Chunky Fever

This morning I have fallen in love with chunky knits. I made a beautiful little warm hat in the time it took me to watch a cheesy romantic comedy. Speed is a beautiful thing. The pattern is from Twinkle's Big City Knits by Wenlan Chia.

Being the procrastinator that I am I decided to put off making decisions about my sweater. But, just because I don't want to make decisions doesn't mean that I don't want to knit. I wanted a fast and satisfying project (and a hat) so I decided to go forward with knitting up this pattern, which I had gotten the materials for many moons ago. I didn't have the right sized needles (a ridiculously large #19)so I had to make some minor adjustments but I think it worked out. Pretty rewarding for a couple of hours work.

Decisions

My sweater has progressed nicely, and I have reached the point where some decisions must be made. Here is my dilemma: This sweater is originally designed as a flat knit sweater, meaning the pieces are knit back and forth and sewn together when they are done. I however, decided that it would be much better and easier to knit it in the round, meaning I knit the front and back all at once going round and round to make a sweater tube. Knitting in the round is great because when you are done you don't have to do any nonsensical sewing together, you don't have any bulky seams, and you don't have to make more pieces. Unfortunately I have to figure out how to adapt the pattern to this round configuration. I would be o.k. with it except there is a fancy neck that I have never done before. I have to admit I am a little afraid.

You reach a certain point on a sweater (when the sleeves are attached) that the idea of having to rip out rows and rows to fix stupid mistakes in necks becomes much less appealing. I have reached that point and now have to figure out how to not screw up the neck. This pattern is, in true '70s style, written out completely with no charts. Charts would make this task much easier. Trying to dissect all of the abbreviations in the pattern and imagine what shapes they are trying to make has pretty much given me a headache. I will conquer it...but it might be a while.

Wrong Sweater

Wow! I saw the most incredible commercial on TV. The ad featured a tall blond man with a Scandinavian accent. It was very clear that they were trying to portray this man as Scandinavian, but he was wearing an Aran sweater! Can you believe it? I was appalled. I don't even remember what the ad was for because I was too busy being distracted by this Scandinavian man's Irish sweater. Who does that? If you are going to go to the trouble to play off of a stereotype, you should at least get the stereotype right. There are so many different sweaters they could have used instead to be believable. Well now we know: that product is no good. If the manufacturers are not going to take the trouble to get the knitting correct, who knows what other corners they have cut.