Any ideas too fix this?
It’s in instaria in the round. I’m going to try stretching the floats when I block as they’re wool (I think) and the CC is acrylic, and thought about steeks but they give me the heebie-geebies.
Any Yes, Nos or Maybes to these or other thoughts?
Thanx, FV
You mixed wool and acrylic:whoosh: aren’t you brave. If it was all wool I would say you would be able to block some of the tension, as long as it’s not too much. But I can’t imagine what acrylic would do. I’ve never seen a garment that mixed the two, NOT that it can’t be done, I’ve just never seen it.
Steeks are quite easy but again, I have never seen acrylic steeked, but doesn’t mean you can’t.
My only suggestion is hindsight and won’t help you now. When I do color work I carry one color in each hand, by virtue of knitting style the right hand tension is always loose but the left yarn can get too tight so when I am knitting stitches witht he left I try to remember to spread the stitches to the right and give the yarn a little tug every 4 stitches or so.
:think:Yeah I’m not sure either…sometimes blocking can help the tension but it depends on how tight it is. The best thing to do when doing colorwork is to work it lose, it may look wrong or like that is way to lose to do any good…but usually after a few rows you will see that it pulls in and looks fine. I also carry my yarn in both hands…I wrap every 3rd st so my floats are not to long. I know some people can go 4-5 sts but I’ve just gotten in the habit of every 3rd.
I absolutely hate saying this, but I think the answer is that there is nothing you can do. Blocking acrylics is very tricky-- you can “kill” the yarn, it just wasn’t meant to be blocked. Also, you’d be trying to block 2 very different materials. When you block, whatever you stretch in one direction, you’ll lose from the other direction-- if you stretch horizontally, the garment will shorten up vertically. I would NOT steek this, although steeking experts might give you different advice. When you steek, they’re assuming you don’t have this problem-- because if you do, when you cut in order to loosen up the floats, what will happen is that it will just pull in from the edges and you’ll lose stitches at the sides. Whatever you do, if you get the floats correct, then the stitches will tighten up. I hope this was something small like a baby’s jacket or a hat, and not something you’ve worked on for months and months! I’m so sorry, but I think it’s a loss:verysad:
Fear not, it’s an iPhone cozy, so it’s tiny. And so far blocking has seemed to have gotten the worst of the “bubbleing” under control. It’s just whether or not it’ll dry that way.
It was weird though, coz it was like the bastard child of Instaria and Fair Isle with some “haha, you can’t see what you’re doing” thrown in. Maybe I wasn’t doing it right? :shrug:
And why can’t you mix Acrylics and wool? :?? Not that I’d aim to, especially not in a large project, but… :shrug:
Obviously I’m a rebel. I get Gauge, I get Drape, I Knit. I don’t get gauge… well most of the time I say stuff it, and knit anyway. I’m a Drape person.
FV
You can wet block acrylic just not steam or iron it. However, I don’t know if it’ll work. Since acrylic doesn’t stretch like wool it may not loosen the floats.
I’ve heard that if you do intarsia inside out where the floats are on the outside (you flip it when you’re done) then they are looser since they are on the outside of the circle and go to the inside where the diameter is smaller. Since you mixed yarns and blocking may not work you might just want to start over. :shrug:
People mix fibers all the time-- but I don’t know well they work out in the long run, because they different fibers will react differently to being worn and washed. Such as, cotton can be heavy and will pull downwards. So if you have a sweater made of wool and cotton, after a few wearings, it may stretch funny. When you wash things, that’s where you can really get into trouble. I think most “mixings” are done as borders, maybe?. . . You know, come to think of it, I wonder if your float problem has anything to do with mixing wool and acrylic? If that could be why they came out tight?. . .
But I am SOOOOO glad it’s an i-pod holder:woohoo: . Actually that’s a great sort of project in which to learn how to keep floats loose! You could knit a couple more and see what happens.