I’m still nibbling away at the The Small One’s Waterspun poncho. To recap – I had seven colors to start, but only about 80% of a skein of each. I decided I really had to have at least one more skein of yarn, so I went out looking throughthe myriad local yarn stores for Waterspun.

How many local yarn stores make up a myriad? An amazing number. I live in the Boston metro area – a yarn paradise compared to most of the rest of the USA. Here’s just a sampling of the shops within an hour’s drive of my home, and most of these are reachable within a half-hour. This list doesn’t include the "big box" hobby shops sellingmostly mass-market yarns:

Please don’t be jealous. The cost of living in this yarn heaven is very steep, and the economy ofeastern Massachusetts is still hit hard by the Great Tech Crash. Those things make up quite a bit for having so many knitting sources nearby.

In any case, I quickly found that even with a ton of local yarn shops, very fewstock Waterspun during the summer season. Even fewer had a range of colors on hand. I could place a special order formy yarnjust about anywhere, but doing so would mean taking a full single-color bag – much more than I needed. Since I know with absolute dead certaintythat Waterspun is NOT about to disappear, I decided on trekking the 45 minutes up to the Hub Mills/Classic Elite outlet. I had a lunch date aboutten minutes away from the place anyway, so I was able to piggyback my errand and save some gas.

Hub Mills is two small, dusty rooms in the same 19th century brick mill building that houses the Classic Elite manufacture/distribution facility and design offices. Think crumblingblock in an industrial New England mill town, complete with a silted-in canalacross the street. Aside from the usual suspects from the standard set of makers in their full-price inventory, they stock cone-ends and "out-takes" of Classic Elite’s various lines. Fantastic bargains can be had, but like every mill-end shop, it’s hit or miss.People who head for the yarn first and are able to figure out what to do with limited quantities or variant dye lots are the best suited tothis type of shopping. I head up there maybe once every 18 months or so,butI’ve found some interesting bits over the years including samples of a heavier version of Sand that never madeit into distribution, odd cones of Montera and Provence, and assorted Fox Fiber natural-color cottons in non-standard weights, all for bargain-basement per-pound prices. I’ve also made the trip but returned empty-handed because the discount shelves were empty.

This time I found my Waterspun, even though the outlet store didn’t have much either. I found one more skein of the plum, plus a remnant cone of the blue that weighed out to the equivalent of about a skein and three-quarters. The plum’s dyelot looks quite close to my yarn. The blue was off a bit. Here’s what I did with them:

First using the method I described earlier. size US #6 (4mm) needles and my new blue yarn, I picked up 100 stitches around the inside of the neck edge. I placed a marker at the point corresponding toeach corner in theponcho body. I worked nine rows in K1, P1 ribbing. Every other row I started each between-marker section with a SSK, and ended with a K2tog. Because I was decreasing 8 stitches every other row I ended up binding off 68 stitches.

Then I went back to the bottom edge. I had already knit the final blue stripe, but I ripped it back because I wanted to alternate rounds between the new and old blue yarns in order to make the different dye lots less evident. (You can still see some minor striping thanks to the wonders of flash photography. In person the difference is less noticeable). I kept going, alternating yarns until I ran out of my old yarn. I finished up using every scrap of the new yarn.One interesting effect I got from using more or less the same quantity of each color (until the blue) was that with the increasing circumference of the piece, the width of the color stripes changed. I didn’t have more teal than pink, more pink than green and so on. That’s just the way the piece worked out. Had I used only the blue I had on hand, the final stripe would have been proportionally smaller. Adding the yarn I did is why it breaks the established progression of diminution. I’m pleased though. I ended up having a blue strip that’s about twice the width of the previous one. Although it is wider, the proporations aren’t all that bad.

