A Little Something

I bought this yarn some years ago and I've always loved it.

I used it in a couple of other projects, and had a little left. Enough for a child's sweater, perhaps, but certainly not enough for something for me.

I held onto it, though, because it was such a lovely yarn. There's something about a special yarn aged carefully in the stash. Every once in a while, I'd wind a skein of it into a ball and play with it for a while.

It didn't want to be anything except a very simple pattern in straight stockinette. The yarn sang so beautifully that it needed its knitting to support, but not overwhelm it.

In late summer, I got a brain wave. If I was careful, I could make it into a light summer tank. I knit a gauge swatch, measured carefully, and weighed it. I then weighed the skeins of yarn. I calculated the square yardage and decided I had just enough to make a tank top that skimmed the top of my hips.

So I did.

I knit from the top-down, designing to cover my bra and conform to my curves, with short rows to give extra length in the bust and short rows fore and aft to give the tank a gently curving hem.

Then I cast on a picot hem and knit Victoria's Lace Picot edging from one of Nicky Epstein's edging books. I grafted the edging onto the sweater, something that I definitely have to do again. So many wonderful edgings are knit from the bottom up, and I, a confirmed top-down knitter, can only use them if I'm willing to graft.

Around the neck and arms, a round of single crochet and then a round of crab stitch to stabilize the edges and harmonize with the Victoria's Lace Picot edging.