Oh yeah, like I surf

I was very taken with Connie Chang Chinchio's Après Surf Hoodie, printed in this summer's Interweave Knits. The only piece of lace I'd done previously was a scarf called Branching Out, from Spring 2005's Knitty and, despite not really being a big fan of lace as a product, making it turned out to be really fun.

The pattern for the Après Surf Hoodie called for Rowan RYC Cashcotton, a gorgeous blend of cotton, nylon, angora, rayon and cashmere and I found it at a bearable price in a striking blue on e-Bay. Bought ten balls of it and started swatching/gauging as soon as it arrived. My tension seemed to be a long way off and I ended up making it using teeny tiny needles - 2.25 mm for the body and arms and 2 mm needles for the hood, which is borderline psychotic.

I had got a long way through it before a Stitch 'n Bitch mate, who was making the same thing, suggested perhaps I was using DK instead of the 4-ply the pattern called for. Naturally, she was right (I think she knew but was being kind enough to pose it as a possibility, instead of telling me I'm an idiot.) I'd been so taken with the yarn's colour I'd ignored its weight. As it turned out, I preferred the result of the slightly thicker yarn. I may even make it again, in DK instead of 4-ply, but since it took two months it's not high on my list at the moment.


It has turned out very well and I've worn it for at least part of every day since I finished it a little over a week ago. The laughter from friends and family about the title has not subsided, since I have never even stood on a surf board in a shop, let alone risked life and limb (mine and others') by trying one out on the ocean. My athleticism, such as it ever was, is long gone, as you probably guess from this picture.

Big Bloke Sweater

In a moment of weakness some time ago 'im Indoors expressed a liking for some yarn we saw in Yarn LLC's New Haven branch (Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Super chunky in a lovely deep red). I grabbed up every ball of it they had while he was still enthused, without telling him it wasn't enough for the sweater he wanted it to magically turn in to, and rushed home to e-Bay where I found more of it. The dye lot was different but when the batch arrived it was clearly good enough if worked in carefully.

Since I am trying to try something new with each project this one was to be knitted from the top down. I tracked down a top down raglan calculator online and starting doing gauges in the round, which took far longer than the more usual square, but since the pattern would be knitted in the round was necessary. Having settled on 6.5 mm needles (my gorgeous Harmony circular set came in to use) I did the required sums and cast on.


Things went well at first. The yarn is a pleasure to work with, despite every single ball having a knot in it, and with the size of needles things went quickly. Having got some inches past joining up below the V of the V-neck I finally compared it to a favourite sweater of the big lad's, rather than trying it on him, and confirmed it was far too big. Major frogging.




After a big drink, got knitting again and it was definitely worth all that ripping. I've got to end of body and have left it with the ball of yarn attached for the moment - don't want to commit to a length yet. It's pretty heavy and I think the whole thing may well stretch once it's in use, so the top-down technique's ability to be shortened may well come in handy.

The first attempt at a sleeve was slightly wrong. My initial decrease at both ends of every third row was making it too narrow too quickly. More frogging. Alternating between fourth and third seems to be working well. At this rate he'll get a hugely warm sweater just in time for the height of summer.