Ariann in DK Yarn

I'm very happy to be here, after having the same troubles as some others with the Blogger invitations. Many thanks to Bonne Marie for her perseverance, as it took four tries.

I'm a knitter, spinner, and dye-crazy mom in Vancouver, Canada. I chronicle my fiber adventures here, if you'd like to read more. I've been inspired by all of your posts so far. I'm proud to show you my Ariann progress to date, as I approach end of the body and prepare to begin the sleeves.

As you probably noticed, the most-excellent Ariann pattern specifies that double-knitting weight yarn will not work for this pattern, because it is made in one piece and has raglan shaping. Always a bit pigheaded, I've decided to see whether I can make it work. I'm using Green Mountain Spinnery Cotton Comfort, which is 80% wool, 20% cotton with a crisp hand. The colour is "Storm." The ballband suggests you can get this yarn to work up at a worsted gauge, but I found my swatch too loosey-goosey. So I'm getting about 20.5 st/4 inches in stockinette, and can bridge the stitch-gauge gap by simply knitting a larger size. The row gauge, however, is a lot more compressed than the pattern calls for and this is where it gets tricky. About 15% more compressed. This is simple enough to accomplish in the body and sleeve shaping, but I'll have to see how it goes when I get to the raglan shaping. Fingers crossed. I'll be deserving fifty lashes with a wet skein if it turns out that I really should have stuck with the tried-and-true Cascade 220.

I'm also hoping that the ribbing curl that you can see in the photo will be banished with a good steam block. If not, I've vowed to snip a stitch and reknit downward on a larger needle. Can anyone who has finished comment on curling ribbing?

Onward,
Lisa