Swatching and switching

This summer has not been very productive in the strict sense, at least concerning my knitting. It has been super hot the last week and I could barely touch any yarn, just existing was already too much effort (note: if it gets hot in Belgium it feels a million times warmer because we're simply not used to it!). I also learned a new word in Dutch: "Hittegolf".

But working on the small things is also work and I've done a lot of swatching for two projects that I've been dying to get on the needles for a while. The first one is Sigrid's "New Waves Cardi" and the second one Anna Wilkinson's "Spencer fair-isle vest" from the book "Learn to knit - love to knit". Both were love at first sight and I immediately thought that they were great projects to get rid of my stash of Latvian yarns that I have now in all colours of the rainbow. 

The "New Waves Cardi" has a very simple but intriguing pattern and I was super happy that Sigrid sent me the draft to do a test knit. I started swatching and it seemed to work out fine with the needle size indicated in the pattern and I also liked the red and white contrast. But when I got started I realized fairly quickly that I was knitting too losely and the bodice was already faaaar to big. Quite frustrating because I felt like I did my swatch for nothing but something went obviously wrong here. I unraveled it completely and the project is now snoozing again until I've taken up the courage to continue.

In parallel I was also knitting some swatches to work out a good colour combination for the "Spencer" vest. Since I didn't buy the yarn recommended in the pattern and I used my own stash, some colours were not corresponding exactly to the original and I had to alter the combination a little bit. It was harder than I thought, especially in getting the dark-light contrast. I also realized that it is much better to have some "dull" colours in stock because all my stash is rainbow-coloured and super bright so actually the colours don't work so well together. In the end I settled on a combination which I like though and I bought an extra pair of smaller needles just in case.

I think I finally worked out a colour scheme that I like and I cast on for the vest/cardigan to be. Updates soon!