And it’s finished! (Not blocked, but finished.)

This was a kit of the Quintessential Cardigan designed by Churchmouse Yarns & Teas. The yarn is Jody Long Alba in the colourway, Moss. I knit the body two inches longer than the pattern specifies. (There’s another blog post about it here.)

I quite like the sweater and it fits well. The colour is great and I love the tweedy flicks in the yarn. It was a bit tedious seaming it up, but that’s always the way – and yes, this yarn was almost as inclined to snap as Rowan Felted Tweed. One great thing is that the sleeves fit perfectly into the armscyes. Yay!

Here’s a detail shot of the front buttonhole band, which has slipped stitches on the wrong side.

The colour’s not very true in this pic – the wool really is that lovely lime shade. In this shot, though, you can see that my miscalculation, the one that made the last button before the collar band a little higher, isn’t really that bad once the buttons are sewn on.

I don’t love this slipped stitch on the band. It looks too different from all the other ribbing, although I understand that it’s intended to keep the button bands from being too long. Another way to avoid that is to pick up the stitches for the button band after the fronts are done and knit them sideways.

It took 3.4 balls of yarn or just under 1200 yards.

I do have another kit in Plum so will be making a second one, with a few changes.
• Since I lengthened the sweater, the waist ribbing falls at my hip, which isn’t ideal. I’ll change that to a garter stitch hem or a moss stitch hem instead and let it be a bit swingy.
• The cuffs are on the narrow side – it’s fine when they’re worn down, but I always push up my sleeves. I’ll make them a bit wider on the next one. I’ll work them in whatever stitch I decide to use instead of the waist ribbings, too. (I don’t love ribbing on my sweaters.)
• Because of that slipped rib stitch on the button bands (which is over 7 stitches), the buttons aren’t centered on the band. You make the buttonhole on stitches 5 and 6. This kinda drives me nuts. 🙂 When I work the button bands in another stitch – to match the hems – I’ll put the buttonholes in the middle of the band, over stitches 3, 4, 5, which will also make them a little bit bigger. It’s snug to get these buttons through the holes, but I don’t think smaller buttons would look good.

Overall, I’m pleased. It’s a very basic sweater, but the colour keeps it from looking frumpy.

I really want to cast on the plum version immediately, but am trying to finish a project first. We’ll see how I manage with that goal!