Pally tomorrow? If you see me come up and say hello, I'll be the one in the loud cardigan, or with the weather we have been having probably carrying the cardigan. I will try and blog more soon.

Thanks Daisy for the shoe link, I will give them a try!