Sunday, June 9, 2013

Cabled Cardi - Part 2

No, I have not forgotten about my KAL with my sister.  The Knit-A-Long is just taking a long time.  It could be that the weather is getting nicer and I don't want to knit with wool anymore.  Actually, that is exactly it.

Kathy is pretty much done with her sweater, as I am the pokey one, am still knitting the body with all of those cables.  Just to refresh everyone on what the Cabled Cardi was, here is a link to Part 1:
Here is also a pic of what it is supposed to look like when we are done:

from knitty.com

Since its cast-on, I have done most of the body.  The raglan sleeves have waste yarn keeping the live stitches for the sleeves holding-tight until I get there.

Top Portion - Front

Looking at these pics, I'm not really liking the color, or the absence of color, much.  Oh boy....

Top Portion - Back

At this point is where I will start the cabled-ribbed part.  It will have no bottom ribbing, that this cabled bottom portion will serve as it.

The cabled was going well, it just takes awhile.  There are a bunch of cables that using a cable hook might take too long.  The quick technique for doing the 4-stitch cable is:
  1. Insert right needle tip into the back loops of 2 stitches on the left needle.
  2. Pop all 4 stitches off the left needle.
  3. Place the loose two stitches back on the left needle and place the 2 stitches that are on the right needle back on the left needle.  They are now in a different order.
  4. Knit, like normal, with the new order of stitches on the needles.
That creates the cable without using a cable hook.  With there being only 4 stitches, it works well.

I have made decent headway on the cabling portion.  But.....there is a minor problem.  Not problem really, but a I just realized I did way more work than I needed too.  Crap!  You'll see:


Here is the cabling.....can you see from the first pic in this post, what is different about it???  Scroll back up and compare the pics.

I did too many cables!  You are supposed to have a ribbing between each cable and I just kept on cabling.  Ugh!  That is way more work than what I was supposed to do.  I do like it, but not what I had in mind.

I only just realized it today, when I looked at the pattern to see how long I am supposed to knit these darn cables to.  I saw the pics and was like, Ah, what is that pic?  Are there different ways you can knit the cables?  Did they give us choices on how we wanted it to look?  Well, the answer is No.  I just did my own thing and did not read the pattern repeat right.

Looks nice, but I'm concerned now that once I put it on, the cables with bunch to the back of me, rather than a nice fan around me.  The cables tend to bunch together, making a ribbing of their own.  The problem with that is that my gauge is now off, with the potential of being too small.  

Well, I'm now putting it back in the bag and will wait it out.  I don't really know what I am going to do with it.  I have a few options:

  1. Continue and hope for the best 
  2. Rip out the cables and start the cable part again
  3. Rip out the whole thing and reknit it in another yarn
  4. Rip out the whole thing and call it a day

Not sure.  Tough choices, since I have spent a ton of time on it already.  I'm having second thoughts of the yarn I chose because it's wool, itchy wool, and can't have it next to my skin.  I'm in Florida, when am I going to wear this?  Only when I'm in Mass, visiting?  I can just wear my sister's sweater that she already knitted.  Hehe.  

I may just rip it out and start it again with another yarn.  A softer yarn.  I'll see what my sister says about it.  I've already placed it back in the bag.  The only bummer is that the project is using my popular size 8 circs.  I like those and tend to use them a lot.  I could have used them on the Weekend Shrug, but used straights instead.

If this happened to you...what would you do?  Let me know!

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