Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

Knittingnana60 — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 00:23:42 GMT

Sandi, my first sweater was a simple cardigan with K2P2 ribs on the bottom of the sweater and sleeves. I made it for myself and wore it for several years, before it became too small. Then I passed it on to someone else, I forget who, so I no longer have that sweater. I did have a size problem with a sweater I made for my sister when she was in college. It had an all-over lace pattern that was somewhat complicated, and it turned out that the lace actually made the sweater smaller that it should have been. At that time, I did not understand about swatching in pattern, and the lace gauge was smaller than the stockinette gauge. She ended up giving it to a soroity sister who was several sizes smaller than she was.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

MikkiB — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 23:44:16 GMT

Sandi, I just read everyones comments and I agree you have just touched the surface in knitting items. When I crocheted I never had to worry about stitch guages, somehow they came out right. In knitting I am making things that gauge doesn't matter. But I have heard and seen a little, that yarn color also can make a difference in guage. The same yarn, by the same company in a different color could result in different guages because of the dyes. So all this is to say please continue on topic. You are doing a great job, helping us to achieve better garments. Thanks.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

MikkiB — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 23:21:51 GMT

wow, I think you have sold me - the non-swatcher - on making that swatch. Your explanation is just what it took to make me hear. I guess I'll use an internet users idea and make plenty of bunnies or afghans from my swatches. Thanks also for explaining how to fix the problem if the swatch is not right.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

DebraP@2 — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 22:11:06 GMT

Are we ever going to have a crochet newsletter?

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

IreneP — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 19:50:10 GMT

My approach is this -- I pay attention to gauge only in so far as it helps me to pick a yarn that looks like the pattern. Having done (or not done) that, I knit my gauge swatch and determine what gauge I am knitting with this yarn. Then using the finished garment measurements I modify the pattern to yield a finished garment in my yarn with the same measurements. When in doubt, I use the same ratios as the original pattern. For example, I might calculate how many rows up to the armhold and determine what % of those take you from the bottom to the waist shaping.

I am rarely disappointed with this approach. Try it.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

BarbieM — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 17:31:42 GMT

What I want to know is how long did it take you after Susan's Sweater to get up the courage to knit another? I knit a gorgeous patterned sweater as my second sweater--but, even though I was making the gauge and had measured carefully, it came out too slim. I got completely frustrated with it and picked something that wouldn't depend so drastically on measurements for my next project. I eventually did get around to knitting other sweaters--far more successfully. My grandmother thinks the pattern was at fault (she eventually reknit the yarn into a beautiful sweater for herself), but I didn't know enough about what I was doing then to check it to see. I've also learned to correct problems in patterns as I've gotten more adept!

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

SoniaB — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 14:11:36 GMT

Hi Sandi,

I so love getting your posts in my inbox. I am a really new knitter, I did a few scarves. And then when I went to move into a sweater is where I got stuck with the how the heck do you choose yarn. Is there a book out there - that say's this yarn at this gauge gives you this, don't ever use this yarn if you don't want to die by sweating to death. Or is the only way to learn is by experience. I thought I could just find a yarn I liked knit a swatch - give my computer program the gauge and knit. I guess one shouldn't learn with custom patterns.

modistamodesta.blogspot.com

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

elizaduckie — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 12:32:21 GMT

I thought about answering Gillian regarding her question, I clicked on her name looking for an email addy, It took me to her profile where WOWIE I found a wall. A wall is a place to write a comment. AND there was also a way to email Gillian. How COOL is that. AND a way to add a friend such as Ravelry does. I think if we go to our own profile page that is the way to find the wall.

I was so surprised, how did I miss this. I recall Sandi mentioning some added features when they changed over the site, but wow...this is fun!

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

mitchellle — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 10:45:42 GMT

Sandi:

I enjoy reading Knitting Daily, I have learned so much. I am a long time knitter (one more year and I will have been knitting for a half century) but there is always so much more to learn.

