Blood-Sweat and Tears!

I'm not quite sure I can express the relieve I feel that this cardigan is done. But I'll try. Knitting was the easy part. If you are partial to a glass of wine (I'm not) you would have needed a whole bottle to get going. Me? I've knit quickly a pair of socks to calm my nerves (and cleaned a little) and played with the dogs and listened to music and cleaned out my car and organized my books alphabetical (just kidding) ... Anything to avoid this nightmare. I've found a video online to learn how to do the mattress stitch. They show it with a piece of stockinet stitch, which looked easy enough. My sweater was not knit in stockinet stitch. Nevertheless, I think I did pretty good. (I don't care if you don't think so)


The picture to the right comes close to the actual color. You would think the outside light might give you a better result, but no. This cardigan is for my daughter Hannah. She's picked it out of the book "Knitting Nature" by Norah Gaughan, I think by now everybody knows that book. She also picked the color and the buttons. I never read all the instructions before I start and so I didn't know that the buttons where supposed to be 1 ". Mine are 1 1/2 " big. When I knit the button hole the one YO made me laugh. How the hell ..... I did 3 YO's in the end and the buttons get trough the holes but with a little force. Oh well.
I made a mistake in the pattern on the back, if you want to look for it, be my guest. I didn't want to tink back a few rows and no way was I letting all the sts off the needles!
The pattern was very well written. I did everything (except the button holes) exactly as in the book. But I found a mistake in the pattern. On page 14, Back: Shape Sleeve: it says to work even for 13"" which would make the back 3 " longer. Stop at 10" because you are going to knit 3" ribbing and that makes up the whole length.

So now to the specifics:
pattern: asymmetrical Cardigan "Knitting Nature" by Norah Gaughan
Size: petit
yarn: Gems Sapphire Chunky Weight, 100% merino wool, 1 skein = 100gr= 103 yds; I needed 8 balls
needles: 5.5mm for ribbing, 6mm for body
error on page 14: Back: Shape Sleeve: work even for 13" (do not) work only 10 ".

It was also the first time I used a chart for the pattern or lets say I could read it.
There's only one thing left to say : I hope it fits Hannah!


These are the socks I made to avoid starting the sewing together. I used Gems Pearl yarn, self dyed it (in June I think). I never get them to be twins. The better looking sock is on top. It did stripe, the second one did a lot of pooling, but I don't care too much. They are for myself and as long as they'll keep me warm....

Helga: I would like to answer but I don't know how to get in touch with you. Maybe you could leave me an e-mail address. You can use my e-mail in my profile to write to me. Thanks.

To conclude this tale - it was a CHALLENGE to make this cardigan. I'm not sure I'll repeat this experience any time soon.

Somebody asked for a link to see how the mattress stitch is made, have a look here http://www.knittinghelp.com/knitting/basic_techniques/misc.php