I’ve had this sweater finished for some time now but haven’t worn it before for some reason and therefore haven’t blogged it. It’s cold now, so the situation has been remedied.

I made this for the One Year One Outfit challenge set by Nicki from Thisismoonlight. It is the same pattern as this sweater, but as it is knitted top down, I cast on fewer stitches at the beginning to make the neck higher.

It is the simplest pattern, cast on and knit in the round, doing increases for the shoulders, and doing the sleeves separately (obviously). My sleeves on the previous one were a bit baggy so I did some serious stitch reduction as I knitted the sleeves, but they were still too loose round the wrists so I unpicked a bit and made them tighter. They are now pretty near to perfect.

When knitting in the round you are really creating a spiral, so when using a contrasting wool, the beginning and end of the rows are jagged. I did all the fancy knitting into the row below to hide this, but also used buttons to cover up the edges. In keeping with the One Year One Outfit theme of having only locally produced materials, I picked up some Banksia twigs and got Archie to make me buttons (blogged here), and here they are in situ. I was a bit anxious that the buttons wouldn’t blend well with the wool, but I think I got away with it! Looking at this photo I am wondering whether I need an extra one at the very top and the very bottom. Opinions?

I wore it to go camping which is why I look pretty casual. Most of this sweater was knitted in the car on various camping trips, so it seems appropriate that I actually wear it camping.

In a nutshell:

Jumper is made with a free pattern I got at the Australian Alpaca Store in The Rocks, Sydney. The wool is from Corriedale sheep in WA and hand spun. I bought it at Bilby Yarns in Willagee. The buttons are Banksia and made by my son, Archie.