Last night after my phone call with dad, I calculated that I only needed 18 more rows on the sleeves. I had been planning on writing up my crayon pattern, and then crocheting a sage crayon for my afghan to test the pattern, but I figured I should finish up those last 18 rows first. After all, I was *almost* done the sleeves.
Well, I managed 16/18 rows. And no crayon progress. Tonight! Tonight I will finish the Klaralund sleeves, and then start the crayon pattern and testing. (While watching the movie with K. I *think* I can do both at once.)
Why did I not finish those last two rows and bind off last night? Well, for one, it was already way past my bedtime by the time I had gotten as far as I did, and also because I need to tie on a bit more yarn to finish each sleeve. *Soooo* close! (Jess... do Klaralund's sleeves stretch? Should I just rip back one repeat of extended garterstitch?)
The second reason is I had to choose which balls to tie on. Of the six balls I had left, I wasn't totally happy with how I had paired them up (that's how I got the sleeves mostly matching... I grouped the balls into mostly matching pairs.) On closer examination, three of the balls had a definite break in the colour sequence about half way through, and one ball had a break near the end. I decided to separate each ball at the breaks, so I could better match the colour repeats:
I have come to the following conclusion: Noro employs "little people." I haven't decided yet if the little people are well-meaning brownies, or mischievious pixies. If they're brownies, they're probably sitting there thinking, gee, these two skeins are quite different, but if I swap half of each, they'll be more similar, and the buyer will be happier. If they're pixies, they're probably imagining the anguish of anal-retentive perfectionists who are trying to get matching stripes. Whether they are pixies or brownies, mine seem to dislike the light green. I have almost none of that colour in the remaining skeins. Well, tonight I'm also going to try to arrange the yarn so I get the "proper" repeat order as best I can. Just because. ;)
Given my experience with the sleeves, I think the colour cycle for dye lot P2 of Noro Silk Garden #8 is supposed to be:
• emerald green
• light green
• olive green
• royal blue
• grey
• royal blue
• very dark blueish-purple
• dark blueish-purple
• redish-purple
• light teal blue
• redish-purple
which brings us back to emerald green.
3 comments:
I just remember my Klara sleeves taking forever! The body went MUCH more quickly (so hey: you're almost done! heh). :)
The sleeves are typically too long for most people, so a lot of people shortened their sleeves (I folded up the garter end and made cuffs on mine). If you have short to normal length arms, you might just be able to rip out one repeat of the extended garter with no problem. Try holding one of the sleeves up to yourself -- wrap it over your shoulder/collarbone where you expect the neckline to be and see how that goes. They do stretch a bit.
I had the worst time with the Silk Garden balls not matching. I gave up on it because there isn't a full repeat in one ball and each ball seemed to start at a different place, and some were wound backwards! I started out picking two balls that looked like they were very close in patterning -- only to find out they weren't. So I just decided to accept the lack of matching stripes. :)
Hmm.. I have long arms. (Most women's clothing has sleeves that are too short for me.) I guess I'll just see if I can find matching yarn for the last two rows. ;)
However you decide to arrange the colors, it'll be gorgeous. I love those blues. :) And being of the monkey arm persuasion myself, I don't believe there's such a thing as "too long sleeves." :::wink:::
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