Jill P:
I keep meaning to write posts that aren’t just finished item posts, but keep forgetting. Here’s my latest finished sweater. I started it before I left for the holidays. I kind of hoped that I would be able to finish the whole sweater while I was at home. I might have been able to if I didn’t have little random stuff to knit at the same time.
Specs:
Pattern: Elaine’s Blouse (Rav link) by Cecily Glowik MacDonald from Interweave Knits, Winter 2008
Yarn: GGH Silky Tweed, just a smidgen over 7 balls of yarn. I only needed the 8th ball to do the neck edging.
I knit the 36 1/2″ size, on size 5 needles. I maybe would have knit it with an inch or so of negative ease, but I went with the sizing available. As is, that’s pretty much zero ease.
Start time: December 19th
Finish time: January 11th
I was able to finish the body of it while I was at home. I did the sleeves back in Los Angeles. The knitting went really quickly. The nice thing about such a tweedy yarn is that I didn’t have to worry about “rowing” out. I made no modifications. I didn’t plan on using the same yarn as in the pattern, but I saw it for 50% off at Wildfiber and had to go for it. The sweater was a bit itchy while I was wearing it, but not too bad. I got too lazy to block it, so that might help it. Or it can grow all crazy, hard to tell! (Of course I didn’t wash my swatch.)
This back looks a little linebacker-y here, but I like to think it looks better in real life. I bought the buttons from Mood Fabrics, right next to my apartment. I think a good blocking will help them not to look so gappy. There’s definitely plenty of room in the sweater. And since it’s a pretty wide neck I don’t need to undo any buttons to get the sweater on. Which of course makes me wish I had done a faux buttonband instead. One thing that does bother me is that it tends to ride up around my neck. I have to keep pulling the sleeves down so that the shoulders aren’t bunched up weird.
Overall I’m pretty pleased with it. Not my favorite sweater but definitely wearable.
And here are the scarves I knit for the Special Olympics:
Pattern: Meandering Stripes (on top) and Parallelograms both from Lynne Barr’s Knitting New Scarves book.
Yarn: Red Heart Super Saver in White and Delft Blue.
Each scarf took maybe 25% of each skein. I was hoping to use it all and get it out of the house, but nope. They are pretty short, about 50″ each. I was happy with how they turned out, but again, it was not my call on the yarn or the colors. An annoying thing about any kind of striping is all the ends to weave in! Lauren was kind enough to send these in for us. I hope the recipients like them! I am usually pretty bad about doing charity knitting, but I’ve always been a fan of the Special Olympics and was glad to participate. I have other pictures of these things on Ravelry, but these pretty much say it all.
Currently on the needles: Green Day vest by Tikru using Terra by Fibre Co. which is the most beautiful yarn I have ever seen. I am also working on some knee socks, but am not sure if they will fit on my “curvy” calves.
Jill B.
jill & jill 