Got Tension?

I had to move my Shirvan-in-progress from a mat frame to my big wooden one, as the opening in the mat was really too big -- I admitted to myself with great reluctance -- and the canvas was distorting dreadfully.  The frame is much heavier and rather awkward for working in my lap, wh. I really have to do because most of the time I work it without my glasses, so have to hold it two or three inches from my face in order to get the benefit of my Super Microscopic Up-Close Vision^TM.  I worked the smaller carpets on a smaller mat, which was perfect for holding up close, and fit into a regular 8 1/2x11 page protector or a zip bag when I wasn't working on it.  Oh, well.  The Shirvan is definitely happier in the frame, I could see at once, though it still has a bit of a list to port.

I am pretty sure that the wobbliness of the stitches is going to come out in the blocking, so I'm not alarmed at present.

You can see the built-in abrash, the color variations often found in Oriental carpets due to time and different dye lots, in the border greens, where there is a darker one along the bottom and a little bit up the side, then a mid-range green continuing.  I learned this word from Cooper, in fact, who remarked on it in the description of another of his charts, that he'd run out of wool and had to match it somewhat imperfectly.  This carpet actually has the color variation charted in a couple of places, so presumably the abrash is in the antique original.

But you can also see the differences in tension, either where I was working up-and-down or side-to-side, or where the wool varied in thickness.  The cream is especially prone to the thick/thin issue -- it's especially obvious to me in the little dashed lines along the bottom edge here, where the outer one is super-thick and the inner one is teeny-tiny.  I'm tempted to work over the teeny-tiny one with another thin strand.

I am really enjoying this carpet, though! the colors are lovely.

Here is another tension issue, though with a much happier initial outcome.  This is the first of Julia's mitts for her DC trip next month.  I got halfway up the stranded part, and wasn't very happy with my tension, so thought I'd try the inside-out trick.  You simply turn the piece inside out and knit it looking at the center -- down the inside of the "tube" -- and the floats are just a little more generous from traveling on the outside of the tube instead of the inside as usual.  I was really amazed at the difference between the two methods, which was obvious after just a few inches.

This still needs a bit of blocking, to be sure, but is noticeably smoother already than the right-side-out method, especially at the needle joins --

The spotted three-stitch stripe up the middle here would have been much wobblier than it is if I'd worked it right-side out.  The white is still a bit looser than it should be, but I'm hoping that a good blocking will fix that right up; I've noticed that Laura's pair, two years old now and much-worn, has tightened up noticeably (to me), so a little looseness at first shouldn't be a problem.  Bit of a mental adjustment, working inside-out, but worth a try!

Comments

[Mary Lou]

I'm off to DC for work this morning. Looks like 63 on Saturday!

[Sandie in Sydney]

That's a great tip, working the piece inside out. I find that I avoid this type of knitting because of tension issues so knowing this might make me less reluctant to try again.