There’s one fewer sweater in my wardrobe now.

First, I started by unweaving the ends … or at least the ones at, well, the ends. The end of the body, the ends of the sleeves, the seams at the underarms, and so on. I figured I’d come across more in the middle of the sweater where I switched skeins, but at least this was a good start.

Then I came upstairs with my niece and took down my skeiner (I so love my skeiner) and we started tearing out the body and the sleeves. Since I was the one who knitted the sweater, I knew how the structure worked, and that helped figure out where to start.

The pile of crinkly, curly yarn grew rapidly. (And, yes, I do love the way yarn curls when it’s been knit and then unravelled. But then, I’m a fan of curly fibers like hair…) Thank you for your help, Tiffany!

I unravelled all the way back to the two saddles. I’m leaving those intact for two reasons. Well, three. One is that, unless I end up really needing it, it doesn’t seem like I’d get enough yardage out of the two shoulders to be worth the effort. Two is purely sentimental. And Three is that … since I don’t yet know what pattern I’ll be using for the cardigan, or if I’ll be making it up or following someone else’s, it’s possible I could use the saddles again.

I’m left with a pile of skeins of widely varying sizes … along with the sixth skein that I barely touched when I made this sweater in the first place.

Next, I need to:

1. Wash and block the yarn to get the kinks out. The trick is figuring out where I can dry them since I don’t have the handy extra rack in my shower anymore, and nothing like a clothesline (even assuming the yarn wouldn’t immediately freeze out there).

2. Come up with a pattern for the yarn. Norah Gaugin’s Tweedy Aran Cardigan looks nice. And I’d love to figure out a way to turn the Celtic Dreams into a cardigan … then (allowing for the gauge/size thing) I could still use that gorgeous cable up the center back, but just turn it into a cardi instead. For that matter, I’ve got an assortment of books telling me how to design my own Aran sweater. (Janet Szabo‘s is particularly brilliant.) I could just plug my own cables into the basic shape and go from there … The problem with that is that I just don’t know that I have the mental creative energy for that right now. The Truffle Cardigan looks intriguing, too. Knitting, yes, but creative pattern design/assembly? I’d rather that creative energy went toward my book. So, please, I still need pattern recommendations. And yes, “A Fine Fleece” has some good ones, but I don’t seem to love any of them.

3. Finish my Redhook, because it would just be WRONG to drop it and move on to this sweater. Especially since it’s coming along so well. I split the body into its fronts and back last night and got one of the fronts done. That leaves one front, and the back, plus the little cap sleeves to go (plus the button bands).

4. Finish performing a little cosmetic surgery on the cardigan I made with my Briar Rose Yarn last winter. As much as I love most of it, I’ve had two quibbles all along. One was that, when I sewed the hem, I folded it under and tacked it down to the inside of the sweater … except, I was just a row or so too low, so that the hem has always flared outward, just a tiny bit. It’s an easy fix–just unsewing that hem, and then rehemming, but I’ve been putting it off. The other fix? The button bands. I had decided that I liked the way the top half curled outward, like a built-in collar, so I only put the button band on the bottom half … except I’ve never been happy with the way that looked. Kind of unfinished. So today I took off the two button bands and will knit brand-new ones, that go all the way to the collar. Much better, I think.

I do love that curly brown look.

Oh, and Dad? Happy birthday!

• Tags: General, Knitting/Spinning • Permalink:One Fewer // 9 Comments »