A Gaggle Of Garter

The north-bound Geese have been flying overhead lately, making me think of the term 'gaggle of Geese'. I've decided that it's a good label for my 'all-garter-all-the-time' Tomten.

I am closing in on the end though. Last night I finished torque-free, sleeve number two and managed to complete the first of the finishing - the edging along both fronts and the collar. In garter stitch, naturally.

That means there are just three - but three big - details left, before I can call it complete.

The first is all those ends.

Should you ever decided to knit a Tomten Jacket, use just one yarn. My multi- yarn Tomten, knit from leftovers means a 'gaggle' of ends to be woven in.

Next will be the sewing of the sleeve seams, with their unusual connection to the body. Because of it's very narrow fronts, when Tomten is folded in half, back to fronts, 14 attached-to-nothing stitches are left to form the underarm.

The instructions say to sew those 14 stitches to the first 14 garter ridges of the sleeve. Leave it to Elizabeth to put an interesting twist on construction.

Last will be the zipper. Yes, I know, it doesn't need to be last but I have to work up to it.
I don't do zippers often so as I find them hard to do and the my attempts are not always successful often look crappy.

My hope is to accomplish these completion points quickly. I'm tired of listening to the knitterly equivalent of honking geese and want to see the end of this gaggle.

Well Trained

Long-time readers know that Fred occasionally does laundry. Sometimes with disastrous results.

But I think he is finally trained. Well trained, I might say.

Yesterday, it was me that washed the clothes and me that hung them on the line but it was Fred that brought then in, once dry. I was at the computer when Fred stopped by the door to the den holding this

and asking "where do you want your swatch?" Imagine! He didn't put it in the drawer with the dishcloths. He didn't put it on the shelf with the cleaning rags. Most importantly, he didn't throw it out! All of that would be evidence in itself of training that took. But to know that it was a swatch! I was super impressed.

What you see from yesterday's laundry is my swatch for Sitcom Cardi. A blatant copy of Wilma and Gail's chic little cardigans and a much needed sweater for my summer wardrobe. If I can work this into EZ's methodology, it might be my next knit.

If you look closely, you can see 4 holes in the swatch.

That is my inspired way of keeping track of needle size. I always start my swatches with the recommended needle size - in this case 3.75 - as per the ball band. If that doesn't work - and here it gave me 24 instead of 22 stitches - then I change needle size. To denote that change I put a 'YO, K2tog' for each mm of needle size. I went up to a 4mm needle - so, 4 holes.


The 4 mm worked. Otherwise I would have gone to 4.5mm and created 4 holes on the right hand side of the fabric and one hole on the extreme left to denote the half. I could, of course make notes of what I've done, but I sometimes lose notes. This way the information is always in the swatch.

I know I should, but I don't always launder my swatches. Yesterday I did, and thank goodness, my laundry-assisting husband knows a swatch when he sees one.

It seems to take forever, and seems as f it will never work, but yesterday's swatch question is evidence that any knitters husbands can be trained.

Hate Is Such A Strong Word

SO -let me just say that I am not nearly as enamoured with garter stitch as Elizabeth Zimmerman.

Once Waterloo was finished, my lazy self thought it would be easier to whip up a Tomten Jacket than clean up Waterloo's leftovers. The Tomten Jacket is knit in garter stitch - miles and miles of garter stitch. Garter stitch was fun when I started the jacket. All 112 stitches, fronts and back, knit flat and all together - another rug-like piece - went quite fast.

Separating the fronts and knitting them up to the shoulders wasn't too bad. Fronts are done on one-eighth of the 112 - or 14- stitches. Of course that seemed easy.

Things started to slow down when I got to the back. After working on only 14 stitches for the fronts, working on the 28 back stitches took twice as long forever.

But the real real knock out punches started coming when I began the sleeves. 56 stitches! Not to mention some varying instructions from Elizabeth's various books.

How confusing is that?

To make matters worse, I chose to do a double decrease instead of a decrease either side of a centre stitch. Faster, I thought, than having to work two decreases. But dang, it's hard to recognize the centre stitch of a double decrease in garter stitch! I can't 'see' things as easily in garter stitch as I can in stockinet - so the first sleeve torques a bit. A look I think will be precious on a little one. My story and I'm sticking to it.

All this garter stitch now leaves me wondering what EZ project I will do next. I had intended to make the Baby Surprise Jacket. Guess what? Garter stitch. Or this little kimono

discovered in an old Vogue Magazine. Guess what? Garter stitch.

Since most of Tomten's sleeve number two still needs to be knit, all those ends sewn in and a zipper installed, the decision doesn't have to be made today.