Me-Made-May 2019 - Winging It Jumper

Day 9 for Me-Made-May is a cozy, stay at home jumper. This is the first adult sized garment I had ever knit. It started from when I had just finished a baby jumper and I thought "How hard can it be to make one adult sized". It turns out, pretty hard. I managed it, and it was the plainest and squarest jumper there ever was.

The jumper is made out of super chunky, acrylic yarn. I had one huge ball that my friend gave me, but she had got it from Aldi, and I couldn't find any more when I realised I wouldn't have enough for the whole jumper so had to find something else that would do.

I started off swatching to find the right needle size for the type of fabric that I wanted. I'm not a very good swatch maker, I just don't really know how to do them properly, and I always feel like I'm using up yarn that could be useful somewhere else. Which is probably why I have never cast off a swatch. Which may have been my downfall.

I cast on in the end, writing down everything as I went, although I am still yet to actually write up what I did! I went for a top down jumper in the round. Which is how the baby jumper was constructed, and the only way I knew how. Needless to say it has quite a wide neckline, I'm not sure how I feel about it, but it is what it is.

I knit down the plain body, I added one little stripe before I switched to the other colour in a hopeless attempt to make it look like the colour change was intended. I finished off the body with a rib. I then started on the sleeves, these I was quite pleased with in terms of matching the body of the jumper. I wasn't so pleased with the cuffs though.

I had made the sleeves longer then the body, but probably not long enough, sadly only something I realised much much later. One of the things I was proud of when knitting my sleeves was picking up stitches in the armpit before knitting the rest of the sleeve and avoiding holes.

The jumper sadly just got worn for the finished object photos and never again. For part of Me-Made-May I am trying to finish off or fix garments I have but I don't seem to wear. This was one of them. I decided that one of the reasons I don't wear the jumper is because of the cuffs.

I had no experience of jumpers, and I didn't even know that sleeves had shaping in them - such a rookie. The cuffs were the same size as the rest of the sleeves and just kind of flopped around my wrists, I didn't like. So I ripped the sleeve ribbing out. I knit 2 together for every knit stitch in the first row of ribbing and then I knit the same amount of ribbing as I had done originally. This made it so much better. I felt that I was able to wear it around the house then.

Only after wearing it for Me-Made-May, I then found out the things I don't love about it. But they are livable with. I'll be wearing it again sometime, and maybe thinking of how I can improve it. I will now leave you with the instagram story, hopefully this jumper will get more wear in time. Perhaps I will grow to love it - Happy making!

Varnishing The Eurofighter: Enamel versus Acrylic

The time has come for me to varnish my Eurofighter, which I did. But first of all I had to figure out what kind of varnish I would need. This was not as easy as I first thought, as I was confronted with forums upon forums of people arguing that acrylic varnish will ruin everything and enamel is the best and vice versa!

So after a bit of reading up on what is actually in acrylic and enamel varnish, and on how they react with different things I made a decision.

Taped up ready for varnishing

I've painted the Eurofighter with acrylic paint, which is water based. But, most of the other model paint I have is enamel, which is solvent based (why it's more smelly!). So as it turns out the difference between acrylic and enamel varnish is very much the same (Although rumors are there are some varnishes that are labeled as acrylic but are solvent based). The problem comes when the paint under the varnish hasn't dried properly, with acrylic paint you're waiting for the water to evaporate and with enamel the solvent needs to evaporate. So if acrylic varnish has been put over enamel paint before it has had long enough to dry, the solvent will try to evaporate and cannot, and will blister up the varnish layer and then you have to get back to paint stripping and starting all over again. But the same can be said for the opposite way around.

There is a huge camp on either side of the fence here, some people will always use acrylic varnish on EVERYTHING, and the same with enamel varnish. So without being influenced by who is shouting the loudest, it is really down to personal preference. I used enamel varnish, but had waited a few months (not deliberately, but I hadn't got around to it) after painting and a few days after putting the transfers on, to make sure they had dried out properly, before I went putting the first coat of varnish on.

The Eurofighter has now had two lovely coats of matt varnish, and is starting to come together and look quite smart.

Underside with a fresh coat of varnish

One of the things I didn't do before I had taken the varnish to my little aircraft was to clean it of the dust and little bits that had accumulated on it, which Mr M told me wouldn't be a problem - using an aerosol meant that the dust would be blown off. Which sadly wasn't the case for me, and now I seem to have varnished in the dust so it now is permanent, oh well, learn for the future it seems.