Project Report: 2026 Wk 2

This week is all about stripes!

The needles I ordered came in on Friday, so I got right to work swatching for the stripey cardigan I'd been planning.

In addition to blocking a full-size swatch for gauge calculations, I also worked up a few stripe swatches to see what pattern repeat I'd prefer. To be honest, I started to fry my own brain with the seemingly infinite ways to disperse three-color stripes.

 

In the end, I decided that my favorite iteration was to have thin stripes of a "background" color placed between each of the thicker bands of contrast colors.

Once that decision was made, all that was left to do was math.

I'm not particularly good at math, but using my swatch and an existing cardigan in my closet, I was able to calculate all the key stitch counts I needed to start the project.

I whizzed through the raglan increases and made it to sleeve separation in just a few days, which is shocking even to me, because this is a fingering weight garment that ended up with about 400 stitches before I could split for sleeves. Plus, it's a cardigan, so half those rows are purling.

My next task is to do some yardage calculations so that I can get a better estimate of the body and sleeve lengths. I'll keep you posted.

In addition to my big sweater project, I also wanted to have a sock project on the go. I went digging through my stash and found the remnants of some Patons Kroy left over from my "Sully Socks" and my "Popinjay Socks."

Since these were scraps and I wanted to use every bit possible, I opted for toe-up socks. 

Toe-up socks and I don't usually get along. I don't think I've made a single pair that have fit properly. With that in mind, I knew I needed to find a better pattern for this go-round.

Enter the "Vanilla Sock with Gusset" pattern from Jo Torr. 

This pattern is over 3,000 words long. It isn't a sock pattern so much as a footwear manifesto.

Nevertheless, it does have instructions on how to calculate the ideal starting point for a toe-up gusset, and that's what I knew I needed to get a functional fit. 

 

If you have a favorite toe-up sock recipe, please share it! I would love to have a go-to option for future toe-up endeavors.