15 December 2008

mini-parade day 3: irish moss

(ok, so obviously this is a slow parade. the clowns must have tripped up the ROTC squad or something.)

pattern: irish moss in alice starmore's aran knitting. i redrew the cable charts so they'd scan easier, added selvedge stitches, and left the shoulder stitches live for a 3 needle bindoff with the saddles. otherwise the pattern was straightforward and error free.
in: knit picks wool of the andes, which is holding up well so far. no sagging, a little pilling.
irish moss cablesmade for chuck, mostly on sundays over the course of 10 months. kind of. i cast on sometime in august 2007, and finished knitting all the bits by may 2008. it could be called the month of sundays sweater, since that ends up being about 40 sundays of knitting. the last bits of it really dragged. suddenly i was sick to death of it (maybe because i wasn't switching between 5 other projects) in a "i can't believe this isn't done yet" kind of way. the last inches of the second sleeve and its saddle were done in a mental frenzy where i kept wishing my hands would knit faster so i could be Done.

i blocked it before seaming (which i don't always), and took it on our MA trip.block partythat was largely futile. seaming is one of those things i like time and quiet to focus on, which was in rather short supply this summer. i tried doing the saddles first as recommended, but they came out not quite right. the pattern doesn't specify the saddle length, and all the stretchy cables in the body made it hard to figure out just how long i needed. so i ended up doing them last, and they fit perfectly.saddle shouldersthe corners look so square and neat. i realized that this is only my third sweater, which may be enough of a reason for the amazed it-looks-just-like-a-real-sweater glee i have when it all fits together.irish moss completethis sweater was intended for chuck to wear last winter, and finishing it in july was a bit disappointing. i wanted to see him wear it right now right now. as it was, he did wear it the week i finished it, thanks to the chilly, rainy summer. i haven't managed to get a shot of him modeling it yet, but it fits and looks very good on him. hugs are extra cozy when he's wearing it, because i can snuggle up to him and the yarn.

5 comments:

Carole Knits said...

You did a fantastic job!

Kate said...

You have "Aran Knitting"?!?!

*curls up in a ball of envy*

It's a gorgeous sweater and I hope it gets lots of wear. I admire your perseverance. When I get to the stage of being sick of a pattern, I tend to frog stuff... :-)

Sunflowerfairy said...

My jaw hurts from dropping so hard.

Wow.

Stunning. And only your 3rd sweater?? Wow.

(At first I wrote "stuffing" instead of stunning. Perhaps I have something else on my mind?)

Angeluna said...

What a gorgeous sweater. Only your third? Wow! You didn't say which yarn you used. I'm with Kate..."You have Aran Knitting?!!!!

BTW, love your photos of The Jambs. My kind of day.

Anonymous said...

Hej mitt Troll!!
Har saknat dig. Roligt att se att det fortfarande finns "krut" i dig.
Kramar/Lasse