As some people guessed from my Monday post, I’m knitting my mum a red sweater for Christmas. I had so much fun coming up with an imaginary outfit for Novak, and I thought I’d do it again for this sweater. The pattern is Kim Hargreaves’s Evie, and I’m using Rowan Cashcotton 4 ply in Red Hot. Of course, I won’t be keeping this sweater, but if I did keep it, this is how I’d wear it. Like most of my outfits, this one is very simple. I’d pair the bright red cardigan with a gorgeous black-and-white Mociun dress, black tights and black oxfords.
{Cardigan from Kim Hargreaves, dress from Mociun, shoes from The Horse}
The new Twist Collective was released today, and to my relief, I don’t want anything in it. There are some beautiful patterns as usual, but nothing that would fit into my wardrobe or lifestyle. Instead, I’ve been carrying on my Christmas knitting. I have big plans this year, and apparently they have a new colour scheme.
If you follow me on Ravelry, you’ll know that I’ve already made some more progress on these knits. Hopefully I’ll have some new things to show you all later this week.
I haven’t been wearing jeans lately, but I’m loving knitting up my dad’s sweater with denim yarn, even though it’s been turning my fingers blue. If you haven’t used denim before, it shrinks 10-15% in the first wash, and then fades beautiful as you wear and love it. I love the transformation, as seen in the picture below of one washed and one unwashed sleeve (no, that’s not some trick of the light or camera).
While the deep indigo colour is beautiful to begin with, I think it takes on a much more interesting character when it’s washed. What you can’t see in the picture is that the fabric, which originally was quite loosely knit, also firms up beautifully in the shrinking process. Cotton often gets a bad wrap in the knitting community because it can be inflexible and hard to knit with, but I haven’t had a problem with the denim. At the end of the day, I think the results are worth the list discomfort anyway.
On a side note, the Elann yarn I’m using recommends a hot wash then round in a hot dryer. We don’t have a dryer, the hot water tap on our washing machine is broken, and I’m much too lazy to go to the laundromat. Instead, I improvised, and soaked the finished pieces in the hottest tap water I could get before chucking them in a cold wash. The yarn bled like crazy in the hot water, and the pieces shrunk up as expected.
Something that I’ve been meaning to blog about this the beginning of the year is NaKniSweMoDo — National Knit a Sweater a Month Dodecathon. Basically, you knit a sweater a month for an entire year for twelve finished sweaters by December. In January, I was in love with sweater-knitting, and I knit several sweaters in quick succession. I finished six sweaters in the first four months of the year before I quickly lost interest and abandoned the project. I’ve blogged two of the sweaters as FOs, but I never got around to blogging about the project.
With my newly revived interest in knitting, I’m planning to get back to it. Right now, I have six finished sweaters, six sweaters in various stages of completeness, one newly cast on sweater and two sweaters that I have yet to receive the yarn for. Yes, that adds up to more than twelve. Hopefully, I’ll be able to squeeze out a dozen sweaters before the 31st, but it’ll be tight. Wish me luck!
Last year, I managed to go handmade on all my Christmas presents. This year, I probably won’t go quite that far (my mum asked specifically for a moleskine planner), but I’ve got a few handmade gifts up my sleeve. And since stores keep reminding me that there’s less than two months left until Christmas, I figured I may as well start early.
First up: my dad. As he keeps reminding me, I’ve never given him a handknit (when you live in Singapore, you don’t need many sweaters). This year, I decided it was time. He’s got a storebought cotton sweaters that he wears regularly, but it’s cream and has gotten a little bit worn out over the years. So, I enlisted my mum’s help in getting the measurements of the sweater and dug up one of my favourite man patterns.
Kim Hargreaves’s Beau has a similar shape to my dad’s favourite sweater, and I think it’ll be great on him. My dad has no need for wool sweaters, so I decided to go for a cotton yarn. I love the way denim yarn looks as it fades, and I thought it’d be a great for a rugged, nautical man-sweater. I ordered a bunch of it in the dark indigo colour from Elann, and I’m loving how it’s knitting up so far.
There’s been a few hiccups, but I’m back on track. I’m sure I’ll share more details as the project progresses.
{Image of Beau from Rowan Vintage Knits, other photos by me}