I also wanted to say something and I hope you take this the right way. So often, we see photos of magazine editors and they look like Meryl Streep in the Devil Wears Prada, or the high fashion magazine editor in 'How to Loose a Man in 10 Days'. Their high fashion, total perfection at all times appearance makes them seem remote and a bit intimidating. You, on the other hand, wear jeans and hand crafted sweaters. Your hair is worn naturally (by the way, nice cut), your smile is open and sunny and you seem utterly approachable, like a friendly neighbor. You look like someone I who might sit in my living room on craft night, sipping iced tea and nibbling cookies while we chat and knit and laugh and share little slices of our lives. So, thank you!

Hugs and Prayers

Serene Knitter

www.sereneknitter.blogspot.com

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

StellaN — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 10:37:37 GMT

I made my first sweater at 11. It was wearable. The only thing wrong with it was the sick shade of pink my mother had chosen for the yarn. It was yarn she bought so she could knit me a sweater.

Don't ask me how I got from not knowing how to knit to a full scale adult sweater, because I don't have a clue. She came home from work I had had half the back done, so she let me continue until I'd done the front and both sleeves and a collar.

I know I didn't know anything about gauge or even needle sizes until years later since I was totally self taught. I'd been taught the knit and purl stitches by my older sister who didn't make her first sweater for a couple more years when she was in her mid-twenties.

I have no idea of how it turned out to be a wearable sweater, but I did wear it, so it must have been OK.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

taknit — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 10:27:49 GMT

Great post Sandi. I would like to request a continuation along this line, similar to SherylIJ's suggestion about how to substitute. I would especially like to know how you would go about altering a pattern to fit the gauge of a yarn/knitter. Seems I rarely use the recommended yarn and I knit tightly, particularly when I knit continental style in the round. I have been making myself do swatches but I still have trouble with gauge at times. I've learned that even 1/4 of a stitch too much on a man's size 42 knit in the round sweater can make it up to 4" too big.

For example, I'm trying to work out gauge for a shell I want to make. The pattern calls for Debbie Bliss Cathay (50%cotton/35%rayon/15%silk) with a gauge of 22 sts and 30 rnds/4" on #4 circulars. Cathay's specs give this same gauge on #5 needles. I'm going to use Filatura Di Crosa Brilla (42%cotton/ 58%viscose) with specs of 28 sts and 34 row over 4" on 3mm needles (#2.5). So far I'm up to #5 needles and getting 26 sts/4" in the rnd continental style. Maybe that will relax a little once the swatch is washed. I hope so. I don't want to go to a larger needle because this yarn doesn't look good with that large of a stitch. I'm to the point now that I'm considering altering the pattern to fit my gauge. I would appreciate any tips or insights in doing this, especially with regard to using cotton and other cellulose fibers.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

Gillian — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 07:55:50 GMT

This is a request not a comment. (although I can only say nice things about everything that I have read since joining a few weeks ago. What I really would like help with is the following. I am just completing a baby blanket that has lace panels (4 across + 5 up) within garter stitch borders. I would like to make a narrow lacy pattern border around the whole thing. Is there any way that one go round 90% corners while knitting a lace band about 10 - 12 stitches wide. I know about mitring but to start a complicated lace pattern with a pointed mitre corner seems just too complicated to me. Can anyone help? Gillian Eyre, Gansbaai South Africa

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

Gillian — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 07:55:32 GMT

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

EvelynU — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 02:30:29 GMT

Thanks also for sharing openly about that awkward topic of the girl crush. I remember rather extreme crushes on several of my female teachers as well as on other girls. And I also went through a girl crush in my 30s--despite being quite hetero in my actual sexual desires. It's a strange and confusing feeling, and the depth of the feelings involved is obvious from the product you produced! Fortunately, I guess, I don't have any mementos of my various crushes. Just warm and slightly awkward memories.

re: Choosing Yarn: The Importance of Drape

JenJ — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 00:50:58 GMT

Sandi,

I just wanted to let you know that I really loved the last two KD newsletters. I'd read the Ravelry thread where some had asked for a return to the more blog-like newsletters. I haven't been with KD long so I hadn't seen them before; if they were anything like these, I can understand why people asked for their return! It was a great story that you shared with us like friends that was also full of great info. I'm a compulsive yarn substituter, so this was a timely lesson!