Winter Means Knitting

Let me just start by saying, I am never going to win any prizes for speed knitting.  This project was started close to a year ago when winter projects were still on my mind.  With the beginning of the warm weather though, it lay around gathering dust until I picked up my needles again when autumn started creeping up on me.

The pattern I used was from a Sabrina magazine that I picked up at my local bookshop in Autumn 2012.  I did have a small issue with the sizing though as the yarn that they suggest I use was not the actual way we measure yarn in New Zealand.  After a little bit of pattern comparison, I decided on a size that I thought would fit with my chosen wool.  It is a 5 ply 100% European wool that I picked up at Lincraft in a sale last year.  It was of lovely quality despite it's economical price of a mere $27 for the entire cardigan, including a sizeable amount of leftovers.

I did find with the pattern that the sleeves were abnormally tight which would have meant not wearing anything underneath.  I prefer to wear an extra layer under a wool cardigan to avoid any possible itch.  I had nearly completed the first sleeve when I found this little gem out, so was forced to undo my good work, putting this project back further.

 I was lucky enough to find two perfectly sized buttons in my stash that matched the cardigan perfectly.

I completed this cardigan a week ago and already it has had two outings.  I had forgotten how cozy a hand knitted wool cardigan is for the winter.  I used to knit for myself all of the time pre children, but hand knitting fell out of favour for quite a few years, so my knitting efforts were reserved for keeping the kids warm as opposed to myself.  

I am pleased I have chosen to pick up the needles again and it has certainly come in handy over the weekend when I was stuck on the couch,  after an emergency route canal on Saturday morning in response to the worse tooth ache and infection I have ever experienced.  My knitting proved to be a great companion to the tv and antibiotics that have been my life since then.