Finished Sweater and Stuffed Eyeball

I am proud to introduce my finished cardigan!!!!

Pattern: "Embroided Sweater", Style No. 6061 from Spinnerin Volume 150 from 1962.

Yarn: Malabrigo, color Holly Hock, less than 5 skeins

Needles: size 4 Clover Bamboo straights for the waistband and cuff, size 9 Clover Bamboo straights for the rest.

Date Started: January 6, 2006
Date Finished: February 27, 2006

Notes: I finished a sweater in less than two months!!! I am so proud of myself!!!

ZantiMrKnit had given me 4 skeins of this yarn for Xmas. One of the women at Windsor Button said it should be enough for a sweater. I decided that I would need another skein, and got one -- just not in the same dye lot. There is a difference in the two dyelots, but I'm wicked smaht and used the 5th skein for the waistband, cuffs, and neckband.

I have put in a small picture on the right of the picture from the magazine. As you can tell, I didn't do the embroidery (duuuuhhhhh!). I thought that the Malabrigo on its own is beautiful enough, and the style of the sweater is fancy enough that it doesn't need embroidery.

The knitting part of this sweater was great. Of course, the soft-as-a-kitten Malabrigo didn't hurt. Once it came time to finish it --- hooo boy! Makes me think of how smug (or clueless) I must have sounded as a new knitter, saying, "I've been sewing for years; I don't mind sewing pieces together." To all the knitters I said that to, I now hang my head in shame and offer my sincere apologies.


The other part about this sweater that was difficult -- the buttonholes. Buttonholes suck! Whatever you do, try to get around making buttonholes! Sew buttons on the front and use snaps to close it, because buttonholes are going to look like poo-poo no matter *what* you do!

The neckband was fun to knit, but one sonofaBoDiddley to put on. I had realized how it was going on while knitting it, but never completely formulated it until Anna at the South Station 1 p.m. SnB said, "You're knitting bias tape." Yup, that's me. I knit bias tape.

I also knit optic nerves!!!

I signed up for the Unconditional Birthday Swap for February on Craftster. One of the posters, Sweetie pie press, wanted subversive stuffies -- one of the things she mentioned was a stuffed eyeball. That set my brain into motion. There was lots of time-consuming work (lots of hand-sewing), and freehanding how to knit up an optic nerve (I just cast on 8 stitches, knit up about 2 inches, and repeated that until I had about 9 of them -- three on each dpn -- then I started knitting in the round with them, decreasing where appropriate and ending it all with an i-cord). I think the hardest part was attaching the optic nerve to the already-stuffed stuffie. I'll be making at least one more, so maybe I can streamline the work. Solvie enjoyed it quite a bit (not to mention ZantiMrKnit, who asked if I really had to mail it away).

Hullo, what's this???

Have I ever mentioned that I sometimes don't finish projects? I started this lovely, Knitty's Rock Star scarf, around July '05. It's a garter stitch scarf done on size 3 needles with sock yarn and novelty yarn. So basically you can knit forever and only have two inches done. I took it out of the cupboard on Monday and started working on it again.

Both yarns are lovely. The neon fur yarn is some JoAnn Sensations brand yarn. It was so tacky I had to buy three skiens, and then try to find a project for it. I found the Rock Star scarf, which recommends Koigu, and I had not idea what that was. I finally got a beautiful coral/pink sock yarn from Minds Eye's Yarn in Cambridge, MA. There were times I considered frogging this and using the sock yarn to make (natch!) socks. But I just watched All Dolled Up (the New York Dolls movie) the other night and would love to strut around like Syl Sylvain wearing this, maybe with garters and high heels.

Please excuse any typos I had tonight. I'm tired and had a glass of wine.

Night night!