Real life knitting

There is fantasy knitting – the sort of pieces that you aspire to, that intrigue you with their construction, beguile you with lace and/or cable patterns, or tantalise you with colour – and then there is knitting reality. The reality that says that what you are most likely to wear has clean, classic lines, a neutral colour that goes with everything and, perhaps most importantly, miles and miles of stocking stitch.

BK (before knitting), I had several long knitted cardigans in my wardrobe. Most of them I’d bought while overseas, and they were perfect over jeans or dresses to add just enough warmth to a Scandinavian spring or early autumn. Here, they were midwinter must-haves.

Since becoming a knitter, however, I’ve spent a lot of knitting time on flirty little cardigans and lovely fitted sweaters. The long cardi – this staple of my wardrobe – has, however, been sadly neglected.

Until now.

Now I have Annikki.

The original pattern is very traditional – knitted in pieces and seamed. Given that I knit this in Berocco Ultra Alpaca, which is a wool/alpaca blend, I did opt to seam the back and fronts to give the garment more structure. I couldn’t resist tweaking it just a little though. I shaped the shoulders with short rows and “seamed” them with a three-needle bind-off, and I knit the sleeves top-down using short-row sleeve caps.

Unfortunately, Annikki was finished about a week too late for Brisbane’s true winter weather. We’ve edged into spring now and, failing a sudden cold spell, it’s likely that it will be put away until next year.

But I guess that just gives me something to look forward to!

In the meantime, I’ve cast on a couple of cute little spring sweaters…

14. September 2012 by purldragon
Categories: Knitting | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 4 comments

Comments (4)

  1. LOVE! Although I prefer to think of these as “zen knitting.” Gorgeous piece though. Probably tedious to knit in parts, but really lovely on you.

    Cheers!
    Daisy

    • Actually, the only (slightly) tedious part was the seaming, but I did most of that at my favourite yarn store which made it more bearable. Thanks for your lovely compliment!

  2. Hi,
    Love the sweater on you. I found it on Ravelry but can’t figure out how to get the pattern. Where did you buy it?

    Thanks!
    Rebecca

Leave a Reply to Rebecca Cancel reply

Required fields are marked *