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Katherine Hepburn cardigan

I have a couple of ends to sew in on T's fatigue and buttons to find. Then I need to wash and/or press it to finish it off.

On Friday night I couldn't see well enough to graft the ribbed back yoke sections together (yuck, that was a job and a half) so I started the Katherine Hepburn cardigan from Lace Style. I'm using Rowan Yorkshire Tweed 4-ply in 'Lustre'.

I decided to start with a sleeve to see if I like doing the stitch and also to check that the gauge is working. I seem to be OK on both counts. I'm really enjoying knitting it. It has the right amount of complexity and repetitiveness that makes it easy to dispense with the pattern but still enjoy the manoevres of yo's and cables. I'm cabling without a cable needle and it's really easy and quick.

Nearly done

I'm so near the finish now, but have slowed down because I'm a little bit bored with dark brown and also not sure that the end result is going to be quite as I hoped. Never mind, it's not too bad and the recipient has tried it on a couple of times and so I know it does fit. In the top picture I've pinned the neck together. You can see that the left shoulder saddle is finished to the neckline and the right-hand saddle is just creeping in.

Here's the way the top of the saddle met the diagonals of the placket:

I had hoped to be able somehow to carry on the lines of the placket but I just couldn't work out how. I modified the decreases from the saddle slightly to give the illusion that the ribs coming up from the placket were going over the horizontal ribs of the shoulder, but without huge success. What has worked quite well is changing from stocking stitch to 2x2 ribbing for the shoulder. The ribbing will carry on round the back of the neck. It's a bit of a jigsaw puzzle at the moment, but I think it will work!

I'm rather distracted by an invitation to join the Twined Knitting group on Ravelry. I've always wanted to learn how to do that!

I've been monogamous (nearly)

I promised myself and the blog that I wouldn't swatch my newly acquired Classy until I had finished T's fatigue jersey. Well I haven't, but I may have done a teeny tiny swatch of Yorkshire Tweed 4-ply:

This is going to be a Katherine Hepburn cardigan from Lace Style. I saw a lovely version on Ravelry done in Yorkshire Tweed 4-ply and it so happened that Janette had a special offer on this colour (Lustre) and Barley (which I went back and ordered later). The combination of little cables and small lace pattern is lovely, I think. Yes, I know the cables bend different ways top and bottom - I was practising cabling without a cable needle! (And, yes, I realised when I'd finished that I had done the wrong double decrease - it will be centred in the real thing.)

But I have made really good progress on the fatigue. I'm doing a seamless hybrid raglan with the shirt yoke variation from Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitting Workshop. I have made a body and two sleeves and have knitted them together into a yoke, decreasing at the raglan seam lines every three rows as instructed. Now I have split the front for the placket, which means I'm no longer working in the round. I was pleased to be able to work out a double purl decrease which seems to match the knit ones OK.

I had to pause for thought about how the diagonal sides of the placket and the raglan shaping were going to interact. I've decided just to go for it and see what happens - fudging is my middle name!