Ruthless Knitting

Thanks for all the comments on my knitting mystery! I also got some great advice from folks on the Knittyboard. Here is what I now know:

The Afghan
The afghan is hairpin lace crochet. It was constructed of individual strips that were created using a crochet hook and a hairpin lace tool. Each strip has a knotted-looking center and fringy loops on each side. The strips were joined together by interlocking the fringy loops. On two sides of the blanket, the loopy edges of the outer strips form a finished edge. The third side is where the interlocking began, and the edge there is also finished, though it lacks loops. The final side is the side with the bobby pins, where the interlocking was completed. This is the side that must be finished to keep the blanket from unraveling. I’m still not entirely sure how to do this, but I joined a Yahoo group for hairpin lace enthusiasts, and I’ve asked for some expert advice there. It sounds like the general idea is to single crochet around all four sides using yarn in a matching or contrasting color. I still need some help with the mechanics, but I’m confident I can do this.

The Sweater
The sweater has progressed from “mystery” to “quandary.” I put all the live stitches on holders, picked apart the seams, and washed and blocked the pieces. Two things became clear to me in the process: first, the fact that one side of the front is lower than the other is no accident, nor is it the result of unraveling. Grandma definitely knit and seamed this sweater exactly how she meant to, and she seamed it to stay seamed. It was a real bitch to unpick because she was so thorough about spliiting stitches in order to keep the yarn in place. One of the Knittyboard commenters, keena, proposed that maybe the neckline was lower on one side because it was meant to scoop down and button along the top of the raglan seam. Aunt Cathy sent a few buttons along with the sweater, and these combined with the other evidence convince me that keena’s guess is right.

The second thing I figured out while blocking the sweater is why Grandma abandoned it in the first place: this was a tragedy of unmatching yarns. Both body pieces are knit in the same shade of the same yarn, but each sleeve begins with one shade of cream and then abruptly switches to another shade about six inches along. On one sleeve, this isn’t terribly noticeable because the same yarn seems to have been used, but on the other sleeve Grandma apparently tried an altogether different yarn — well, an altogether different two-ply worsted weight wool yarn — and it really stands out as being a different color and texture. I think that my earlier supposition was correct — that she had a bunch of cream wool leftover from different projects and tried to combine them. She ran out of yarn after knitting the body, so she used some different yarn that looked extremely similar in the ball. As soon as she seamed it up and had a look at it in the light of day, however, she realized it was a no go and abandoned the project. My mom said to me in an e-mail, “Thelma [my grandma] was plagued by whites that didn’t match.” Add creams to the list.

So how to rescue this sweater? I took all the cream yarns my Aunt Cathy sent, wound them into balls, knit a long swatch with ten rows of each yarn, and compared it to the sweater. I don’t think any of the yarns are exactly the same as the ones in the sweater, but there are some fairly close matches. Then I dyed the whole swatch brown to find out whether the dye would conceal the color shifts in the yarn. Unfortunately, it seemed to make the color shifts even more obvious, which rules out dyeing as a way to solve the problem.

I think the only solution is to partially or completely reknit the sleeves. The best method would probably be to reknit them completely using matching yarn. Even if they’re slightly different from the rest of the sweater in color, as long as each entire sleeve is the same color, the whole sweater should appear to match (at least in most lights). My next step is to baste the sweater pieces back together and try it on. If I’m going to reknit the sleeves, I may as well reknit them to fit me, don’t you think?

Yes, but Have You Been Knitting?
In other news, I knit some socks. These are short little bed socks knit with the yarn held double for extra warmth and speediness. They’re a very belated birthday present for my friend Anne. I used Mountain Colors Bearfoot in Flathead Cherry, size 4 dpns, and my own fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants version of Priscilla Gibson-Roberts’s dream socks pattern from Interweave Knits. Anne has tiny little feet, so these are knit over 44 stitches to produce socks that are 7 inches in circumference and about 7.5 inches long. I hope they fit.

I’ve also been working on the Clementine Shawlette, though not especially quickly, since I don’t find it very exciting knitting. I think I have seven or eight inches to go before I’m done with the first half. Can you spot the mistake? I’m ignoring it.

In more exciting news, I’m finished with the Puff-Sleeved Feminine Cardigan. Sort of. I’ve done all the knitting, and fits very nicely, but I had to order some buttons, which I’m still waiting on. Also, I’m concerned that when the buttons come and I install them, the front of the cardigan will be gappy. If that turns out to be the case, I’ll try making the button bands wider (though I don’t have very much of the green yarn left). I also have to weave in my ends and wash and block the sweater. Oh, and I have to undo the sleeve bind-off and try again, because it’s a bit tight. But we’re getting there.

Miscellany
This post is already too long, but let me leave you with a bit of non-knitting-related excitement:

This is a dictionary stand that my parents gave me for my birthday. It required some minor repairs that David did for me today, so it’s now officially in service. Libraries used to use these for dictionaries and other heavy reference books, but they’re gradually being decomissioned, and you can buy them now on eBay. This is a heavy-duty, cast iron stand with an oak (I think) top divided into two sides, each of which supports half of the book. As you flip the pages, one side will lower and the other will raise up so that the dictionary’s spine is supported. Professionally, I’m an editor of academic books, and I actually have to use the giant dictionary quite a bit, so it’s quite exciting to me to add this piece of furniture to my office. It means I don’t have to haul the dictionary off the shelf each time I need it, balance it precariously on my desk, and flip through to find the definition I need. I’ve been rescued by nineteenth-century technology.