I’ve been busy!
I’m a very cold blooded person, so I have quite a range of jumpers and cardigans, many of which get very frequent wear all year round. Not long ago I acquired a booklet of Rowan patterns, and in there was Solange. I could do with a cardigan like that, I thought.
The booklet was called Rowan from Kids to Teens. Now, thankfully, I am not a teen. Whilst I am happy in almost every way to no longer be anywhere near my teenage years, it does mean I can’t get away without altering the knitting pattern! The largest size published was 14-16. I’m not hugely bigger than I was as a teenager, so I just worked out the difference between each size, and created a ‘one size up’ pattern. It was simple really – just two extra stitches per row in the back, and one extra on each side of the front.
Once I had decided that, I went on the internet and lucked onto an eBay auction, an unopened pack of 10 balls of Rowan Felted Tweed Chunky (colour: sand), with no bids and ten minutes to run. It’s not often that happens to me! The wool arrived and it was gorgeous. Soft and lovely. The only problem was that it was slightly musty. It had obviously been stored for a while. I put it away for a month or two as I was busy with other things. Utterly unthinkingly I put it away in the box I had also stored my lavender in. When a pulled it out last week, it smelt wonderful. Serendipity again!
Here’s the finished item:
You can see in this picture another alteration I made. Once I had finished the first pattern repeat I decided to make the cardigan longer than the pattern said. It’s much more ‘me’. I did four pattern repeats instead of three.
This was a very dangerous strategy. I was literally counting stitches to make sure I would have enough wool to finish. It was a really close thing. The sleeve caps were supposed to have a little sleeve of four rows of rib attached. I just picked up the stitches and cast them off again, missing out the four rows. Even then, I had to cast off the last three stitches using the end cut off after sewing up the shoulder seams. There were enough odd ends to complete the making up, including sewing on the button. Just enough. The button is only held on with two loops of wool, because there wasn’t a long enough end to do a third stitch. It was that close. I think it must be the most efficient thing I’ve ever made!
Tags: Felted Tweed Chunky, Knitting, Rowan, Solange