FO- Placed Cable Aran

About a month ago, I had the brilliant foresight to cast on for a warm, comfy sweater. I'm now wallowing in self-congratulatory glee.

I'm still working through my stash alphabetically, so I grabbed some Cascade 220 from the bin. It's the workhorse yarn of the craft world. It's not super-soft, but it's durable and has good stitch definition, and comes in oodles of colors. You can use it on just about anything that requires a worsted-weight yarn. Plus, it's affordable- You can find it for around $7, and if you hunt for a sale you might pay $4. I used 5 skeins for my sweater total, so you can feasibly create a sweater for the price of a single Andrew Jackson.



This is the Lapis Blue Heather color. It's not quite navy, with quite a bit of purple and greens worked in. It give the garment an interesting tonal effect without being too loud or clown barfy.

I was looking for a big, comfy sweater pattern and, with some modifications, settled on the Placed Cable Aran from the Fall 2007 Interweave Knits. I didn't care for the funnel neck (nothing with the word "funnel" in it is remotely sexy) and I thought it distracted from the lovely cables on the front and back.



I found the yarn a tad splitty, and it did bleed quite a bit when I soaked it. Otherwise, I'm happy with it. I feel a bit of a prickle when it's right up to my skin, but its not so bad that I find it unbearable. I always wear a cami or a thin tee under sweaters anyway, so it's only really noticeable around my neck and wrist. I know that bothers a lot of people, but I'm fairly tolerant of slightly scratchy wool.



I didn't like the rolled hem at the bottom edge, so I added an inch of 4x4 rib to keep it from rolling up.



This sweater has basically no shaping and no sleeve caps- they are drop shoulders. It's just a big, roomy comfy warm. Really, it's just what a bitterly cold and blustery February ordered.



Instead of making a giant funnel neck, i picked up stitches and made about an inch of a roll-neck. It lets the cable design pop a bit more.

I'm hoping to squeeze in one more big winter sweater project before the weather turns warm, and then silks and cottons and linen will be on the brain. Last week was fashion week in New York and you see a whole lot of people dressed skimpily and suffering in the cold for the sake of pleasing the fashion gods. I'm not quite that bold and I'm still buried under layers and layers of woolies for the time being.

The specs:

This is part of my A-Z Stashdown Challenge- C is for Cascade (I still have some B is for Berocco Ultra Silk in my stash, but that is my first springtime sweater knit project). I used 5 skeins of Cascade 220 Heathers in Lapis Blue- about 1100 yards- and US size 7 needles. It's completely mindless, movie-theater knitting until you get to the yoke, and then it's almost completely mindless knitting-group knitting from there.