Knitting Ranger

It has been a bit quiet recently, but as usual before Christmas life is busy with Christmas parties, preparing Christmas cookies and of course Christmas gifts. But as it is not yet Christmas, I will not post anything about that right now, but rather catching up with a holiday knit from this summer. Inspired by a friends jacket I prepared this jacket.



I used Bremont Valentina - wonderful thread, wonderful to wear. It is a simple jacket, with no specific pattern, except for the slightly longer front parts. Very comfortable, especially in this dreadful December winter rain.

I just realized, that I had started this post ages ago, but never finished or caught up with it. I had started it, as I wanted to write down the pattern for a change, as I never seem to remember my own patterns. This one was an easy one, so I can finish the pattern description, using the finished product.

Lang Yarns Marisa is actually a crocheting thread, but I wanted to see what happens if you use it for knitting. I ordered several skeins of the color 9.0001 (white, as you can see in the picture).

Cast on 110 stitches.
12 rows are knitted in seed stitches.
Afterwards knit 6 rows, reducing 1 stitch on both sides -- repeat 11 times.
Afterwards, I knit 6 rows, increasing 1 stitch on both sides -- repeat 10 times.

On the front bind off the 10 middle stitches for the neckline.
After 15 rows, bind off the 50 middle stitches for the back.

For both front and back keep reducing one stitch on every side on every other row.

Sew front and back together. The neckline is finished with a simple, single row of simple crochet stitches.

The arms where started from the arm hole using double-pointed needles, finishing with 12 rows of seed stitches. The arms can be as long as required. In this version, they come down to the elbow.

The finished product looks like this: A very simple, white T-shirt, very nice in the summer, but also over a coloured top.

... the other day I discovered a new wool and I have to admit it was not love at first sight. But first the details: The wool is by ito (http://www.ito-yarn.com), it's pure silk, with approx. 400m/50g. But because it is silk, the thread is not completely even, which makes it slightly less straightforward to knit. But the result is amazing. The pictures show the top I made from this dark blue thread before it is finished. In the meantime I did finish it and also wore it and it is just gorgeous. I had to put it on my kitchen scale, because I could not believe how light it is. It just has 95g(!) and for the extremely warm summer days it is just perfect. One can wear it and in the evening just wash it quickly in the sink and it will be dry two hours later. I promised myself to get some more of this wool and make one or two tops more. It is definitely worth the money and the pain with the thin needles and the ages it takes to knit the thin thread.

As soon as I manage, I will also add a picture of the final piece. But for now half of it has to suffice. It has been knitted in parallel again - so both parts are exactly the same:



The pattern on the sleeve unfortunately is not very prominent when it is being worn. I am still thinking of adding something (i.e. a pearl) to it.

... what it was supposed to be. I love the wool by Bremont. I already have several pieces made out of their wool. And now that I am quite sure about myself I wanted to make a pullover for my husband. But in the end, it turned out to be a pullover for myself - again. This time not because it would not fit, but because I ran out of wool. At least now I know that for the next attempt I will rather get 12 balls than just 10. Anyway, I now have another super comfy pullover for the next winter - good that summer just started .....

Some statistics: Bremont, Carmen Black, 10 balls. Raglan arms, but for a little twist, I added a cable pattern to the raglan. And a turtleneck. Other than that it is a simple pattern.
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The detail of the pullover:

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The full pullover:

In order to have something to place here, I looked through the stuff I already have around and decided to use this. It is based on this pattern: http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/kimono-diamond but I changed a couple of details - including the wool. I used Austermann Merino 160 - colour 233, which is a light petrol-blue-green colour. The wool runs at 160m per 50g - Sport / 5 ply (12 wpi) is another categorization.

The reason I call this the Hunger Games Knit is, because I knitted this while reading the Hunger Games series, finishing it, while watching the first of the movies.

The following picutes show details of the final work. Unfortunately, my skills in taking pictures are lacking. So bear with me.

This is the front:

This is the back:

This is a detailed picture of the back:

And this is a detailed picture of the arm: