knitting

Die verstrickte Dienstagsfrage 25/2014

- sarah Leave a comment

Ordinarily, I post in English but since I’m an avid reader of Wollschaf’s Dienstagsfrage I want to answer her question in German.

Today the Wollschaf asks:

Oft ist es so, daß gerade das Modell, in das man sich unsterblich verliebt hat, nicht in der eigenen Größe verfügbar ist.
Insbesondere deutsche Anleitungen sind in ihrem Größenspektrum ja oft sehr eingeschränkt.

Was macht Ihr, wenn Eure Größe nicht dabei ist?

  • Komplett umrechnen? Wenn ja, “zu Fuß” oder mit einem Strickrechner? Wenn letzteres, welchen benutzt Ihr?
  • Pi mal Daumen ein paar Maschen mehr oder weniger anschlagen und hoffen, daß es zum Schluss passen wird?
  • Dickeres bzw. dünneres Garn und Nadeln nehmen?
  • Ein ähnliches Modell suchen, das in Eurer Größe verfügbar ist?
  • Zähneknirschend verzichten und etwas anderes stricken?
  • Ganz was anderes, nämlich…

Vielen Dank an Tichiro für die heutige Frage.

Um ehrlich zu sein habe ich sehr oft dieses Problem. Gerade die deutschen Anleitungen haben ja – wie schon erwähnt – ein kleines Größenspektrum. Mit meiner Kleidergröße 48/50 fall’ ich oft aus den errechneten Größen heraus. Das ist auch mit ein Grund warum ich aufgehört habe, deutsche Zeitschriften zu kaufen. Natürlich sind da oft schöne Anleitungen drin, aber wenn ich das alles neu ausrechnen muss, brauche ich das Heft fast nicht zu kaufen. Dazu kommt, dass die Strickmuster in amerikanischen Heften (Interweave Knits, Knitscene u.Ä.) einfach ausgefallener sind und mir besser gefallen.

Natürlich habe ich auch eins, zwei Muster im Hinterkopf, die ich irgendwann mal umrechnen und stricken möchte. Wenn, dann würde ich das aber alles “zu Fuß” machen, mit Hilfe des Dreisatzes eine Anleitung auf die eigene Maschenprobe und/oder Größe umrechnen sollte jede Strickerin beherrschen. (Meiner Meinung nach kommt das gleich nach das Gestrick “lesen” können.) Schließlich kommt es doch sehr oft vor, dass man die Maschenprobe des Designers nicht erreicht, egal wie sehr man es versucht. Das kann ich nur aus eigener Erfahrung bestätigen.

Um die Frage kurz zu beantworten, ich bin schon oft auf eine andere Anleitung umgestiegen, weil meine Größe nicht dabei war. Leider passiert das auch häufiger bei Ravelry.

WIP Parade

- sarah 1 Comment

Inspired by a recent post by Karen of Fringe Association fame (if you don’t already follow her, do so now!), I got the urge to pluck out all my works in progress (WIPs) and  take a picture. Well, it turned out that I needed not one but two pictures, because a) I didn’t have enough space to put them all in one photo and b) the size I’m knitting is large, I would have needed two pictures anyhow.

So, without further ado I give you picture numero uno.

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Knit ALL the sweaters!

- sarah Leave a comment

Not only do I have three different sweaters on my needles, no. I’m always lusting for new ones!

For example, as soon as I got the current issue of PomPom Quarterly into my hands (order yours here, it’s so worth it!), there were at least two sweaters and as many shawls inside that I wanted to cast on immediately. The shawl Baya is very high on my summer knit-list. Although it’s such a wide shawl I think it will be knit up in a breeze. And Creamsicle, well. I even gave up on my yarn diet and bought the recommended yarn for this. Don’t know what I was thinking really, but I just loved the fun bobbles on the front. I have yet to see if they’re even fun to knit. Never having knitted something before doesn’t deter me from trying them out, though. At least the designer promises great stuff in her post about her design.

Lately I’m much more into seamed sweater constructions (I have to thank Lori Versaci for this!) but I still haven’t given up on the top-down all-in-one thing yet. The only negative point I see with this kind of construction is that I have to lug around that huge piece of sweater. And most of the time that is far from practical and sometimes even irritating to knit. You just don’t know where to pack all of that knitting! Be that as it may, I got Laura Aylor’s Sun Rose jumper and Ankestrick’s Holsten to compare them both for their take on the contiguous method of starting a sweater. If I find the time, I might knit both and tell you which one I liked best.

And I don’t even know where to start with all the patterns that I bought lately. New things that made it into my library include Amy Christoffers’ New American Knits, Veera Välimäki’s Juniper and Laneway (although I don’t even know if the former is even sized up to my size) and loads and loads of mystery knitalongs. There are so many things floating around in my head that it’s hard to not start them all, riiiiiiight now.

What is your next project? Anything you are looking forward to? We are having a holiday weekend ahead of us, with many things planned but I hope to get at least one day of uninterrupted knitting in. It’s high time, since I also have a time-sensitive project on the needles. And it’s not even Christmas yet!

 

Some exciting things happening

- sarah 1 Comment

The most exciting thing that happened in all of April was… a yarn exchange. You read that right, there is a nice women from the States who offered to exchange some yarn with me. We were going for something like 5 skeins each and then just send it to the other. Instead, we went a bit overboard and I might’ve asked for a sweater quantity of Loft somewhere along the way. I decided differently in the end, but more on that later.

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Long time no see

- sarah 3 Comments

What happened meanwhile? I finished my Conic (and still haven’t taken pictures of it) which took me maybe five months? I knit three pairs of socks the week before Christmas. Lesson learned: Prepare your presents beforehand. Perhaps I can stick to this next year.

The boyfriend and I were at the 30C3 in Hamburg and guess what? There were lots of knitting courses! Little side note, a conversation with a friend went as follows:
“I heard you wear at a knitting workshop!” – “Of course, I’ve been to all of them!” There was Yarnbombing, short rows, knitting machines, you name it. But there were also other fun things to do like lock picking, listening to talks and of course meeting people.

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On my needles: Winding Way and Conic

- sarah Leave a comment

Last year Christmas surprised me when it came around the corner, so I started earlier this year with Christmas knitting. Yesterday I started this beautiful sock, designed by Emily Wessel of Tin Can Knits. I mixed her pattern up a bit, because the socks are for my dad and he doesn’t like patterns on top of his foot.
sock_front

Yarn is Wollmeise Twin in Mont Blanc. Although I very recently didn’t have any nice words for the thinner Wollmeise qualities, this yarn totally changed my mind. It has less yardage on a skein than the 100% Merino yarn, but is so much more comfortable to knit with! Twin is very tightly wound and has a nice spring, so you hardly notice that you knit something – it’s wonderful. Definitely not my last Twin project!
sock_sideview

The other project I started during the conference week is my Conic, design by Cookie A, who is better known for her sock designs. Last year she released a clothing collection, and this cardigan has been in my knitting queue ever since.
conic_full

I had a few differences with this pattern. When I first tried it, sometime last winter, I couldn’t get the right stitch count for the second(!) row, no matter what I did. Turned out I had knit pfb instead of pfbf (increased just one instead of two). Obviously I needed to write Cookie herself an email to realise that. *cough*
Plus, it had been the wrong yarn. I had used Wollmeise Pure on my first try, which was way too slippery. Now I bought Holst Garn Coast for this in the colour-way Blackcurrant. conic_detail

Today Plucktember starts and although I probably won’t have time to knit a second Monomania, I will certainly knit the Westknits MKAL in Plucky Feet. Totally looking forward to this, September will be – wait for it — awesome!