Friday, April 4, 2014

Fiber Arts Friday: Alpaca Cape, part 3

My Alpaca Cape is starting to get a bit unruly.  Measuring in at 36 inches by 36 inches and just over half-way there.  It's going to be luxurious when it's finished.  :-)


I'm using US6 needles which I did not realize until reading this Spinster Beth's post that US6 actually comes in two different sizes.... 4.0 mm and 4.25 mm.

So of course, I had the smaller size for all of my circs and the larger size for all of my dpns.  *shakes head*  But I've been to the LYS and have all of the smaller sizes for this project.

The cabling is in progress....


... and going well, but I had one cross in the wrong place.  So this spent about two weeks in time-out while I decided if I was ok with it as a design feature.

I decided I wasn't.  Then I spent some time thinking about ways to fix the cable.

I figured I could drop the stitches, but wasn't sure how to re-make the cross.  So I resigned myself to the worst case scenario of having to rip it back... I didn't want to, but I was ok if I had to.


So I took the project to Knit Night a couple of weeks ago and asked my Comadres for some advice.

We talked about different strategies and the pros and cons of each and decided the best course was to drop the 8 stitches and re-knit using smaller dpns.  One of my lovely friends even found this tutorial by the Yarn Harlot.  I do love my Comadres.  :-)


So here we go.... I have a table, headlamp, reading glasses, crochet hook, smaller-diameter-dpns, a clear head and coffee for courage.  ;-)

I knit up to the cable panel and removed the stitches from the left needle:


Then I dropped the 8-stitch panel 6 rows to the last cable-cross:


I put the loose stitches on my smaller diameter double-pointed needle and clipped the strands of yarn out of the way with a stitch marker:


Separating out each strand as I was ready to work with it, I re-knitted up to the correct location for the cable-cross:


 Completed the cable cross:


 Knit the remaining rows and returned to my needles:


I've fiddled with this some to try and stretch out the new stitches.  So now I just have to decide if the loose stitches on the left side of the cable panel will work out enough during blocking.

This process was much easier than I expected.

I've knit a couple of rows since fixing the cable, and the loose stitches seem less obvious, but I'm not certain if I'm happy yet.


I'm on ball #5 of 10.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday.

8 comments:

Cathy Johnson said...

Well done for fixing the cables, I'd be so worried and mostly likely it'd become one of my (many) UFOs. Can't wait to see the finished item.

Natalie said...

Great job. You are lucky to have such a support group. Note to self: I need to find a knitting group! Thanks for sharing. You inspire every time (mine would have ended up in the "abandoned" pile).

Unknown said...

I've done this too many times to count. It will come out in the "wash", or blocking in this case. Just did it last night over 16 sts and 20 rows!!!! Argh! But now I am back on track.

Vivian said...

You are very brave to try this! I usually just count it as "design feature" and hope no one will notice.

Word Lily said...

I think it looks great! I bet the stitches will adjust themselves and no one will ever notice. Such great confidence it gives us when we can learn how to fix our mistakes, though, eh?

Voie de Vie said...

Nicely done on the cable fix! I can't tell the difference, so I'd bet that blocking with once again work its magic.

WonderWhyGal said...

Hooray for working through the fix. It always helps to have friends with you when making the big "tear back" plunge and even better when you feel good about it and learn from it. It's looking fantastic!

Unknown said...

I didn't even know you could get 4.25mm needles! Hasn't been an issue for me up to now thank goodness.

I fix cables that way too, It's a bit scary but I feel so smug when it's done and I've saved myself a load of frogging. I figure it's always worth having a go as if it doesn't work I'd be frogging back anyway