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Sunday, January 25, 2009

My first ever 'KNIT' baby sweater- An advenure !
I've been dreaming about this for long enough and so finally decided to take the plunge. Since natural fibres are not available out here I went ahead with the acrylic yarn that I had in my stash.
Did I tell you that I'm fairly new to knitting? I picked up a simple beginner pattern from my current 'mentor' book. It's called vogue knitting beginner basic. Great book and this is my fourth project from this book.I've tackled two hats and a pair of booties so far from this book.
Okay, so I'm in the learner stage and learning a lot. Some of it I love and some I totally hate. I loved the new techniques, the different textures in knitting and that so far I've noted that knitting takes up lesser yarn than crochet- ( is this true???) What I hate is my lastest lesson: when you work stockinette stitch in acrylic you are stuck big time with a rolling mess!!!
I have knitted the back , the left frpont, right front and the sleeves and I have ended up with five peices that are all rolling in!!! I'm trying to figure out how to block it. I pinned it and sprayed it liberally with water until it is almost drenched. Lets hope it is blocked when it dries up ...or else ....I'm thinking I'm going to kill it!! I'm lost .
I was reading up on blocking and everywhere it says acrylic doesn't block. If it doesn't block how will I stitch the peices together? Any suggestions??Please? I try and post pictures of my effort :( .
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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Congratulations on your first knit sweater!
I'm afraid stockinette will always roll, no matter what you do. The nature of the stitches makes it so. That's why usually patterns will have you do a border in a different stitch such as garter or moss/seed or ribbing, which don't roll. I'm surprised the pattern didn't tell you to do some other stitch. It would roll even if it was wool or other natural fibre.
If you wet it, it will lie flat for a while, but it will roll again when it dries. Killing it might help, but it will also destroy the texture of the work and stretch it permanently.

25 January, 2009 19:17
Umme Yusuf said...

Welcome back Yasmine!
It's nice that you're knitting too!
Regarding the baby sweater, Do Not kill the acrylic, it can be quite disastrous and will change the size of the sweater as well as make it all limpy. St st does roll but it is not so hard to seam , once you get a hang of it. May be, you can try pinning together the peices prior to seaming. The good thing, the rolling effect goes away in the finished state.

25 January, 2009 19:20
Yasmin said...

Thanks for the input. So it is agreed that killing it wont work. I'm not surprised!
Swapnae, the pattern did not mention any border. Just cast on and work in stockinette stitch.
Ummeyusuf, I'll give your idea a shot.Pin the peices together and seaming it.Sounds like it might work.

25 January, 2009 19:58
Anonymous said...

Your first baby sweater - show us pictures!!! The stockinette will roll - especially the bottom. But since you've worked the sweater in pieces, mattress seams on the edges will take care of the side seams. For the bottom, you could crochet a border to give it some stability and help with the curling.

26 January, 2009 20:24
Charmaine said...

You might find that wet blocking will help, but as a rule acrylics do not have the same response to blocking as natural fibres do. You could try a cool iron as well, but be careful not to melt it!
As the other have said, once you seam it the rolling will be greatly reduced. A crochet edge is a great idea also, and we know you know how to do that!

01 February, 2009 15:45
Mimi said...

Sounds frustrating, but I guess you'll find a way. Would love to see the knitted baby sweater :)

06 February, 2009 11:38

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