Long, long have I waited to use that title, and now I think the time has come at last. I really don’t ever want to be froggier than I am right now.

But first… these words from our sponsors.

Tserf’s Up

Not my line, but that of the Tserf hertself. Like I said, all you clever clogs who figured out who it was, it’s not like I was looking to be tsecretive about it! Just wanted to check with her first, is all. So she is georg, or you might know her as thegeorg, and that’s all I have to say about that for right now except to reiterate how psyched I am.

Massachusetts Sheep and Wool Festival

We will be there this weekend - with bells on and packing checklists in hand. Hope to see you there! I don’t know exactly where we’ll be - no map on the festival web site - but we’re outdoors, i.e. in a tent, so please join us in hoping for good weather. As with NHS&W we are not on the vendor list (late registration), but as at NHS&W you’ll find us cheek by jowl with our very favorite neighbor, Patrick of West Elm Farm.

Something Else

I am quite, quite sure there was a third thing I wanted to announce, but I am equally sure I won’t remember what it was until after I press Publish. Sigh. So without further ado…

Froggy, Froggy, etc. etc. etc.

I’m working on the usual complement of stealth projects - have sworn myself to coyness on the nearly-ready second sock for the club, just as a change of pace from the open secret of Firebird. Meanwhile… WAIT! WAIT! I just remembered the other thing! Ha! And I haven’t pressed Publish yet after all! Here it is:

Me and the Octopod

The octopus picture from NHS&W - here re-posted by kind permission:

That handsome fellow on my shoulder is Octopus Prime from this project.

I seem to have misunderstood the terms of the… the… contest thingy or whatever it is. From what Kate and Laura said I thought at first that the point was that I was having my picture taken with a famous octopus, but apparently I’m supposed to be the famous one - at least, danged if I’m not listed under “Famous Friend.” Yes, I am a giant, a bonafide celebrity, in the world of polypods. Oh, won’t Archie be proud….

Anyway, I love this picture. I think OP and I, with our matching shades, epitomize the Cool Couple.

Incidentally, OP’s dashing squid companion was Tentaculus. Apparently I wasn’t Famous enough for his purposes. Hmph.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled…

Froggy Froggy blah blah blah

So as I was saying, in between Stealth This and Secret That, I have also continued to work on my Multi-Mega-Swatching for the Tsweater. While I was up at Jen’s last week we devised a new palette for the colorwork bands - more sophisticated shades of the colors I used in earlier versions. Here are most of them:

The green we actually decided on is more vibrant and emerald-y than the one shown here - don’t have a skein of that yet, due to logistical constraints, but hope to get it this weekend, along with a huge whack of base color yarn. Meanwhile I’m champing at the bit to swatch the colorwork with what I do have, but can’t until…

Q: What is this?

A: The mirror image of this.

See?

These are part of a stockinette mockup of the tsupertstructure of the tsweater. Purpose: to work out details of shaping and also to produce a realistic blank canvas on which I can determine the best layout and spacing for the twisty-cable panels.

How many times have I frogged it back to this point? I lost count after #5. Let’s just say that the number of froggings has tended to confirm the wisdom of doing the mockup in the first place.

The bit that I’ve been happy with almost from the beginning, the bit that worked right out of the box - well, OK, at the second attempt, which isn’t bad - is the basic structure of the shoulder ridge, with the different slopes for front and back. Short-row shaping needs blocking to lie right, but even before blocking you can see how the angles work. Pleased with this, definitely.

Didn’t get into trouble until after I joined the back neckline.

I had taken it well beyond this point -

- when the purling really started to get to me. Mind you, I’m not a big anti-purl type, but at sock gauge this constitutes a lot of purling, and my hands were starting to hurt just thinking about it, let alone actually working a row. I looked at how far I still had to go to shape the front neckline, and had the big DUH moment: stoopit stoopit stoopit, you’re steeking the front opening anyway, so WHY pray tell are you not also steeking the front neckline?

Pull off needles. Frog back to the two shoulder pieces. Start again.

Start front neckline steek as soon as back neckline joined.

MUCH more betterer.

Then notice that row gauge doesn’t match assumptions and scale drawings, so it’s going to throw off aspect ratio of neckline. Frog again. Draw again. Start again. Reach same point.

Then notice that tips of shoulders are puffy/puckery because increase ratio is wrong in the critical first few rows.

Frog again. Start again. Reach same point.

Tips of shoulders are good now, but the overall shoulder increase ratio is wrong - needs to be about 1-1/2 times what it is. Need I say what happens next?

And so on.

Notice I’m sparing you - and myself - pictures of some of these interim stages. You can thank me later.

Anyway, I’ve got my feet and elbows touching wood as I type this, but… I think we’re there now.

Course, it looks all distorted here, because the steek makes the front neckline squish inward.

And then when I do cut the front neckline steek it will look distorted the other way, because the bands and the front opening steek will make the front disproportionately wide.

But the neckline is shaping up the way I want it to -

- and so are the proportions of the sleeve cap.

Would I put myself through this degree of insanity if I were just making this thing for myself? Honestly, I don’t know. But I suspect so. It Has To Be Right, after all. Not necessarily perfect… but right. Right enough so I’ll be happy wearing it. And in real life, right enough so that it can be coherently written up for others to knit. OK, so maybe if it had just been for me I wouldn’t have frogged back to start the neckline steek - I could just have cast on for it at the point I’d reached when I thought of it. But I figure, the more iterations I go through with this thing, the deeper understanding I will have of its structure before I take the scissors to it. I’m not afraid of the cutting any more, you know… but I remain mindful that in steeking you don’t get any do-overs. So it behooves me to get the worst of the trial and error behind me NOW, so that when I cut it it’s… RIGHT.

How far I’m going to go with this, I don’t know. Maybe till I run out of yarn on the sample skein - that will give me a chance to finish and cut the neckline steek, cast on the front steek, and do a bit of colorwork with the new palette.

And of course there’s no knowing - even now there may still be a whole pondful of frogs between me and the scissors… and nothing to keep me from the froggy, froggy re-do.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 20th, 2008 at 4:50 pm and is filed under Bloggerei, Change-ringing, Belshazzar's Nemesis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.