Vintage knitting pattern - finally finished

After many a blog post about the jumper I've been knitting for at least the past 6 months, it brings me great pleasure to finally blog about it being finished!

I had only ever knitted one jumper before and it was in one colour of super chunky yarn so knitted up really quickly. Then I started to discover vintage patterns and there was something about the old fashioned pictures and nostalgia that made me want to knit one up. Little did I know how dam complicated it would be! Blood, sweat and lots of tears have literally gone into this jumper.

I choose this pattern. A fitted jumper with a modest neck line which used the fair isle technique to create the wavy stripes.

First problem I hit was all the measurements were in the old UK system. Sizes 10 and 13 needles and the amount of yarn was in ozs. Google soon resolved that hurdle for me. Next up it recommended 3ply yarn. Most of what I could find in 3 ply was baby stuff so after a discussion with my Mum I went for 4ply, did a tension square and adjusted my needle size so it corresponded to the tension in the pattern. I was ready to go.

I know we all learn and read differently but the description of the pattern repeat was literally boggling my mind, especially when I had to start accounting for the increases.

My first major stumbling block hit..... I got onto ravelry and found a local knitting group and went along in the hope of some much needed help. By the end of the night I had been shown how to use stitch markers to make increasing while maintaining the pattern a heck of a lot easier and off I trotted home to write a grid of the pattern repeat so I didn't have to read the complicated written version.

After that it was plain sailing...just for a while. Until I ran out of yarn and the extra stuff I bought was a from a different dye lot, thankfully its not too noticeable. Then I knitted a whole sleeve wrong because I forgot a crucial increase row and it turned out just a bit too small...doh!

But last Thursday I finally finished it, with all its little imperfections, I can truly say I gave it my best shot and I'm proud of it anyway.

One thing I didn't realise is, is that as people went Simon Cowell stylee with their high waistbands back then, the top is a bit short on the body. Ah well...guess I need to embrace the full retro style and get something high waisted myself to go with it. I'm thinking maybe a Colette pattern Ginger skirt....

Ginger skirt by Colette Patterns