When Cables Go Pear-shaped

Having made my list and checked it twice, so to speak, I could hardly wait to jump into knitting Campbell’s Aran. Planning and noodling have their charms, but they’re not knitting, ya know? Due diligence done, there’s a point after which one can’t predict every possible happenstance. I’m always happy, then, when it’s finally time to settle down and play with string in a meaningful way.

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Above is the view from my lap, a few inches away from my provisional cast on. There is more to be said on the what and why of that choice, but for now we’ll just call it a deplorable excess of Start-itis. I wanted to crack straight on with the sweater back, and lower edge treatment be damned.

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Somewhere about halfway through the first 32-row repeat, I experienced a sinking feeling. The honeycomb panels adjacent to the center felt stiffer than was strictly necessary. And I wasn’t loving how fiddly the stitch pattern was, calling for all those 2-over-2 crosses on every right side row. Spreading out the sweater back to re-measure and “admire” my work, I admitted to myself that I really didn’t like those honeycomb panels at all. In addition to the other issues, they were too close to the same scale as the filler mini-honeycombs at the sides.

How, after all of that swatching to audition cables for knitability and scale, did I make such a glaring error? I unearthed the honeycomb swatch to look at it again, compared with what was happening in my lap:

Can you guess, Gentle Readers, what happened? How about now?

That’s right. After swatching the honeycomb not once, but twice, and finding it worthy, I failed to knit the pattern I had chosen. Instead of working the cable crosses every fourth row, as God intended, I was working them every other row. No wonder it was fiddly, and dense, and small!

Come to think of it, I’ve known PEOPLE who were fiddly, dense and small because they were crossed too often, and I didn’t much like them either.

In my fit of Start-itis, I had been so focused on following the charts I combined to get my pretty center cable that I never even bothered to look at my honeycomb swatch. Which could only mean one thing, of course:

Surgical Intervention. I still don’t know if it would have been faster to operate on it like this or to frog it and start over. I told myself that the surgical route would only require re-knitting 2,560 stitches, while a total do-over would call for 6,400. But of course, any decision that causes me to resort to math is probably already a bad one.

Heed, Gentle Readers, the lesson of our forbears: Those who do not study their swatches are destined to repeat them.

Auditions and callbacks

I’ve been doing a fair bit of mental noodling about Campbell’s Aran sweater, now that the yarn is ready. As always, there are some considerations that will inform my design choices. Conferring with my client, we arrived at the following for the basic silhouette:

Garment Silhouette

As you can see, it’s pretty traditional, with Campbell’s favorite elements included to personalize it. Specifically, he requested shoulder saddles and a shawl collar. It wasn’t till I sat down to sketch it that I realized: I don’t think I’ve ever seen shoulder saddles and a shawl collar on the same sweater. There’s no reason not to do it - I just think it’s a bit uncommon. So is Campbell, though, so there you have it.

Design Elements

Of course, if there are shoulder saddles, I insist that they continue all the way down the sleeves and into the cuffs. Because if it’s not sexy, why bother? Also sexy is when the body cables extend down into the lower edge treatment, through careful planning. Add that one to my list of requirements. There may or may not be a closure of some sort where the collar overlaps. We shall see, but you know me: If there’s a place to put a button, buckle or tie, I’ll find it.

Cable Styles

Cam also had some opinions about the styles of cables he likes: Honeycombs and twists more than geometrics and braids. And finally, we agreed that I could add some special motifs that would be secret messages to him from his mom, but that they would be somewhat hidden, in panels at the sides. More to come on the secret message motifs!

Construction (knitter’s safety)

Before losing my heart to any particular cable(s), I wanted to sort out some construction details. I *MAY* have mentioned that this will be a big sweater. And by “big” I mean “as seen from space”. The amount of fabric in it will require some structural support. For that, I’ll be relying on seams.

At first the idea of seams made me sad, as I prefer to work circularly whenever I can. But on reflection, I realized that swinging a 56-inch sweater around in circles is actually much more work, physically, than working the pieces one at a time. Aside from eliminating seam-sewing, the main advantage to knitting in the round is that you don’t have to work wrong-side (purl) rows. But while that’s true for stockinette knitting, cable knitting has just as many purl stitches on the front as the back side of the work. Knitting separate pieces will also work well for bottom-up construction. I’m choosing that this time so I won’t have to reverse-chart any cables, which can be an adventure/aneurysm.

Another thing I’m thinking about is the cable(s) I’ll choose for those shoulder straps. Yes, they’re dreamy, but they also have to support the weight of the entire sweater. I’m leaning toward something dense, without too many rows between crosses. Otherwise they might stretch laterally, allowing the whole garment to drag out of shape.

In addition the construction, I’m considering scale. I started shopping for cables in my stitch dictionaries with an eye to the sizes, as well as the styles. I’ve got a lot of blank space to fill, without using too many different cables, and without having to repeat elements too frequently. While I will use varied widths, I want the effect to be proportionate to the garment as a whole.

