Monday, January 27, 2014

Four New Sweaters

This was UFO week.  I sewed on so many buttons this week that I will be making pullovers for awhile until I can face a button again.  However, I now have 4 more sweaters. 

The first cardigan I decided to finish off was the navy jacket.  While I was on a roll, I finished the green cardigan jacket with the eyelet borders:
 
Then it was the raglan variegated cardigan:


 It seemed at first that it would be hard to find buttons that would go with this busy yarn, but I found some excellent ones at Beverly's.
I always thought that raglans didn't look good on me, but now I have changed my mind.  If the sleeves are 3/4 length and the seams are slightly fitted, the sweater looks very good.  It certainly is easier to sew in raglan sleeves than set-in sleeves.

The last sweater was the fair isle cardigan.  It's nice that this is finally done, but I don't think I'll make any more round yoke sweaters because I don't like the fit on me and how the yoke feels.  I'd like to try more fair isle though.
I'm almost ready to hang the light blue pullover on the machine.  It will be great to finish off a sweater without buttons.

Monday, January 13, 2014

Midwinter Knitting

Well, time has been flying along and here it is a new year already.  Here in California, we are having a very cold but dry winter so far.  Those completely sewn-together sweaters have been making me feel guilty, so one of the first things I am going to try to finish up this January is getting the buttons sewn onto the three cardigans.  I even wore the navy cardigan jacket once with a fancy pin holding the top together, so that is the one I decided to work on first.


I think I will get a lot of use out of this sweater because it has a classic shape and 3/4 sleeves.
 

The emerald green sweater jacket is the same pattern but has eyelets in the borders just like the pink jacket I made last year (which I happen to be wearing right this minute).  I didn't get the button positions marked  yet, but at least it is out of the stack of unfinished items and ready to work on.  Both of these colors will be very useful.  I have been making an effort this winter to wear my sweaters more often instead of just finishing them and putting them in a drawer.

The current project is a pullover sweater (will not languish unfinished waiting for its buttons) from this book:

I am using the stitch pattern and my TNT sweater pattern, and the finished pullover will have 3/4-length sleeves.  One thing I have discovered is that it is very hard to knit a lace pattern and watch some of my favorite Korean dramas at the same time, because I lose my place in the pattern when I look up to read the subtitles.

The lace portions will be knitted by hand and then hung on the machine for the rest of the bodices and sleeves.