The last step is adding an four-stitch I-cord edging in plum onto the live blue stitches. I’m using US #9(5.5mm) needles, the same size employed for the body. I’m attaching the edging by working the last stitch of the I-cord row as a SSK along with a live blue stitch. I’m doing this at a 3:4 ratio – three attached rows of I-cord, followed by one "free" unattached row. This is keeping the I-cord from bunching up the poncho into a gathered edge. (I could make a ruffled bottom by increasing the number of free I-cord rows.) I’m handling the points by working four unattached I-cord rows at the corner tips.

So far I’ve used less than a quarter of my remaining original ball of plum, and have completed more than a quarter of my I-cord. I should have enough to go around the entire piece once. But as you can see, I’ve got the classic stockinette edgeroll problem. I need more weight to stabilize the thing and tame the roll. Iplan toadd another round of the I-cord on top of the one that’s already there. I’ll document how I attach one row of I-cord to an existing row of I-cord in my next progress report.

The Tiny One’s poncho continues apace. I only have had about an hour or so to knit each evening, and as you can see, I’m almost done. Dark blue is the last body stripe. The remaining plum is reserved for edging and mistake-fixing.

It does turn out that the neckline is way too wide. 100 stitches as cast-on would have worked for an adult, but for a tall Kindergartener (size 8), it’s too big. If I were to begin again, I’d probably go with 80 stitches, tops. Instead of ripping everything back and starting again, or unpicking the top and knitting in the opposite direction, I’m going to fudge it and in doing so produce a detail that (I hope) will look planned.

My goal is to preservethe currentrolledcollar as a welt detail,but fillin the loose-fitting neckline with a contrasting texture. Using plum, I’m going to pick up stitches in the purl bumps of the last row of thecurrent rolled collar, just before I switched from plum to the teal and began the body increases:

Using these stitches, I’ll work at least six rows of K1, P1 ribbing. Where the "corners" of the piece happen, I’ll use a double decrease, keeping the centermost stitch of the decrease on top: slip two together as if to knit, return both slipped stitches to left hand needle, k3 tog.

With luck, I’ll have just enough of the plum left over to do an I-cord edging. If not, I’ll rip back any completed I-cord and buy another skein. Even if the dye lots don’t match (which they probably won’t as I got the plum months ago), between the striping and the large visual distance between bits of the same color at neck and hem any differences will not be noticeable.

The moral of the story is – if you decide perfection isn’t a prime goal, make sure you have coping strategies on hand that turn any shortcomings into design features.

In an effort to use up leftovers, reduce the stash, and find something mindless to do, I’ve hit upon doing a quick poncho for The Tiny One (age two below, but now in Kindergarten):

TheClassic Elite Waterspun I’m using is left over from a swatching/pattern design exercise I did earlier this year. I’ve got seven colors, but onlyabout 80% of a skein of each. It should be enough for a little kid’s poncho. If not, I’ll pick up an additional skein in another color and add another stripe. Before starting thisproject I swatched out my remnantson a US#9 (5.5mm) at 18 st/26rounds = 4 inches (10cm).

I decided to minimize thinking, so I cast on around 100 stitches in the round, did eight rows of stockinette to make a rolled collar, then placed four markers evenly spaced around the piece. I did a M1 increase just after the first stitch and just before the last stitch in each marked group, alternating these increase rounds with plain stockinette rounds. I’m planning on doing just plain old stockinette, using up each color in turn, saving out the plum for last. I’m not taking special care to always end my colors at an increase corner, I’m just knitting until I run out of the old color, then starting a new one. Depending on how big the thing gets, I’ll use the remaining plum to do some kind of simple edging, one or more rows of applied I-cord, or maybe just some rounds of seed stitch to finish. Any of those treatments should tame the bottom edge enough to minimize rolling. No fringes though. Small children, woolen fringes, twigs and leaves can meld themselves into an inseparable glob that I’d rather not deal with come wash day.

