janestarz | Getting over hiccups

In August I cast on the Bagtanker cardigan, a fun project with an interesting construction. It's been on hold for a while now and I could never quite figure out why I didn't feel like picking it up anymore. Last time I posted about it was in September, but I know I did a little more work on it since then and then inexplicably stopped altogether.

The Bagtanker is a package deal: buy the wool and get the pattern for free. I did, however, have some of the same wool in a different dye bath, and as I am tall I figured it would come in handy. I just needed to mix it up properly so the colour difference between the dye baths wouldn't show too much. Since the sleeves are striped, I could hide the slightly lighter shade in the sleeves, and use the darker three skeins for the body. But that meant I had to save half the yarn for the other end of the sleeve. Once I changed the pattern from a rolled stockinette hem to a picot hem, I realised I would have to change the pattern so both sleeves would be knit from the bottom up, whereas the pattern originally knits from the hem of one sleeve to the hem of the other sleeve, creating a striped band over the back of the cardigan.
This meant that I needed a second set of DPNs to knit the second sleeve on, working my way up one set of stripes at the time before switching to the other sleeve in order to make sure the skein from a different dye bath was distributed evenly up the arms on either side.

Following this so far? Because it sounds so simple in my head but in reality it's a lot of work. Knit three stripes on one sleeve, knit three stripes on the other. I could have worked with scales to figure out when I was nearing the half-way point of the ball of yarn, but I don't trust scales that much, with their ~1 gram accuracy. ~1 gram of yarn = a lot of stitches on 3 mm needles!!

But the knitting TAAT (two at a time) wasn't why I didn't pick this up. It wasn't the thought of weaving in a million ends of yarn either. It was the DPNs. Working with a pretty loose gauge gives you a lovely drape, even when working on four DPN needles. The longer the sleeve gets, the more it drags on your lap while working. And then you reach the point where it no longer drags on your lap but twists around itself. That also wasn't what was bothering me.
It was the way the other three DPNs were hanging down from my work. I never have this problem with socks, for some strange reason. But it felt weird on my wrists. It's a tiny little feeling, not consciously registering. But it was enough to one night put the sleeves into the zip lock bag and not pick them up again.

Fast-forward to the end of 2018. I was writing my knitting review and realised there was no obvious reason why I wasn't knitting on the cardigan anymore. But I badly need a few new cardigans for my wardrobe! I decided to switch back to a circular needle and see what kind of a difference it would make.
I remember in the beginning I used Kinki Amibari bamboo needles with a small cable and was annoyed by how the sleeve was stretched out over the cable and didn't want to slide properly. In my big stash of interchangable needles and loose cables I now picked KnitPro Karbonz tips of 3mm (I forgot I had bought those, but the lacquered wood ones broke a few years ago, so when I wanted to get my set complete I chose carbon tips instead). Combined with the smallest cable the sleeve would just fit. I could slide a few stitches up the left-hand needle and then slide a few down the right-hand needle and work. But because the carbon needles are so smooth and they are tipped with metal tips, the stitches didn't snag and would just slide smoothly around the cable and tips as I worked.

I was off to a flying start, knitting nearly 65 rows in one weekend, e.g. 9 colour changes and change. I nearly got to the end of my odd-dye-batch ball and switched DPNs for my sweet new ride to work on the other sleeve.

When I got tired of knitting that much, I started with weaving in the ends, because that would be a big job later on. I'm not confident enough in keeping an even tension to keep all yarns attached as I move up the sleeve, and I'm afraid it'll pull on the work. I tried it recently with a pair of striped socks and it never looks quite as smooth.

I've been knitting solely on these sleeves for the past week and a half, and by now I've finished the one dark skein of the odd dye batch. I've finished one sleeve to the number of stripes (27) the pattern calls for and added two more for my long arms. I realised that it would have been better to mix the odd dye batch in every other row, in stead of using it just at the bottom of the sleeves. And I am flying, flying, flying through this, enjoying the click-click-click of the needles. It's making me wonder if I should invest in more of these needles, as I now have them in 3 mm and 5.5 mm. And I wonder how this thin wool plus cotton mix will feel on my skin. At this rate, it won't be long until I find out!