Swatching...

Very soon I'll have very little time to knit - but up until then I'll have plenty. This combined with the fact that I have no projects on the needles that I want to finish (those few WIPs still lingering in my knitting basket have been put into hibernation) makes this the perfect time for starting a lot of new, larger projects.

My reasoning is that what really takes time and attention in a project is the planning, the swatching, and setting up the project. Once you have a few inches on the needles it's often plain sailing from there. Thus, if I have several projects at this stage - and at various difficulty level - I'll always be able to find one that I want to knit a few rows on whenever the opportunity is there. I have therefore been doing some serious planning and swatching over the last few days and am now in the starting-up-projects phase.

Firstly, I listed all the sweater-sized projects at the top of my queue in a spreadsheet featuring the intended gauge, required amount of yarn and yarn weight, etc. along with a list of the yarns in my stash I wanted to use up next featuring their yardage and amount. 2011 brought an addition to the stash of (ahem) 6 kg of yarn (almost 9 kg out, but 15(!) kg in), which means that I now have plenty of lovely yarn to knit from and that knitting from stash is really a pleasure while also being a necessity. I am a follower of the Isager school of pairing several yarns to get the intended gauge and texture, so with all the possible combinations, the list of yarns was rather long.

(Somewhere in here was acquisition of two new Kim Hargreaves books - Shadows (my favourite!) and Scarlet - and two patterns from the new Wool People vol. 2 - knitting from stash wasn't meant to be costless, right?).

Then I started matching those two lists paying attention to key points such as drape and texture needed for each project. This was quite an interesting task! After that it was time to start swatching to see if my yarn choices would actually work. In the end I came up with 6 new projects! Here they are:

Craft (Rav link) from Kim Hargreaves' Scarlet in Rowan Kid Silk Haze (colourway 650 Killer Red) and Isager Alpaca 2 (colourway 025). I'm 3 inches on to the body by now.

Baron (Rav link) from Kim Hargreaves' Shadows in Cascade 220 Heather (colourway Summer Sky) and Blackhill Højlandsgarn (colourway Andeæg). After taking this photo I realised I'd swatched the wrong stitch pattern (should be moss st, not seed st). Also approx. 3 inches on to this one.

Fuse (Rav link) by Veronik Avery from Wool People vol. 2 in two strands of Holst Garn Supersoft (colourway Heather). 6 inches of the first sleeve is done.

Lawrence (Rav link) by Melissa La Barre from Wool People vol. 2 in two strands of a single ply wool from Bindestuen in Saltum which I bought at the knitters' festival on Fanø this September (I only bought one skein of yarn, but then it was a 340 g one!) in the most wonderful purplish blue colour (which unfortunately bleeds a bit). I'm casting on as soon as I finish this post.

Hanley (Rav link) from Kim Hargreaves' Shadows in one strand of a Gotland wool I bought at a farmers' market the year before last and have been wanting to try out for a long time - and one strand of Posh Yarn Mimi (colourway The Clock Struck Midnight - wonderful purple colours!). Still only a swatch.

A variation of this sweater from Pickles (I want mine long and raglan) in black angora from Garnudsalg.dk and a viscose/merino/cashmere blend from the same place. Still only a swatch.

I've also recently started Fargo (also from stash) and I want to start Jade, too, once I can decide on the colours, so I think I'm more than covered in terms of WIPs that can be picked up for a few minutes and then put aside - and I'm very pleased with it all!