Sweater Washing

Skip has worn this or the other Icelandic sweater I knit him every day since the cold weather set in. He finds them to be light and warm. Icelandic wool has those wonderful properties but because of the wiry guard hairs, is not comfortable to be worn next to the skin. With a long-sleeved, collared shirt, these sweaters can be worn comfortably.

I first soaked the sweater in wool wash and tepid water. Rinsing is not usually required but the water was quite dirty so I gave it another soak, and did rinse it several times until the water ran relatively clearly.

To facilitate faster drying, I squeezed out quite a bit of water, then rolled it in a big towel. I then stepped on the roll, expressing as much water as the towel could absorb. I then rolled it in another towel and did the same thing.

I then pinned it out on the foam mats to the desired dimensions to dry.

Scooter's/the guest room bed is very handy for this. If necessary, the mats can also be propped up relatively vertically as the pins hold everything in place.

First, I run wires up each side of the body with the tips just above the underarms. Then pull them out to the desired width and pin them at the underarms. I then run a short wire across the top of the back of the neck, pull, and pin firmly. Then I weave wires along the bottom cuff of the back of the sweater, then pull to desired back length.

Next I run two wires up each sleeve, pin the cuffs to the desired length, then pull the wires apart and pin.

The sweater will dry in that shape and maintain it until the next washing. It will not have felted and be clean, and fluffy, thus making it like an insulated garment and very warm.

Changing gears...

While reading Attic 24's blog, I became intrigued by her Ripple Blanket Tutorial. I had unsuccessfully attempted to crochet a feather and fan blanket a year ago and wanted to try my hand at it again. Lucy's descriptions were excellent and explained that treble crochet in the UK is the same as double crochet in N America. I had trouble with the return row then realized I needed to skip two chain sts to create the 'valley' (as opposed to only 1 in the very first row). Once I figured that out, things went much better.

I also learned that crochet diagrams were pretty easy to interpret. I am predominately a visual learner.

I did tension swatch first as Lucy strongly recommended. The purpose of this was to check for correct hook size and also to have a go at internalizing the simple 'ripple' pattern. With a 4.25mm hook, I got pretty close to gauge but found the foundation chain to be too tight. I tried the foundation chain again with a 5mm hook (as she suggested) and this solved the problem. Then continued with the smaller hook.

I'm not using the 15 different colours of yarn that she's doing for her CAL (CrochetALong) but I had a bunch of red Mary Maxim DK weight acrylic yarn in my stash plus a few balls of black and other random colours of superwash DK yarn. 

I'm crocheting the lap blanket size which involved 150 sts (multiples of 7 plus 3). It's about 40" wide (1m) and hopefully will be about 55" long (140cm) long. It won't be pretty because I'm only using black and red yarn and can't be bothered planning a clever design, so it may just end up being a donation to the cancer/chemo unit at our local hospital.

I highly recommend Lucy's crochet (what she calls 'hooky') tutorials. She has several versions of ripple blankets - some with no eyelets, some like feather and fan, some with wider 'mountains' and 'valleys', etc. Her blog is always interesting and informative, too.