Ariann

What can I say about this Bonne Marie design? It's perfect! I love it!

Ariann was started the weekend I noticed Copper Bear feeling under the weather. When Copper passed away, I found it very hard to pick up this project (or any other project for that matter) since I associated knitting to fond memories of Copper laying on my feet. The pattern is so easy to memorize and at the same time so easy to mess up. Ariann has been sent to "time out" a few times due to "user error". You know the drill, knit 18 rows then rip out 8 rows.

The holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas) were so hectic that I barely had a chance to knit. I mean all I did to finish this was bind off the collar, seam the pits and weave in the ends. I had to join a new ball to bind off the last 20+ stitches. Unbelievable! I bet if I knew how to do those spit joins, I would not have touched the 13th ball. Anyway, in all the excitement, I wove in the ends on the collar on the WS of the sweater. When I tried it on and looked at the mirror, I saw the bumps on the collar. Sheesh! Another ripfest but I fixed it almost immediately. Who needs dinner anyway, right?

Ariann
Pattern: Chic Knits
Yarn: 12+ KP Andean Silk in Chocolate
Needles: Addi Circulars in US #6, 7 (8 for bind off)
(10/14/06 - 12/29/06)

I finally got the courage to sew on the buttons last Thursday evening. Yes, it took me almost a month to get the courage to sew buttons on this. I'm still not sure on the placement though. It still needs a good blocking but that will come later.

Knitting hiatus is over

After the loss of Copper Bear, I had a hard time picking up the knits. Copper Bear was my knitting buddy. He was always by my feet whenever I would settle down to knit.

When I was ready, I picked up the lovely Ariann where I had left her and joined the sleeves to the body. First, I dropped a purl on a YO. I attempted to fix it and continued to knit. When I got back to that same spot, it looked horrible ... a big gaping hole in the left front panel. Ariann was quickly packed up in the Ziploc bag it calls home.

A week later I attempted to fix the problem. That mistake took hours to fix. Then I continued to knit a few more rows. I got so cocky and ended up decreasing the raglan too fast. Once I realized my mistake, Ariann was banished once again to the Ziploc bag.

Ariann prior to RIPfest
Thanksgiving happened. Once all the guests had left, I decided to tackle Ariann again. I knew what I had to do ... RIP back all those rows and start fresh at the join. So I spent an afternoon ripping stitch by stitch all of 10 rows. By this time, I figured out the stitch counts prior to those decreases so I was ready to proceed. I've knitted up those 10 rows and then some.

Weekend Update

The knitting on the placket sweater was getting a bit tight on the 32" Addi circular needles. I kept having to push the stitches to the right every dozen stitches knitted. This was slowing me down big time (not that I'm a fast knitter to begin with). I broke down and ordered a 47" Addi from Elann on the 11th. In the meantime, I could not resist Chic Knits' newest pattern so I cast on for Ariann.


I'm using KP Andean Silk in Chocolate. I've used this yarn before on my Hourglass Sweater so I did not bother making a gauge swatch.

I can't believe the needles arrived on the 14th. Thanks Elann! I transferred the sweater to the new needles. See ...