I’m almost at the finish line of my Penguono sweater by Stephen West. It’s been quite an adventure and I’m happy with it. I don’t think this pattern would suit everyone, with its crazy colours, but it was a very enjoyable project. I was happy I was making a dent (albeit a small one) in my stash, and hardly bought any extra yarn. In the end, I bought a couple of skeins for it but I used them up almost entirely, so I felt they were a good purchase. The majority of the yarn was from my stash and I used up some that I’d been holding onto for years for that ‘one special project’, which turned out to be this one. For example, three skeins of Green Mountain Spinnery yarn in a colourway called Amethyst that I bought years ago at the Twist yarn festival made their way into the project. I double-stranded that with a sweet silk-blend lavender yarn by Sweet Georgia that I’ve had for ages and have used in various other projects, but still somehow had a couple of partial skeins left, so I used quite a bit in this sweater.
I’ll insert a couple of photos of the finished object (FO) into this post, which show off all the colourway choices I made both for the front and the back. I’m currently knitting the second sleeve and I’m realizing that they don’t completely match. I didn’t work it out mathematically, so that’s what happens, but it’s that sort of project. The only modification I made on purpose (I’ll get to the ones I made by accident) was to lengthen the sleeves. I didn’t think short sleeves really suited a sweater knitted in such heavy yarn. On the advice of one of my knitting friends I’m not knitting them full length, so they don’t drag into my soup, etc. They are meant to be a bit wide, which is always inconvenient in longer sleeves, so I did some decreases which weren’t in the pattern, but I’m not tapering them as much as a normal sweater, because the more relaxed fit is much more in the style of the sweater. Everything about the sweater is oversized, except the length, which is not exactly cropped but not super long, as you can see.
As for the accidental modifications, or “mistakes” if you will, there were many, but luckily the pattern is very forgiving. I found myself with the wrong stitch count a few times, but no matter— that’s what knit-two-together is for! I messed up the seed stitch a bunch, but again, if here and there I have two knits together instead of a knit-purl, nobody will be the wiser. Or, in my Mom’s immortal words, “A man on a galloping horse would never notice!”
In Stephen West’s version of this sweater, his collar stands up quite nicely around his neck, and mine doesn’t for some reason. The back piece was a bit too wide to begin with, which means the shawl collar spreads out a bit more than optimal, so maybe that’s why it’s missing that jaunty look. Anyhoo! Moving on..
Update: I’ve now completed the whole sweater, including weaving in ends! Luckily, I wove some in as I went, so I didn’t have as many as you’d imagine at the end of such a project. I used the “Weavin’ Stephen” method that Mr. West demonstrates in his entertaining videos. I’m very pleased with the sweater, and I think it’ll be great for those chilly fall evenings.
The next sweater project is going to be a striped sweater (probably a cardigan) I’ll be knitting with the gorgeous yarn I bought in Vermont recently when I was there visiting a friend. The name of the yarn company was “Vivian’s Orchard” and the people who ran it are no longer in business, so these will be collector’s items (right??), plus with that name, I couldn’t resist! I’m toying with the idea of figuring out a pattern for this myself, rather than buying one. It depends on whether I can find a pattern that matches my imagination, and whether I’m feeling energetic and creative. We’ll see!
Thanks for following me and I hope you enjoyed this little deviation from my usual mental wanderings.
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