WIP: Playful Stripes Cardigan for Penelope

Remember WIP shares? Maybe they’re still happening somewhere, but for years my blog feed has been taken over by FOs – beautiful, carefully photographed ones—but still, no works in progress.

In any case, let’s pretend it’s 2006 again! So, grab your flip phone and let's go...

There’s no dirty mirror selfie with the ubiquitous giant flash, but it’s a crappy WIP shot nonetheless

For my niece’s 2^nd birthday, my sister requested a knit sweater to replace the couple of baby sweaters she’s outgrown. I warned her I was a little backlogged, which she totally understood. Not sure she realized it would be ohh… six plus months before a sweater would appear, but better late than never, right? Did I mention this was back in July?

In our house, there’s a lot of love for the somehow unblogged Ella Funt I made for Greta back when I was pregnant and was in constant wardrobe rotation until she was at least three. Maybe four. I wasn’t messing around when I said there was a lot of love! To try and recapture some of that magic, I selected a cardigan pattern with a nice, colorful yoke and a smallish gauge.

Ella Funt in Action

I found Playful Stripes in my usual fashion – the Ravelry pattern browser. I add a couple filters for age, sweater type, gauge (I knew I wanted either sport or dk), and added colorwork OR stranded and then sort by most popular because I have a high level of trust in my fellow raveler. This is probably basic, but I’m always interested in other knitters’ processes, so now you have mine.

I ordered some Cascade 220 Superwash Sport because a) it was the right gauge, b) it’s superwash, c) I liked their color palette, d) it’s affordable, and e) Cascade is always a sure bet for me. Separately – I had ordered right before our 10^th anniversary trip to Costa Rica so I’d have some moderately-sized travel knitting and it arrived just in the knick of time. STRESS.

I’ve been making a few mods along the way – mostly instead of doing a picot edge I’m opting for a traditional 2x2 rib and I was one color short for the yolk, so I improvised the color scheme a bit.

I’m in the home stretch now with just one button band and blocking to complete. Gotta make sure Penelope gets in some wear before winter is over, right?

Separately on a happy note – I haven’t been knitting nearly as much as I used to and the girls’ interest is definitely piqued. Both are asking when they can expect their sweaters. Win!

Comments

Box Bag Tutorial

A couple of you inquired whether I made this pouch based on a tutorial or pattern and if not, if I could provide one. Ask and you shall receive! I've learned so much from tutorials out on the internets, I'm happy I can give back for once. Bear with me, though. This is my first tutorial and creating one is much tougher than I imagined. I give anyone who's created a tutorial tons of credit! I feel obligated to preface this by admitting I'm a trial and error sewer. I make things up as I go along and test things during the sewing process to see if I'm achieving my desired results. Also, I taught myself to sew just playing around on a sewing machine, so I don't always use text book methods. Just wanted come clean before you all jump into this and so you have a little understanding if I did something in a backass way. The pattern works, which is all that matters to me! Because of the versatility of this pattern, my instructions can be used more as guidelines. You can ...

Done: Weekender Bag

Happy 2007! I hope you all had a good time ringing in the new year. I have some lofty goals for this upcoming year and some musings on last year, but that's for another post because-- Finally! (the top looks kind of bumpy. I think it looks crisper when I'm holding it.) Pattern. Weekender Bag by Amy Butler Exterior Fabric. Amy Butler, Sunbloom Collection Cording Fabric. Amy Bulter, Charm Collection Lining. Khaki Fabric from Joann's I relied a lot on the tips from other bloggers who made this bag and wanted to give something back to the blogging community, so here are my.... 10 THOUGHTS & TIPS ON THE WEEKENDER 1. Dominating the cording. As the layers increased in the sewing, keeping the cording sandwiched in place became challenging. I had the best luck pinning the fabric together parallel to the fabric edge, rather than perpendicular. Stopping so often to remove pins got a little annoying, but was better than ripping and resewing. 2. Topstitching = Enemy number 1. I d...

WIP: February (Little) Lady Sweater

I’m generally not one to reknit patterns, reread books or rewatch movies. That said, once in awhile I come across one of the aforementioned that warrants repeating. And repeating. And repeating. I can’t get enough. It’s the reason I’ve watched National Lampoons Christmas Vacation 400 times, memorized most episodes of Sex and the City and Seinfeld and it’s the reason there is always at least one Elizabeth Zimmermann’s baby sweater on the needles. Mostly the Baby Surprise Jacket (the surprise gets me every time. Seriously, how does that strange stretch of fabric become a sweater?!), but also the February Baby (or Lady!) Sweater . There’s just something about that gull stitch pattern that makes this sweater fly off the needles. There’s enough to it to keep my interest, but it’s not so taxing I can’t multitask or memorize the pattern. And the garter stitch yoke / lace body combination makes the sweater appropriate for any season, isn’t too girly, and has that little extr...

Drago[knit]fly

Search This Blog