FO-Jeffrey Cardigan
After a few months I finally have a finished object - the Jeffrey Cardigan. This pattern was published in Nomadic Knits Issue Twelve: Utah/Nevada. The pattern is titled Jeffrey Pine by Julee Mackessy. Overall I give the pattern a B-. It is a little confusing in the way it is written. It took me numerous cast-ons to get the reversible cable to work. In addition as many of the few reviews it has received something seems off on the sleeves. I followed the pattern for the size I was knitting. I could hardly get the sleeves on and off. I had to frog and used the numbers for a size 3xs the one I made for the body.
Eventually after ripping out I ended up rewriting the cable pattern out and using that as a guide rather than the very skimpy directions in the pattern. Once I did that they went along swimmingly until I had all the pieces joined. It turned out I needed to reverse engineer the cables on one side due to knitting in the flat (the sweater is never knit in the round). Nothing mentioned in the pattern about how to do this. Not a pattern for a beginner knitter. Below is a close up of the reversible cables.
I did reach out to the pattern designer who eventually responded not to really answer my questions about how to complete a stitch but just to state she was sorry I was experiencing issues with the pattern. Nice, but not all that helpful. I sent a reply email but never heard another thing.
Love the reversible cables (once I got the hang of them). I have done cables before but did not even know reversibles were an option.
The yarn is from Fiber for the People in her Merino Rambouillet Nevada Born and Shorn line. This yarn is from sheep raised in Nevada. The colorway is Greco and is even more stunning in real life. The yarn is a sport weight and a dream to knit with. It is a little on the rustic side (you find tiny bits of hay matter when knitting:). It washes and blocks like a dream. I highly recommend her yarn. When washed you get absolutely no color run off in the water.
All in all I am happy with the final product. It took me just about 6 months to knit this sweater. Of course you know I was not working on it exclusively. Now I just have to wait for cooler weather to wear my newest hand knit.