Swatching

With all those ideas in place, I shopped just about every book about cables that I own. Once I found the contenders, I swatched. A. LOT. The paper tags in the photos below are to remind me where I found each chart, and of its stitch count, row count and measurements. Swatching each element and laying them out in order is the best way for me to predict how they will fit and measure together in the actual sweater. I’m sure there are knitters who can accomplish this using math, but I’m not one of them.

This one’s a clear winner for the center front panel. It needs borders on either side to keep it company though.

I remembered this little number from a different book. Its row count is perfect, and there’s a lovely reverse of it for the other side (didn’t bother swatching the reverse). And then I added a wee 4-st twist to border the works and divide it from the next panel:

Which will be Cam’s requested Honeycomb. It took a few tries to get a width I like but I love it juxtaposed with the rope-y center twist. Bonus: it’s un-thinky to knit, and the row count also works well with its neighbors.

And now for the important stabilizing shoulder saddles. I like this firm plait for the job. I can also easily widen it if need be.

Here’s a combo I made up to border the shoulder saddle. I don’t love it yet and still need to try again. Adjacent to that is the filler stitch I’ll be using throughout: Mini Honeycomb. It’s fun to knit (no cable needle required!) and the fabric is both fluffy and flexible. I’m a fan.

This is the swatch collection (only those making the first cut - there are MANY others I deemed not groovy) so far. On the left are some contenders for the “secret message” side panels…To be continued.

So that’s the state of Campbell’s Aran at the moment. How do you like to plan your cables, Gentle Readers? Please share your process in the comments!

Perserverence > Skill

Greetings, Gentle Readers! When last we checked in with Campbell’s sweater, it was still a big nondescript pile of undyed yarn. In the days since, I’ve been doing a fair bit of trial and error in the hopes of getting the color he requested. As a dyer, it turns out, I make an excellent knitter. Which is fine with me. I don’t expect to be good at everything I try - in fact I like to keep the bar low in some areas (I’m looking at you , kitchen) to lessen the pressure.

In fact, I’m a big advocate of sucking at some things, just so I look better at others.

So when my Boyo chose Aubergine for his Aran knit, I determined that anything in the general zip code of eggplant would be good enough, and screwed my courage to the sticking place. Congratulations to Lindsay M., by the way, for the closest guess to what color I’m planning! Drop me an email with your mailing addy so I can send out your prize. And as always, to everyone who played: thank you so much for jumping in with your guesses!

Here’s how the adventure went down: First I made a few test swatches in little jars in the microwave, just to see what would happen. I was really happy with the Aubergine (#475) color I ordered HERE, just as it came out of the pot. That simplified everything, because I could abandon thougts of blending and then scaling the “perfect” combination of red-violet and blue-violet with brown, etc. to get aubergine.

The center one is darker than the one on the right, if you’re wondering - turns out this is a tricky shade to photograph. I liked all of these, actually. I eliminated the darkest one, because knitting really dark colors in the winter, mostly at night, is no longer the rollicking good time for my eyes that it once was. I was sure I’d like anything close to one of the other two, though. Armed with some measuring tools and the force of my steely will, I leaned in to Operation Aubergine.

I had a lot of free-floating anxiety about getting all the skeins to match. So even though just about everything I read cautioned against it, I decided to dye all 4,185 yards in one go, in my washing machine. I cranked the hot water heater up, removed the agitator from my trusty top-loader and stood by with an electric kettle of boiling water, leaving nothing to chance. Yeah, that failed. As you cen see above, the color that happened was less eggplant and more Grimace.

I still considered myself on the right side of the Dyeing Gods though, because A. I hadn’t felted the yarn, and B. the gross color was very consistient across all 17 skeins.

So next stop: Dye Pot on the stove. Did I mention we’re having a blizzard? Sure would suck to lose power in the middle of this project, I realized in the middle of this project…

With better control and higher heat (DUH) I was able to exhaust all the dye into the yarn, where it belongs. I did it in four batches because this is my biggest pot. I recorded the time and temperature for each step and repeated each exactly, including the bonus round of using the snow to accellerate each cool-down.

I reported my progress to Campbell, who was also celebrating nature by being trapped at his place on the other side of the Columbia River from me.

Still wet, the yarn looked miles closer to what I was going for. The only question remaining was would it all match from batch to batch. Ruby both approved and reassured me as she supervised.

I still wasn’t able to see whether my batches looked the same until the following morning, when they were dry and we had daylight.

Atlas was a fan of the drying process, and of the color, too.

And here we are! I couldn’t be happier with this color. I could honestly eat it with a spoon.

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On behalf of rank amateurs everywhere, I’d like to report that tenacity can sometimes make up for a lack of experience. As long as the standards for success are low.

Would I ever do this again? Well, I didn’t bore you with what happens when you overflow your washing machine with aubergine dye in the middle of a blizzard. No one who’s met me will be surprised THAT happened. I also won’t point out that I’ve now got two whole days invested here, between re-skeining and dyeing (twice) all 4000 + yards. So yeah, it’s already a labor of love. Cheap in terms of cash outlay (between gift cards and multiple coupons, etc. I have around $40 invested in the yarn). Expensive if measured in time and anxiety. But worth it? Hell yeah. What else was I gonna do with my bonus blizzard day off?