I’m doing this poncho using the two-circs method popularized recently for socks. In the photo above, you are seeing the thing sideways, because the needles meet at the shoulders, not the center front and back. The poncho is identical in all dimensions though, so these points are arbitrary, and don’t really matter. Here’s the logic of the thing:

The two ends of Circular #1, shown in teal above,are used to knit the front. #1 **always** stays on the front of the work. The two ends of Circular #2, shown in orange above,are used to knit the back. #2 **always** stays on the back. At no time does the entire piece end up on one circular needle, nor at any time am I working with an end of Circ #1 in one hand andan end of Circ #2 in the other.

One advantage of this method is that the stitches are nice and spread out instead of being jammed onto one needle. I can call the Target Kid over and try the piece on without having to transfer stitches to a piece of string. I can also add another needle or two if the poncho grows too wide to handle with only two needles. While I don’t find this method of special advantage for socks (immodestly, I’d say I’m wicked fast with standard DPNs), I do like it for large pieces knit in the round, and for sleeves.

I’m still not sure if the neck hole is too big or not. It looks o.k. for now, and fits well over my daughter’s head, but I’ve seen ponchos stretch out due to their weight. When the piece is done I’ll check back. I might haveadd a few rounds of K1, P1 rib (with mitered decreases) to tighten up the neckline. If I decide to do so I’ll pick up stitches on the inside at the base of the rolled collar and knit them up from there, leaving the rolled outer edge as a trim detail.

GORE PLACE SHEEPSHEARING FESTIVAL

Hello to everyone I bumped into yesterday at the Sheepshearing festival in Waltham, Massachusetts. Please excuse me for not naming everyone I met, but I am afraid if I try todo so I’ll leave someone out. The sun was bright,andthe air was cool – perfectwool weather. My daughters and I were there from around 10:15 or so to 3:00. If you saw someone in a crayon-bright flash sweater, followed around by a little girl in vertical orange/yellow stripes and a larger pre-teen in blue, that was us. Also apologies that there will be nophotos of the eventhere. I’m not of the pix-as-part-of-the-experience crowd. I never quite remember to stop what I’m doing at the time in order to document it. I had the camera in the backpack, but somehow it never tunneled out from under my day’s purchases, and never saw the light of day.

In spite of the perfect sweater weatherI was disappointed (as usual) to see how greatly Polarfleece wearers outnumbered wool wearers, there were quite a few notable hand knits in the crowd. I saw a couple of really nice mosaic knit cardigans and coats, several hand-done Arans, a couple of Fair Isle style stranded sweaters plus twoScandanavian-style sweaters(one was a Dale Nagano, the otherpossibly from Norsk Strikkedesign), a whole flock of little kid cardigans, hats and pullovers,several very nicely done Intarsia pieces,a long-length coat done entirely in cables, a Surprise-style vest. I also ran into someone buying yarn for a Rogue at one of the yarn booths. There were other great looking hand-knits around (including quite a few pairs of socks). Please forgive me if I neglected to mention yours.

As far as yarn/fiber vendors – there were about eight, including some animal-to-skein outfits outside the main fiber tent and a booth from Minds Eye Yarns, a local Cambridge, MA store catering to spinners, dyers and knitters in with the sheep and llama farm yarn people. One outfit was selling whole fleeces (apparently you could also bid on the fleeces from the Gore Place sheep if you were there at the right time). I got a couple of skeins of rustic styleAran-weight from the At Nick’s Meadow Farm booth. They’ll end up as a felted pillow, similar to the one I described before. I’ve used their wool before, and found it an excellent value for the type. Joie de Vivre Farm,was there too, with some of their Mostly Merino, in fingering, sport, worsted and chunky weights. I did get a little bit of hand-spun fingering weight Merino from the Greenwood Hill booth. I’ve just added the basic info for their yarns to the collection, no reviews yet, though. I’m thinking it may be enough for a couple of simple lace scarves to be lagered away as future gifts.

Verdict? A grand day out in the only glorious day of spring weather we’ll probably get here this year (we don’t usually have many). Meet me there next year!