What's on my needles

After a very long absence, I'm back. It's not that I haven't been knitting - in fact, I've been working on lots of jumpers, all from vintage patterns, of course.

At the moment, I am working on this - see if you can recognise the vintage pattern just from the colours.

I was very pleased that I happened to have these shades lying around.

It is Starring Stripes, from the fab zilredloh, who has kindly shared some lovely patterns on her blog. It is from Stitchcraft, one of the loveliest women's magazines of the period. I had been eyeing it up for ages, and eventually cast on a couple of months ago, right before we moved house. I think the stress of moving drove me to abandon a very time-consuming lace jumper in favour of a new and exciting knit, to take my mind off things. I love the thrill of starting a new jumper (except the ribbing).

 

It is knit sideways, another big draw for those who tire quickly of ribbing. The welt is picked up along the straight edge, so you don't get out of it, but at least it can be done at the end, when you can really see the whole jumper coming together. I have finished the back and am halfway through the front. It's a very straightforward knit, just stocking stitch and garter, with shaping for the armholes and neckline. Of course that didn't stop me forgetting where I had increased/decreased, so much ripping back was done.

The wools I'm using are:

Bairns-wear Scotch Knitting 3 ply in Fawn or Natural (vintage yarn, only 2ozs required, we'll see!)

Quince & Co Tern (a fingering? weight) in shade 144 Bouy (yellow)

Jawoll superwash 4 ply by Lang yarns in shade 198 Spring Onion (green)

Jaeger Matchmaker 4 ply in shade 758 (brown)

Nature Spun by Brown Sheep Company sportweight in Pomegranate (rust)

I am using up odd balls of wool left over from other projects, although I am slightly concerned about the different weights. The pattern gives the measurements as 33 - 35 in bust. At the moment the back measures at least 18ins, so  blocking will be interesting.