Monday, January 05, 2004

New Year, New Project

On New Year's Day I began my Phildar Irlandais. I thought I deserved to begin a new project for the New Year even though other projects await finishing. I don't know what it is about beginning a new knitting project, but it is like eating chocolate -- the feeling is wonderful!

After swatching, I realized I needed to go up one needle size for the yarn I am using. So I casted on all 208 stitches and knit 2x2 ribbing for 35 rows (what amounted to be 4 inches). Let me tell you, I sure was sick of ribbing after that many stitches and rows. I have only knit 4 rows of the pattern since completing the ribbing, but just getting the ribbing done felt pretty good.

This pattern has a ton of cables. On row 3 of the pattern, every stitch (other than the selvedge stitches) is involved in a cable. All the cabling is done on the right side rows, so I get a break by just knitting the knit stitches and purling the purl stitches on all wrong side rows. So far, I am doing all the cabling without a cable needle. Don't know if it goes faster or not, but it is kind of fun to use this technique for a change. Also, it does not seem like the cable stitches are getting stretched out like they sometimes do with a cable needle.

I nicknamed this sweater "Cable Clouds" because of the beautiful pale blue color and the softness of the yarn.

So, is anyone else starting a New Year project?

posted by Kristy @ 12:38 PM Comments: 0