Cranberry Cables

or my almost-Christmas cardigan...

I desperately wanted a new cardigan to wear for Christmas and I tried so hard to knit fast enough to get this one finished. Technically it was, as I sewed the last button in place at 11.55pm on 24th December. However the finished cardigan needed blocking again so it sadly wasn't ready for its debut on Christmas Day.

The pattern is the Lady's Jumper cardigan from A Stitch in Time vol 2. It was a lovely pattern to knit. I was drawn to it because of the cable pattern and the square neckline. This is a design where the tension is crucial as the pattern uses different needle sizes to grade up for some of the sizes because of the large pattern repeat. I found that my knitted pieces grew significantly when they were blocked. At first I was worried my tension was too tight but the knitting really opened up once it was wet and pinned out to dry.

The recommended yarn is Excelana but I used Rowan Pure Wool 4 ply in Port (discontinued colourway) as I already had it in the stash. I got 10 balls for £18 in the sale a few months ago. I think I used 8 balls, maybe a little of the 9th.

Here's a little close up of the cable pattern and the buttons. I have lightened this photo slightly so you can see the pattern a bit more clearly.

The buttons were from John Lewis and cost £4. I knew I was unlikely to find a good colour match so I planned to use plain black buttons. However this dark silver looked so much better. And I felt that they seemed a little more in keeping with the vintage style.