Yarn Along

~~Joining Ginny for another Yarn-Along!~~~

During Holy Week I suddenly got the urge to make a little white shrug for my Princess.  I don't know where the idea came from, but I grabbed some baby yarn from the stash and set about designing it "on the fly."  I used the skills I learned from making Pip's custom top-down raglan sweater.

Like how NOT to make the neck so large.  

Ahem.

So I'm also learning about the importance of knitting a swatch----which, for people like me who just want to dive into a project, is excruciating.  And then you really should block that swatch, too, because yarns change when you wash them. This shrug turned out fine because she had on a dress with large, puffy sleeves, but it did grow a bit with blocking.

Soooo, no swatching or washing of swatches here, and I made an educated guess on needle size to give me the right gauge.  Using that gauge, (which was actually pretty close!) I figured out how many stitches to cast on and charged ahead.

I made the neckline a V (by increasing on all knit rows), then did a few rows straight when the tips met in the front, and then started curving back by decreasing every 4th row (every other knit row).  I added 3 rows of k1p1 rib to the sleeves and hem to keep it from curling, but it didn't seem to be quite enough to stop the curl.  I'm going to block it again to see if that takes care of it.  I hope so, because I had accidentally knit an extra row on one sleeve, bound it off, and then I had to redo it when I realized it was longer than the other side, and I didn't like the way it looked with the longer rib.

It took only a few days to make.  Maybe 3?  I don't remember, but I took it everywhere with me because it was a simple project.  I only had to fix that sleeve, block it, and sew on the ribbons on Holy Saturday.  Of course, those "3 days" of knitting mean that I was knitting at the stoplights and during Altar Server rehearsal, not when I was at home (much) because I had so many things to do at home.

I've been wanting to create something of my own, and now I've done it!  I'll probably knit another and try some different design elements, but I'm pretty happy with this first attempt.

Have you ever tried designing anything?