19.02.2017

Bound off earlier than the pattern called for by a few inches - I wanted the front at the crests of my hipbones and it would have been too long. The length is good like this - I have a slightly short torso.

You can’t really see the ribbing at this gauge in boucle without squinting enough to give yourself a headache, but I’m assuming it will still fulfill its function. I didn’t go down a needle at first and then changed my mind after four rounds and added 2 on a 5mm (I didn’t have a 5.5 mm) before binding off semi-loosely with 6mm.

I read the instructions for the sleeves but then I just decided to wing it - I prefer sleeves not to be too loose and my arms are both unusually slender and unusually long, so I’ve been decreasing ~every 6 rounds and have just gotten past the elbow. Times like this I really wish my arms were short (I’ll be glad again when I can get things off the top shelf, but I get so tired of knitting sleeves…).

03.03.2017

Picked up and knit the collar on 5mms in 2x2 ribbing. It took three tries, because when I just did 4 rounds and then bound off with the stretchy kkp bind off, it was way too big (and hanging kind of limply because this yarn doesn’t really make very stretchy ribbing. It isn’t as elastic as it could be because the bouclé sort of felts to itself rather than sliding back and forth. The body of the sweater is extremely springy, but none of the ribbed edgings have any real contraction to speak of. The ribbing basically just serves to keep them from rolling, I suppose, but it looks fine, so).

So I tried again and added 2 rounds with decreases to tighten it up, but when I tried it on the neck opening was way too small. I mean, it fit over my head, but it looked ridiculous.

So for attempt #3 I frogged back to the second row of collar and added another row with decreases, then bound off the next row after that with a combination of ordinary bind off and slip-slip-knit bind off in a few places where I wanted to make sure it had a bit of stretch. Again, the boucle covers up the difference.

The neck opening of this sweater is pretty wide, so it’s fine that it doesn’t have any real grip to it. It lays flat, which is what I wanted. But given the peculiar quality of the yarn, I think a narrow opening would be weird.

Another few notes on the yarn:

It felts to itself as you’d expect while you knit, so frogging is a pain in the butt, but it’s not literally impossible. I actually only broke the yarn trying to frog in one place. In the others I was able to pick it back apart with a crochet hook, a darning needle, a knitting needle, or a firm tug. It didn’t escape unscathed, but slightly bald spots in the yarn are also readily covered up by the fabric once it’s knit up.

The yarn has a stronger synthetic core and the loops of the bouclé appear to be made with a sort of tube of alpaca blend that’s knitted around it like a little sleeve. When I was frogging, it’s this outer layer of alpaca that would tear, due to the loops having gotten stuck, and then it would bunch up weirdly, exposing the core. I was able several times to run my fingers down the yarn and push the covering back into (more or less) place to cover it again.

The skeins are very loosely wound, pretty much no tension, and fall apart just from being used. If you’ve got a ball winder, you could probably save yourself some trouble by using it.

03.03.2017

I also added extra raglan increases to size 106 stitch count for a looser fit.