I’ve been waiting for a while to start Sari. Several of us at GPY wanted to knit this, especially after seeing one knit up by one of the Friday night regulars. Of course, it has to be a knit against. Don’t know how competitive I can be on this one, since I’ll be in the middle of my 4-shaft weaving class.

Summary

• First time using my stainless steel DyakCraft heavy metal needles.

• I am not using the alternate left side chart. Entire shawl will be knit using the left hand side chart.

• I am using the yarn as follows: main color shift, 2 pattern repeats per color; warm and cool color parades, 4 pattern repeats per color.

• In order to make the chart easier to read, I took screen shots of the 2 chart pages and then manipulated them in Photoshop to put both charts on the same page. I then copied the legend and pasted it under the right-hand chart, so both sides of the chart have an instance of the legend. I then created a PDF around the image and loaded it into good reader. The chart has quite a few long stitch runs. Since I don’t want to count the number of stitches each time, I used GoodReader to add counts on top of each of the long runs. This allows me to work through the pattern much faster.

• I am grafting at color changes. I’ve had to change the graft a bit because both of my ends were ending at the same “end” of the graft. So after I pull through the first part of the graft, I turn and re-enter the graft with the same yarn, but only go half way through. I then remove the needle, pick up the other end and weave it back through the graft, half way through. I cut the ends. This way the ends are “pointing” at each other rather than both poking out the end. I think this is a cleaner way to end the graft.

• Yarn Remaining (2 colorshisfts, starting with botanical green):
  ~ Color 1: 2.7 grams (also used for the ribbed edging)
  ~ Color 2: 6.1 grams
  ~ Color 3: 6.1 grams
  ~ Color 4: 8.0 grams
  ~ Color 5: 6.4 grams
  ~ Color 6: 6.4 grams
  ~ Color 7: 6.5 grams
  ~ Color 8: 6.4 grams
  ~ Color 9: 7.7 grams
  ~ Color 10: 7.6 grams
  ~ Color 11: 7.2 grams
  ~ Color 12: 7.5 grams
  ~ Color 13: 7.4 grams
  ~ Color 14: 7.6 grams
  ~ Color 15: 7.4 grams
  ~ Color 16: 4.1 grams
  

• Yarn Remaining (Cool Parade): ~ Color 9: 2.6 grams
  ~ Color 8: 3.1 grams
  ~ Color 7: 3.0 grams
  ~ Color 6: 2.9 grams
  ~ Color 5: 3.2 grams
  ~ Color 4: 3.0 grams
  ~ Color 3: 3.2 grams
  ~ Color 2: 3.4 grams
  ~ Color 1: not used
  

• Yarn Remaining (Warm Parade): -- won’t start until halfway through shawl since each ball gets used twice starting from opposite ends of the shawl:
  ~ Color 9: not used
  ~ Color 8: 7.4 grams
  ~ Color 7: 7.3 grams
  ~ Color 6: 7.5 grams
  ~ Color 5: 7.3 grams
  ~ Color 4: 7.5 grams
  ~ Color 3: 7.9 grams
  ~ Color 2: 7.5 grams
  ~ Color 1: 7.5 grams
  

Watch Out For

• The pattern uses the standard dot for purl to mean a twisted knit or purl, depending on the row. This can be a bit confusing until you get used to it.

• The last stitch of the point bind off is the first stitch in the diamond symbol sequence. This means that as soon as you have completed the bind off you will knit the diamond symbol stitch N-1 times. Once the diamond sequence stitches are complete you will have N stitches on the right-hand needle.

Journal

2014-12-26: I looked at both color combinations and decided to stay with my original colors. I’ll make use of the crimson-midnightblue-purplecerise in another project.
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Cast on 121 using GTCO, starting with Botanical Green. Complete starting border and Chart A transition. Complete row 9, chart B, Color 1, first repeat. I’m now getting in the groove of the pattern.

2014-12-27: Complete color 1 (2 repeats of chart B).

2014-12-29: Complete color 2.

2014-12-31: Complete color 3. I think I might need to add a third colorbridge to get sufficient length. My unblocked row gauge is 39 stitches / 4”. This will never block out to the pattern gauge.

Complete color 4. I measured the length of the stranded pattern (not including the ribbing) area and got 13”. This means I will end up with about 52 patterned inches + about 1” in border, before blocking. Its likely I will need to buy another colorbridge and more of the warm & cool parade colors, as I will likely need to knit at least another 4 repeats and maybe the full 8.

2015-01-01: Complete color 5. I wanted to complete color 5 before doing a preliminary block as I want to measure the first 4 colors with some accuracy. My shawl is blocking now.

2015-01-02: 4 sections block out to be 15 1/2” long. So my shawl is running at 62” in length, with each colorbridge section running 3.875”. If I want 72”, I need at least 3 more sections. I will get 80” with 21 sections. Shawl is 19” wide, point-to-point. I would love to get it to 72”, but I would need to buy another colorbridge, a warm parade and a cool parade. my gauge at this point is 34 rows / 4” & 30 stitches / 4”. I will report a final gauge in my summary once the project is complete and blocked.

Complete color 6 and graft new colors.

2015-01-05: Complete color 7.

2015-01-06: Complete color 8.

2015-01-08: Complete color 9.

2015-01-09: Complete color 10.

2015-01-11: Complete color 11.

2015-01-12: Complete color 12.

2015-01-13: Complete color 13.

2015-01-14: Complete color 14.

2015-01-15: Complete color 15.

2015-01-16-10:37: Knitting complete!!!!

2015-01-16-11:16: Ends woven in! Blocking now…..

Knit-against Saris

• tygerknit’s Sari along

• br8kfree’s Splendiferous Sari

Next Time

• Instead of starting and ending with ribbing, start and end with seed stitch.

• since there are 9 colors in the cool and warm parades, start with #9 of each and only work it through 1 repeat of the chart and change parade colors. This way, the parade color change will not align with the colorbridge color change.

• use US 3.0 (3.25mm) needle or maybe a 4. I’m a tight knitter and my gauge using the US 2.0 (2.75mm) needles is way too tight. I am a tight knitter.

• I’m not real fond of the thickness resulting from grafting the color transition ends together. Next time, just leave the ends and weave them in. I think the results would be cleaner. We will see, as tygerknits is weaving in ends.

Getting Ready….

2014-12-11: Wound, labeled and weighed 3/4 skeins of yarn in preparation for the start of our knit-against.
I went back to the colorshift site and picked out a purple to red shift. Its a rainy day here so I need some color! We’ll see if I get the yarn in time to start the knit-along. Meanwhile, I’m not winding the last color bridge set.

About this Yarn

• Yarn ordered on 7/27/14 based on the bottom picture. I spent a fair amount of time looking at the various color bridges on the ColorShift etsy site. While I love the original colors, I wanted to do a colorway that was a bit more “me”. The dyer took the time to show how the progression colors would work with the color bridge I chose. The bottom picture is the picture she photoshopped for me. I chose the “Botanical Green to Clay” and “Clay to Earth” color shifts.

• Yarn arrived 8/7/14 -- pretty quick!