Lightbulb moment
While I was in Italy, I bought a knitting magazine. There are several pretty patterns in it and I quite like the look of this jacket/bolero thingie (technical term):
The yarn required is Schachenmayr "Goa", a ribbon yarn, used double on 15mm needles -like that's going to happen for the loose woman over here. Investigation (Google really is your friend) revealed the bad news - "This yarn has been discontinued and is no longer available." Then I suddenly bethought myself that I still had the gazillion balls of Colinette "Giotto", unravelled from the poxy moss stitch (I believe you chaps across the pond call this "Seed stitch") cardigan, which I never liked because the fabric was too floppy (technical term) and just had no shape whatsoever. Here it is lanquishing on the carpet:
But would it work? Yardage for the Goa is 75m/50g. Yardage for the Giotto? 156yds/100g. Why do they do that? What is it about yarn companies in this country (though the US is not immune) that they have to mix imperial and metric measurements in the same breath? Don't get me started.
Anyway, a few sums later: 156yards is 142m. That's for 100g, don't forget. 142m divided by 2 gives us 71m/50g. Which looks to me to be pretty darned close. I reckon it will work. I will, of course, have to do a swatch. I cannot imagine that I will be using 15mm needles. I might start with a 10mm and see how I get on, but will not be at all surprised to find myself using a 7mm or something even smaller. We shall see.
Update on the cat (which some say is a kitten)? It has, as 'im indoors put it, succeeded in taking over our lives. It is now, even as I write, installed in the armchair of 'im indoors. I really, really like the idea of being adopted. I feel I have arrived, both as a mother and a knitter but (and it is a huge but) am allergic to cats. They make me sneeze and wheeze and cause reddening of the eyes and general all-round misery. I really can't have a cat. I don't know what to do! I don't wish the animal any ill but I don't want to be ill either.
It's a dilemma all right. 
3 comments:
Knitting an ickle swatch has got to be worth it in this case - that Giotto will make a lovely bolero thingy
The maths sounds OK, so do the swatch, and see how you feel then
I love all your "technical terms". I'm quite partial to using such terms myself. They're just so much more precise than layman's terms :)
I've long thought that there's a conspiracy among yarn companies to make knitters go nuts with non-standard skein sizes. I can't explain it any other way.
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