CandleFlame! [knitting]
Dec. 6th, 2006 06:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tcepsaThis is belated, but that doesn't make it any less of a reason for celebration: I finished the CandleFlame shawl (just) in time for Mom to wear it to Thanksgiving dinner! ^_^ Pictures will be forthcoming (just got the pictures off my camera late last night, so hopefully will get them formatted and posted in the next day or so. In the meantime, though, it came out to be something like 45,000 stitches. That's a massively high-water mark for me so far. Of course, I also did it over the course of about eight months. Still, that is probably the longest project that I have ever completed (with the possible exception of my chainmail tanktop vest). I'm very pleased with myself for being able to see it through to the end.
I think the part that I'm most proud of myself for doing, though, is that instead of doing the original vertical garter stitch border, I developed a variation of the pattern itself.
While I was pondering whether I really wanted the garter stitch border across the top, someone at Springwater suggested that I do a series of candle flames across, like in the pattern itself. I liked the idea, but it doesn't immediately translate; the flames interlock with each other so that the widest part of one is next to the skinniest part of its neighbors and you can't just cut out a straight line of a single candleflame without replacing those neighbors with... something. It will end up being a very wavy strip of knitting, and if you try to attach one side of it to a straight edge (such as the one across the top of the shawl) the opposite edge will be forced to be even wavier and it will be nigh unrecognizable as the same candleflame pattern. There may even be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
So to get around this I came up with a stockinette "filler" to replace those missing neighbor candleflames. When the candleflame is in its increasing stages (increasing by two every other row) the filler decreases by two in the same row, one on each side. Vice versa when the candleflame is decreasing, so the net width remains a constant 15 stitches (11 for the candleflame and a 2 stitch border on either side at its widest point). There was a minor setback, as I didn't take into account the fact that since the ratio of knit stitches to purl stitches is changing, the width of the whole piece (in inches) is not constant. However, it's a much more subtle, much nicer wave than it would have been otherwise, and fits in better with the pattern of the shawl's other two edges (which are also wavy). So overall, I'm really happy with it and will probably try a scarf or something with it a little farther down the road.
For now, I'm going to focus on my Einstein coat, my tabi socks, and developing my continental skills.
I think the part that I'm most proud of myself for doing, though, is that instead of doing the original vertical garter stitch border, I developed a variation of the pattern itself.
While I was pondering whether I really wanted the garter stitch border across the top, someone at Springwater suggested that I do a series of candle flames across, like in the pattern itself. I liked the idea, but it doesn't immediately translate; the flames interlock with each other so that the widest part of one is next to the skinniest part of its neighbors and you can't just cut out a straight line of a single candleflame without replacing those neighbors with... something. It will end up being a very wavy strip of knitting, and if you try to attach one side of it to a straight edge (such as the one across the top of the shawl) the opposite edge will be forced to be even wavier and it will be nigh unrecognizable as the same candleflame pattern. There may even be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
So to get around this I came up with a stockinette "filler" to replace those missing neighbor candleflames. When the candleflame is in its increasing stages (increasing by two every other row) the filler decreases by two in the same row, one on each side. Vice versa when the candleflame is decreasing, so the net width remains a constant 15 stitches (11 for the candleflame and a 2 stitch border on either side at its widest point). There was a minor setback, as I didn't take into account the fact that since the ratio of knit stitches to purl stitches is changing, the width of the whole piece (in inches) is not constant. However, it's a much more subtle, much nicer wave than it would have been otherwise, and fits in better with the pattern of the shawl's other two edges (which are also wavy). So overall, I'm really happy with it and will probably try a scarf or something with it a little farther down the road.
For now, I'm going to focus on my Einstein coat, my tabi socks, and developing my continental skills.
