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Short row shoulder shaping

Posted on September 29, 2008 | 7 comments

I finished the shoulder shaping on the back of the hoodie the night before OFFF. I love how this Louet Riverstone worsted is knitting up. Funny, because I didn’t like it for the February Lady, but it’s perfect for this sweater. (The color is not quite right but my editing software is pretty rudimentary and can’t fix it better than this.)

I’m short-rowing the shoulders so I can use a three needle bind off to join the fronts to the back, when I get there. Here’s a link to a great walk-through on Knitty on short-rowing shoulders.

Sunday was gorgeous here, 80 degrees and sunny. We went kayaking in Ridgefield, Washington on Lake River. Funny name, but it’s a very slow-moving river that flows from Vancouver Lake, paralleling the Columbia River. The Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge borders parts of this river. I forgot my camera in the car, so these pictures are from my phone.

The Kid had a single kayak, and the Husband and I had a tandem. This was the first time I’d been in a kayak that had a rudder; the back paddler (me) controlled the rudder by foot. It was disconcerting at first; I’m used to steering with the paddle, but once I figured it out, it was pretty nice to just paddle alternating left and right.

We saw a lot of birds, including a great blue heron. It was an awesome sight when it took off from the riverbank. We also saw fish jumping. But our favorite thing was a caterpillar. We found it swimming near the shore, looking pretty bedraggled. It looked like a fishing lure. The Kid scooped it up with his paddle, and gave it a ride on the back of his kayak until it dried off.

We were afraid it would fall off when it started crawling around, so we scooped it up on a paddle and flipped it back to shore. He didn’t even say thank you!

Marie has nominated me for a blog award. Thanks, Marie; I’m honored!

Here are the instructions for the award recipients:

1. Please put the award on your blog.
2. Add a link to the person who awarded you.
3. You must nominate at least 4 fellow bloggers for this award.
4. Add links to the recipients.
5. Leave a comment so the recipients know they have received an award.

(Please save the award picture to your own hard drive and do not link to mine….thanks!)

I’d like to nominate the following blogs, and there’s a theme. I love the pictures on these blogs; big, bright, colorful.

Toxophily, Peaceful Knitter, Knit Quest, and Tiennie Knits

Isn’t this a cool way to honor the blogs you love, and to discover new ones, too?

7 Comments

Posted in Blogging, Knit, travel

Tagged kayak, Knit, lake river, ridgefield, short row shoulders

Josephine’s shoulders: short rows

Posted on June 22, 2008 | 6 comments

I’m a big fan of the three needle bind off for shoulder seams. I’m in this for the knitting, not the sewing! Fewer sewn seams = happier knitter. Josephine has slightly sloping shoulders instead of a straight across seam, so I needed to learn a new trick before I could use a three needle bind off. Short row shoulder shaping! I found a very good tutorial at Knitty. Worked like a charm. I couldn’t figure out how to simultaneously short row the neck shaping (I ended up finishing in the middle of the shoulder when I tried it), so the neck has a stairstep bindoff, but the shoulder is perfectly smooth. No problem; picking up stitches for the neck on a stairstep bindoff is easy. Here’s the back of Josephine:

And the shoulder:

Modifications so far: shorter on the lace portion at the bottom (reduced by 1/2 repeat) because I’m short and want it to end at hip length, and also I think I’ve arranged things so that the eyelet row that will hold the drawstring will be right under the bust, instead of on it. I think it will look more flattering that way.

On to the front! The other modification that I’m planning is to raise the V-neckline. I hate wearing layers; I don’t want to have to wear a camisole under this. The pattern as written has a very deep V-neck, suitable for a cami underneath, or else a sewn-in lace inset. Neither idea excites me, so I’m just going to start the V neck a bit higher. Fingers crossed!

On the piano front: I finished reading Katie Hafner’s A Romance on Three Legs: Glenn Gould’s Obsessive Quest for the Perfect Piano last night. I’m not much of a Bach fan; my preferences tend more towards Mozart and Beethoven, but I do love all things piano. I didn’t know much about Gould other than that he recorded two definitive versions of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, early and late in his career. It was really interesting to learn about him as a person (beyond idiosyncratic) and the piano he loved, but even more interesting to learn about Verne Edquist, the piano technician who tuned and regulated the piano to make it into Gould’s dream come true. You can learn more about the book here: