Audrey A-Long

I feel pretty, oh so pretty...

I've done my homework! But before go any further, I must say that:

1) This swatch was NOT done in the color I chose for Audrey. This is leftover Calmer from a project I did last year. My Audrey is going to be deep RED. Oh la la!

2) Ain't the swatch horrific in all its rugged "let's experiment with shaping in a haphazard manner" state? Believe me: I will do everything in my knitter's power to ensure that Audrey does not look like that.

So...why the swatch? I already know what my tension is when knitting Calmer (again, my project last year), so this swatch was not for gauge-checking purposes. It was done exclusively to try out all sorts of shaping. I do that often with swatches, only I rarely show the swatches on my site because practicing shaping like this on a swatch uglifies it to the point of scaring anybody off a project. But, I thought you might like to see it. Plus, Theresa asked for it.

In the swatch above, you see double decreases done via all sorts of wacky methods [don't ask; really...don't ask], symmetrical increases, spontaneous increases when I found I was running out of stitches, and (most importantly) what would be a mini bust dart achieved via short row shaping at the top of the swatch. See how the top part of the swatch curves slightly outward? That's an invisible bust dart, and it is what I was thinking about doing with my Audrey. And, I think I will.

However, the decreases will not be included in my sweater. I tried the decreases as stated in the pattern on another swatch, and I've decided that even though I love visible darts on other projects I've done, I don't want visible darts on the front of this particular sweater. Something about the 2x2 ribbing...

Tiffany, are you out there?

Posted by Becky at April 6, 2004 12:08 PM