Back to the Back of Sigil
Sigil is turning out to be almost like a felting project for me. Nothing is finished until the pieces are washed and blocked.
Gabrielle asked me the following in the comments to my last post about Sigil where I described that I had blocked the band before picking up stiches. I'm confused. Why block the band before picking up the stitches? When you go to block the finished back, won't the picked up (and previously unblocked) stitches shrink in the same fashion, leaving them smaller (or rather narrower) than the band, thus puckering said, admittedly gorgeous, band? That's what's happening in my head when I picture the procedure. Unconfuse me, pretty please?
I hope these pictures help to answer some of the questions. You can see by comparing the before and after pictures that I have more stitches/inch in the pre-blocked fabric and more rows/inch in the fabric after blocking. In other words, the fabric, after blocking got wider and shorter. I wanted the bottom band to be as close as possible to the width that the body of the piece was going to be. If it had been wider, then there would have been a lot more yarn in the picked up area, which I was worried would have an effect on how the fabric would block. I also didn't want the body of the fabric to prevent the consolidation of the bottom band after the stitches were picked up, since I knew the fabric would widen after blocking.
In order to do the armhole shaping, I bound off 3 stitches at each edge. Then I decreased 1 stitch on each side, 3X on alternating rows (48 stiches remaining). After that, I knit straight for 39 rows and did the shoulder shaping by binding off 4 stitches on each of the next following 4 rows, and 3 stitches at each of the next following 4 rows after that. Finally I bound off the remaining 20 stitches.
While soaking this fabric, it gave off quite a bit of dust and debris. To get it to block correctly, I did have to mold it and shape it a bit into the shape I knew I finally wanted it to take. But the end result is soft and and beautiful and exactly the size and shape it needs to be. I guess my swatch didn't lie to me this time.
The next stage of the project will be a sleeve. That will start with creating another band, similar to the bottom band of the back of the sweater, only with 4 pattern link repeats.
Thank you to everyone for the nice birthday wishes. I'm looking forward to this year and I am hoping it will be a great one. And great for more than one reason. Be sure to check out Rob's comment to my last post. Apparently, while the Ab Fab is being discontinued in the UK, it will still be available here in the United States through the US distributor. So if you haven't gotten your Ab Fab fix yet, there's still plenty of time.
You are tearing along on that Sigil. Next up: sleeve cap!
What is your blocking process for this yarn? In my experience, most wool has expanded upon blocking. I'm shocked at how much this shrunk in height.
I didn't do anything special. I soaked the piece completely in water with a little Eucalan. Then I squeezed out what water I could in the sink and follwed that by rolling the piece in a white cotton towel and applying pressure to remove more water.
You're right that I didn't see much change in the length at this point.
However, when I laid it out flat on the board and started moving the fabric into place, and the fabric started to dry, everything started to change a bit. The stitches and the yarn in general started to puff up a little bit and there was definite and comfortable growth width-ways and shrinking height-ways. You might think that this wouldn't last, but the change in the yarn is fairly substantial.
I'll take up close before and after shots of the stitches in the sleeve so that everyone can see the difference.
ooops! I'm a day late, but Happy Birthday! And Sigil looks amazing. :)
HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY, THERESA!! WE MISS YOU AT KIP!! BRANCHING OUT INTO SWEATER DESIGN, I SEE. YOU WILL DO A FANTASTIC JOB, NO DOUBT!
So that explains why the band looked wider than the back when you picked up the stitches in the first post. Wow, do you knit like a superhero or what? I can't believe you finished the back so fast! And that's quite a change of dimensions after blocking. I assume you didn't pin it out, but simply shaped it before letting it dry. Amazing how different wools behave. Thanks for unconfusing me.