My friend Hélène (@hportmanteau on IG) strongly suggested that I knit the Field Day cardigan by Ozetta so I took a look and really liked the style and shape. I might have left it for a while except Jenny (@joeandroxy on IG) had given me a bag of beautiful Sublime baby cashmere merino silk DK yarn in a silvery grey, which seemed to be the perfect yarn for this cardigan. Yardages were checked and I had more than enough, so began swatching. I could not get the gauge correct, so I finished up going down a couple of sizes for one needle and three sizes for the other. It still wasn’t right, but I figured it would be near enough. Time would tell!

This is a pattern that had a lot of new to me techniques and I really enjoyed knitting it. It’s basically knitted in one piece so there was a lot of cardigan to hump around at the end, but the lack of sewing up made up for it!

Part way through knitting the body I began to realise that my cardigan was going to be longer than the pattern as I followed the number of rows, rather than the measurements. This meant that I used more yarn. A lot more yarn! I began to fret about this, as it was clear I wouldn’t have enough. The yarn I was using had been discontinued and I’d never match the dye lot anyway, so I set about finding something that would coordinate. I visited Calico and Ivy, a local shop, and they had the replacement yarn (Sirdar) in the same colour. The match was perfect and I can’t tell where I added in the new yarn. I could not believe it, that never happens!

I finished it whilst at our holiday place and didn’t want to block it there, but was desperate to wear it, so out came the steamer (complete with a repair to the water reservoir as I dropped it).

I knew exactly what buttons I wanted – little ball ones, each a different colour, but then I could only find three instead of four, gah! A hunt in my stash revealed these rather fabulous buttons. They are ceramic and I have no idea where they came from. Were they a gift? Did I buy them on my travels? Whatever, they are gorgeous and I love them.

A close up reveals how much this cardigan needs to be blocked!

I immediately put it on to take photos, so forgive the shoes. I’m also wearing a Blueprints for Sewing Geodesic sweater I made in 2017 from amazing linen and silk knit from Knitwit (it has pockets!) and my $10 tracksuit pants (the ones with the $10 in the pocket).

We had an excursion to Bridgetown, another lovely country town (and I note the quilting and wool shop is gone – sob!) and I wore the cardigan thinking I’d get some photos there, but everytime I thought about it the rain began, so here we are, back in the bush!

I’m wearing it with dark grey wool ponte Jalie eleanore jeans, and a very fine merino long sleeved tee that was given to me as it was moth eaten (now it’s embellished). The cardigan is really warm and even though it’s raining in some of these photos I wasn’t feeling at all cold.

The cardigan has dropped shoulders which I don’t usually care for, but it does mean that layering underneath is easy. Layering over the top is more troublesome though. The cardigan is supposed to be a cropped length but due to the aforementioned gauge problems it did turn out a bit longer. I rather like it though.

This cardigan will get a lot of use, the colour is so neutral it will go with everything.

Finally a photo of Miss G with her grandfather – he often has a spinner on his head!