The Practice Yarn

Have you ever been to the Verdant Gryphon? If you haven't seen their yarns you MUST MUST stop everything and go check them out. They have a mystical, mythical theme and some of the most beautiful hand-dyed  semi-solid tonal yarns on the internet. I remember finding their site a few years back, when I had just begun knitting. I loved their yarn, but just wasn't there yet. I was still at the Oh-Look-This-Acrylic-Skein-Is-Only-1.99  stage of my fiber journey.  I drooled over it a bit and then went on with my learning on crap yarn, in the process, forgetting all about this magical Gryphon website of yarn.

Flash forward to last week when I stumbled across them again! Being now in a totally different yarny mindset, with several years of fiber festivals, dying in the backyard, washing and spinning whole fleeces under the belt, the Gryphon yarns do not seem that out of reach. I really want to knit something from the Gryphon now! I think I can do it; just need a pattern.

Oh, look!  They have patterns! Check out this slinky little sweater called Themis designed by Gryphon Corpus.

This actually looks like a really good sweater for Texas.  Average winters where I live provide about 4-6 weeks of heavy sweater usage. That isn't much opportunity to wear something that took months to create. It was quickly decided that THIS was the perfect sweater, available as a pdf download too. This could be my first project using Knit Companion on my ipad mini!

Once I checked out the yarn required for my size (2 of their fingering weight skeins in each colorway) I headed over to the yarn page.  Everytime I put two colors together that I liked one of the colors would be sold out or only have 1 skein left. Should I compromise on the color choice or wait? Then I took a moment to do a little math. I am not a math major, or an engineer, but it didn't take me long to figure out that I would be spending over $100 in yarn (after shipping cost) on a sweater that I still have to put together. I find this really funny since I would NEVER spend $100 on an already-made ready-to-wear sweater, even at the finest department store.

I really want to make this though!  And I want to make it with the beautiful V Gryphon yarns! What if I really mess it up? What if I spend months knitting only to find that this $100+ sweater looks terrible on my body type? It seems to look fine on the model who is also of the tiny stick figure build, but ya never know, right?  I mean, I can put on a top that fits terribly, scrunch it and pose just right, and voila, looks ok in a photo.  How do I know that this technique was not employed for said model photo?

Then the ultimate solution came to me. I don't know why I hadn't thought of this before! It is perfect! I will purchase the pattern and make a sweater with practice yarn first! I will work out any adjustments that may need to be made to the pattern on less expensive yarn. By the time I move on to the drool-worthy Gryphon yarns the garment will be like it is custom made just for my little stick body.  I am now patting myself on the back for thinking of this plan. This will give me more time to choose the colors I want from their website, PLUS I can start right now!

Perhaps I have something in my stash!  Ok, stop laughing now.  You know as well as I do that no matter how much sock yarn any of us have squirreled away, the chances of finding the required yardage in two complimentary colorways in the stash is about as likely as finding a sparkly unicorn in my shower. To avoid that hour of search  being a complete waste of time, I sort of organized the sock yarn stash. It should only take me 30 min  next time to determine I don't have anything usable.

There is really only one thing left to do at this point as I am determined to begin the practice sweater RIGHT NOW.  Yes indeed, it is time for a trip to the LYS! Armed with the pattern requirements I begin the search for the perfect practice yarn. It must be fingering weight in 2 complimentary colorways that I will actually like.

I didn't expect to run into the same issue at the LYS as I had in my own stash. I would find two colors that worked well together, but at least one of the colors would only have one skein in stock. There were also very few tonals. I was mostly finding hand dyed skeins that were big blocks of color dyed across the skein. This would only work if I could find a solid or semi solid that matched one of the colors in the dyed skein.

I was just about to give up when I came across these!

Beautiful! They match and I love the colors. I've been told recently that I should wear more green and this grassy green tonal is just wonderful and springy. To top it off there were many skeins of each colorway. This is SweetGeorgia Yarns CashLuxe Fine in Grouse and in Green.  Fiber content: 70% Merino, 20% Cashmere, 10% Nylon.

oooOOOOOooooh  Cashmere!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I love it even more!

So, at the end of the day.  I spent $150 on "practice" yarn so I don't waste any of the $100 yarn I plan to ultimately knit this sweater with.  Yes, I cast on right away.

Christmas Knitting

I swear I am not going to do this to myself next year. So behind on the Christmas gifts that the hats I intended to make have been abbreviated into headbands. I had such good intentions. What happened?

Those sock you were going to get? Yeah they are just toe covers at this point.

That bag I was going to make? It is only a small pouch.

Afghans? Ha! Don't make me laugh.

I will not stress over this. I will not stress over this. Nobody is going to die if I don't get these done. No children will starve, no dogs will be harmed. It is all going to be ok.