F*&^%ing guage!
This is a knitting rant for those of you who may be interested.
Ok, so my latest knitting project is this long-ass sweater I'm making for myself. Its based on a pattern I found in a book by Noro, a Japanese yarn company that makes hand-painted yarn in a thick/thin texture and which stripes really nicely. I'm using Kureyon, which is 100% wool and has various color schemes. I'm alternating my color using #s 52 and 40. Lots of blues, purples, a little yellow, green and brown and even some gray in areas. Looks lovely.
So despite my best efforts, apparently I still haven't mastered this thing called guage. Guage (or tension) is how tightly or loosely one knits and is determined by how many stitches per inch you're knitting. Its quite important when you're making a sweater, as guage will determine the size of the garment. Most skeins of yarn will have a recommended needle size, and the guage that needle size should give. So, for example, on this pattern I'm doing I'm supposed to be getting 18 stitches (sts) over 4 inches on a Size 8 needle, or about 4 1/2 sts to the inch.
Previously, I always measured guage by doing a swatch of knitting and after about 4 inches, measured my stitch guage. If I measured the number of stiches required in one inch, I stopped. For example, I knit my swatch, then take a ruler/tape measurer/whatever, and measure how many stitches fit into a one inch measurement. On this pattern, I measured 4 1/2 sts. I didn't count to see if I made 18 sts over the whole of 4 inches.
So last Saturday, I'm at the knitting store I work at talking with one of the gals who was working with me. She was doing a guage swatch for a sweater she was making, and talking about how she had to keep using bigger needles to get her guage. In the course of the conversation, she had said she measures the sts over a 4" area, not just 1", in case her tension changes towards the ends of the row. She explained that although the first inch may reveal she has guage, the fourth inch may also show that she's short/over the number of sts she's supposed to have.
Needless to say, I'm now freaking out. I have now knitted up 3/4 of the back of this sweater (about 3 feet worth) and am second guessing my guage. The next day, I re-read my pattern book; 18 sts over 4 inches/10 cm. I take out my knitting and measure...
Sonofabitch! Sure enough, I don't have guage. I only have about 14 sts over 4 inches. Thus, my knitting may be too wide.
But then I discovered that I screwed up somewhere earlier which I didn't fix - namely I somehow lost 4 stitches. I had cast-on 106 sts to begin with, and in the course of working a chevron pattern, I somehow screwed up & lost 4 sts. I have no idea what I did wrong (maybe I shouldn't have done that last decrease at the end of a row). However, I'm now realizing that maybe two wrongs make a right. If I lost 4 sts, I essentially lost 1 inch off the width of the back of my sweater. However, if I was knitting too loosely and only getting about 14 sts over 4", then maybe it shakes out, and I maybe only off 1/4 - 1/2". If so, no big whoop (its a cardigan, so I can adjust the fronts as well as the button bands if necessary).
So I hold up the back & compare it with the back of my body - doesn't seem too skinny. In fact, its seems to fit alright. Hmmm, crisis averted perhaps.
But now I want to make guage when I do the front panels of the sweater. Since I'm not getting 18sts/4inches, I go down a needle size to a 7. Nope, still the same. I go down to a size 6. Now I get about 5 sts over the first inch, and only 16 over 4 inches (how the is this happening???????). If I go down to a 5, I know the fabric will be too tight, and will be a pain to knit.
And I was thinking of using knitting as a spiritual practice :S