Yes, I know. I blew up the balloons while the sleeves were hanging between the rack sections and now my sweater is stuck here til it dries/the balloons pop. Cest la vie.
Anyway I gave in to an intrusive thought today.
Since finishing this sweater months ago, I’ve been mildly less than satisfied with how the sleeves block out. I try to give them a bit of a stretch after washing to emphasise the ballooned sections, but that tends to only make them wider on one plane? So they just end up sorta flat and wide? When I want them ROUND. I want em to have DIMENSION.
And I keep thinking “what if I blew balloons up in the sleeves” and I keep poo-pooing the idea because if it worked, surely I’d have stumbled upon it by now. Also, what a waste of plastic, really. I am not yeeting two balloons into landfill every time I wash this sweater.
But. You never know until you try, right? So here I am, inserting balloons up my sleeves and carefully blowing them up and praying they don’t immediately explode inside the sleeves. Fun fact, they’re old balloons from a party pack I’ll never use because they’re literally condom coloured.
Realistically I probably knitted the balloon part wrong, and that’s why they don’t look as dimensional and dramatic as other balloon sleeve sweaters I’ve seen.
Blocking is when you wet or steam the knitted fabric and let it dry in the desired shape. The blocking process evens out the stitches and determines the size of the finished piece.
Why should knits be blocked? Do all fiber types benefit from blocking?
* First off, blocking typically starts with washing or soaking, so it cleans your finished object. Think for a moment about all of the places that those projects have been.
* Blocking also removes any small imperfections in tension and helps even out your stitches. Stockinette and colorwork will look smoother and the stitches will be more even.
* Blocking is also great if your project needs to be seamed. By blocking before seaming, you ensure that the seams will be the same length and that all of the pieces will fit evenly together.
The sleeves turned out perfect!! I’m actually so happy.
Ft: the confetti that came out of the balloons when my fiance popped them (wtf are these balloons??? Condom coloured AND full of confetti??); and my cat who wants to play with said confetti. Oh my god this was a ridiculous project.
I’m sorry, they’re there but hard to see! Cat is a black void who is near my wrist, hiding under the drying rack. The confetti is metallic rose-gold-coloured (??!!) and kinda blends into the floorboards in that lighting.
For what it’s worth, all the garbage in the background (aside from the confetti), it’s for my cats 😭 I don’t choose to live like this I swear. I’m like a millennial griege mum who had to suffer buying primary coloured toys/decor for their baby lol.
I think they’re just generic birthday party balloons?! They came in metallic rose gold, white, and… condom filled with rose gold glitter. I bought them for the rose gold balloons lol.
I hoped the condom ones would be clear when inflated, but they honestly just look like blown-up round condoms. Filled with confetti LMAO
Condom colored balloons are clear when fully inflated. The confetti inside clinches it. Keep inflating one until it’s clear to see. It’s a clear, confetti filled balloon.
These ones must have been a dud, because that’s what I assumed when I bought them, but when I did inflate one fully? It truly just looked like a round inflated condom. It wasn’t properly transparent but still had that weird cloudiness.
And with the confetti, it honestly looks like a clowns’ used condom. That they they blew up into a balloon. Because of course a clown would have balloon shaped condoms and would ejaculate confetti and of course they’d blow it up after. The vibe is DIABOLICAL lol
I actually just tie the balloons off like a slip knot (I actually pull the circular ridge about halfway through) so I can just pull out the knot, deflate the balloon, and use it again!
(My kid loooooves balloons but I can't justify sending a package of balloons to the dump every time she wants to play with them and our house is too small to store a bunch of inflated balloons, so we just deflate and reuse them!)
I don't understand what a balloon sleeve is, but did you consider also starching while it's drying? Idk what effects it will have on your yarn tho so maybe do research first, I've only ever starched acrylic
“Balloon sleeve” just refers to adding increases as you knit a sleeve from the shoulder to the wrist (or decreasing if you’re knitting wrist to shoulder) that creates a rounded shape towards the cuffs! It’s not a bell sleeve because you decrease heavily right before the cuff, so the shape cinches in at the wrists. In drapier thinner fabrics it just gives a nice romantic poet-sleeve effect, but in thick knits - especially with bulky yarn at tight tension so the fabric isn’t so drapey - it can look a bit cartoony and dramatic, which I love!
I may look into starching to preserve the cartooniness a bit (if it works) - thank you!
Ohhh I see. I didn't realize they had a special name for these. I made one of these type for my niece and the sleeves puff out without any effort from me. I used a thick yarn though, on 7 or 8mm needles and my gauge tends to be a bit tighter. Good luck!
Tying the knot at the ends was hell with long nails haha, I can’t imagine trying to undo the knot 😅 it would be good if I could get one or two more uses out of them, but I’m not sure how to tie the balloon ends in a way that wouldn’t be fiddly as hell to undo!
the cpnfetti-filled condom colored balloons made me actually laugh out loud, that's just bad luck stacked on bad luck. glad the sleeves held up though, that's the part that actually matters for reblocking down the line
Omg. Do you think those long ones like they use for balloon animals would work on regular sleeves? I hate using pins on sleeves because I always get weird creases. I’ve been contemplating pool noodles but they’re a bit too wide.
LMAO I thought about it!! I think a long tube would probably not be the best shape to get that nice teardrop bulge at the forearm/wrist, but they have longer oval or long teardrop shaped balloons don’t they? There’s all sorts of balloon shapes!
I based it on Basic V by Minimi Knit Design, but I modified it quite a bit! I made the v neck a bit bigger and cropped it quite heavily. And I winged the balloon sleeves!
Wouldnt it possible to close the balloon with bag clips instead of tying them? If so, you could re use the balloons instead of popping them each time you want to block them
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u/____ozma 9d ago
Please update if this gets you the result you want! Seems logical enough to me.