Gentle Rose

It's finished and I love it!

I wore it to work on Tuesday, which was also Knit Night, and it got lots of good comments.

It's been finished for three weeks, but had to be blocked, plus at this time of year I always have to wait for the weekend to photograph FO's because it's dark when I leave for work in the morning and even darker when I get home.

What I loved about it:

Moss Stitch edges

Cabling detail - the amount, process and the finished result

Beautiful yarn

Beautiful colour

Fluted sleeves which also turn in at the elbow to createa puffed look - they feel really nice and look flattering

Ribbing - flattering and clever arrangement - the ribbing on the fronts and back is echoed by the sleeves, the detail of which also taper at the side

Sizing is perfect

Very thick and warm

Speed of project - v. quick; took about 3 weeks

Would make another, or similar with modifications

What I didn't love:

At least one knot in every ball

Depth of colour differed noticeably, despite using exactly the same dye lot throughout

As you can see, the positives far outweighed the negatives.

The only modification I made was to knit the sleeves in the round (of course) and the entire body in the round, only separating at the very top of the fronts and back. This made it much quicker, and of course I avoided having to seam.

I would have picked up stitches and knitted the sleeves from the body, but I didn’t want to fuss over the sleeve shaping calculations, so I knit the sleeves in the round separately and joined them to the body using mattress stitch. I thought I would be able to kitchener stitch the top of the back to the two fronts, as I did on the neck band join, but as they’re ribbed they looked better with mattress stitch.

Yes, there is band of slightly different-coloured pink along the bottom. I used exactly the same dye lot for the whole project. As I have enough yarn left over, I thought about picking up the stitches and re-working that area, but there’s no guarantee that the colour will be right that time. Fortunately you don’t notice it so much when it’s on.

I'm back!

Sorry for the long delay, but I've been busy.

What with finishing lots of Christmas presents (my poor family members!), designing some projects of my own which I have called the Ripple Collection (the three russet-hued items below - check out my Etsy) and managing to squeeze in a break in Cornwall, I've been pretty busy.

Here's a glimpse of the last six weeks in photo's:

The mittens below are from the pattern by the eminently talented Malin.

Our week in Cornwall was wonderful. After my poor DH's spate of working til 2am and doing all-nighters at the office it was great that he downed tools and let me whisk him away down to the farthest, most south westerly point in the country.

The rugged landscape, stormy seas and little harbour villages really moved me, and I was inspired to pick up the needles. Look out for the Cornish Collection. Coming soon....