Green & Gold - Further Adventures in Planned Pooling

So, I've started another scarf - this time in the Oakland A's colors. I wanted to make a slightly wider and shorter scarf than the last one, so I experimented with more than 50 stitches. I thought I might be able to force vertical stripes, so I started in the middle of a green section with 52 stitches.

But instead I got what the pooling planner predicted I would get if I started at the beginning of a yellow section. The good news is that the pattern is remarkable uniform.

 

Pooling Update

Well, I wasn't happy with the way the pattern was going, so I measured the color runs on the second skein and tried again. Here's the Planned Pooling calculation for that skein:

So I cast on and started knitting:

I liked that much better, so I did more calculations on the first skein, and found that 46 stitches worked well with it, too, so I'll start over again.

As I'm going along, the pattern is changing because the color segments aren't equal throughout each skein. But I'm hoping that the variation will just add interest to the finished scarf. Otherwise, I'll have to change the project entirely. Hitchhiker and Trillian are two options, especially since there are good examples of what the sports teams colors look like in those patterns.

It's not as easy as it looks...

Well, the pooling/patterning is getting out of control again. The segments of color aren't exactly 54/47 stitches, and it was okay for awhile but now it looks weird to me. Do I keep going? Or should I try it again with the second skein?

It seems like the color segments don't stay the same length throughout the skein, and now they are about equal. That makes the piece stripe one row each color. Argh!

Getting Your Pooling to Behave

It’s all about where you start. On my first attempt, I cast on at the start of the orange and it didn’t create the pattern I expected. But I used this first try to determine the number of stitches in a black section (47) and the number of stitches in an orange section (54).

48 stitches on US 4 needles, cast on at beginning of orange

I used plannedpooling.com to figure out the right number of stitches to cast on but you have to start knitting where the colors begin. If you’re off by even a little bit, the pooling won’t work. Then I used a long tail cast on to ensure I would start knitting at the beginning of a black section.

1. Determine the number of stitches in each color section.
2. Use a long-tail cast on to ensure you start in the right place.
3. Use plannedpooling.com to play around with the possibilities.

48 stitches on US 5, long tail cast on to beginning of black

 Some of the difference can be attributed to changing the needle size, but it's mostly about whether you start the cast on at the beginning of a color or whether you start knitting at the beginning of a color.

And another project is wrapping up...

I started this cowl on February 13th and worked on it pretty steadily. It went quickly since it's just simple stockinette in the round. Two rows of the solid gray, then two rows of the ombre - repeat these four rows until nearly all the ombre is gone. One last row of ombre and then graft. Okay, yes, I still need to graft the ends together...but that's 84 stitches in the round.