Sweater Troubles

This is all the fault of Ravelry designer Caitlin Hunter. I’m busy knitting away on her Tegna sweater (for the second time… I made one of these last month and I discovered that I needed another) and I have gotten above the lace section at the bottom and am now cruising through the plain knitting section.

I have really picked up speed now that I am above the lace. Woohoo! I may have this done in another week depending on how much I wander off to knit other things like socks because, well, it is just a tad boring… my mind wanders. I start to dream of other projects and about things that I want to do. I think about books I want to read. I think about mowing the lawn. I think about what I want to cook for dinner. I start to plan the next sweater and then I go on a mental wander of yarn stash. Hmm… what is in there? What should I knit next?

I take knitting breaks to drag out yarn in the colors and weights that I think might work for my next project. I go back to knitting, and then on the next break I head back to the stash to pull out another couple skeins that I just remembered. I have literally woken up in the morning thinking of another possible yarn/color combination. The yarn, stored in plastic lock-top bins, starts to stack up next to my knitting chair. My mind wanders more…

Today I dragged out 4 skeins of wild fuchsia painted yarn that my BKB Deb convinced me to buy a few months ago out to the back deck to look at it in the sun with different contrasting yarn combinations. I’m thinking of colorwork here…

I fussed and worried about my choice, kept looking at how the yarns played with each other, and finally decided on choice #2 as it calmed down the wild colors a little and blended better with the dark undertones in the main color fuchsia yarn. So, what will this be? You are looking at my next project, a Sipila (by Caitlin Hunter) long sleeved sweater that should be done just in time for late summer/early fall.

But wait… I also found this fabulous Uncommon Thread yarn in the colorway Brasselthwaite lurking in the back of the stash.

At first I though that this yarn wanted to be a Zweig (by Caitlin Hunter) sweater and I matched it up with a yummy gold cashmere blend yarn that I bought from Western Sky Knits to make the lace yoke for the sweater.

Here’s the problem… I have all of this yarn that I’ve dragged down to the knitting arena to go through during knitting breaks. I keep finding colors that I really liked. I kept thinking of different combinations of colors. I had my heart set on some colorwork. Gee, Caitlin Hunter has some really nice colorwork sweaters…

If I knitted a Sunset Highway I could use the Uncommon Thread for the body and the other three colors would make the colorwork yoke. I really like these colors… I really liked the idea of making the Zweig… I have a lot of skeins of grey yarns with little flecks of color… can I maybe fade them together to make the Zweig, but if I do that , what will I use for the lace section? Hmm… I wonder what is in the stash?

I am knitting like the wind now on the Tegna, and as I stitch I mull over my sweater options. So many sweaters, so much yarn. My goal is to use as much yarn as I can from the stash without heading off to the LYS to buy more. I’m trying. Really, I am. I am determined to have a stash that has shrunk by the end of summer.

So, I have gone down the Caitlin Hunter sweater rabbit hole. Just a little bit…

I am having sweater troubles for sure. May you all have the same. 🙂

Author: Midnight Knitter

I weave, knit and read in Aurora, Colorado where my garden lives. I have 2 sons, a knitting daughter-in-law, a grandson and two exceptionally spoiled kittens. In 2014 I was diagnosed with a serious rare autoimmune disease called systemic sclerosis along with Sjogren's Disease and fibromyalgia. View all posts by Midnight Knitter