About A Sweater

I woke up this morning, got out of bed...and I was cold.  Usually I wake up warm every morning.  I used to be REALLY warm in the morning, like a sweaty mess warm but I'm past a few milestones in the menopause adventure and luckily those days are behind me.  So, today...cold.  Might be because instead of my usual long-sleeved pj top, I had on a t-shirt with my flannel pants.  So I thought about grabbing my usual morning "sweater".  It's a shorty-robe type thingie that is made of super soft fleece-y type material my sister gave me for Christmas.  I love it and live in it from about 8pm to bedtime every day.  And I usually put it on in the mornings too...but I can't fit it under my coat for my early morning walk with Gracie.  The thought of having to take it off and wear just a t-shirt and my coat to fend off the cold morning made me shiver.  It's 23 degrees out there folks! And icy!  Sooooo...I grabbed my Dark and Stormy sweater instead. It fits beautifully under my coat for cold morning dog walkies.  Oh Dark and Stormy, how I love thee!!  You may be the perfect sweater.  Perfect for me because I modified the pattern to make you so. And the yarn is so nice, too.  Wool...but soft as can be, right up against my bare arms.  Cozy.  Here she is:

 I modified the back neck line, the shawl collar (I like mine long enough to lie flat so I'm not messing with it) and narrowed the button band and made smaller button holes...and made it longer.  Pattern calls for a shorter length, right about the belt line.

When I knew I wanted to make this sweater, I opened up a project for it on Ravelry, long before I had the yarn to make it.  Then I added any modifications I liked to the notes on the project page. I linked in the projects I liked (other knitter's projects, ideas, mods). It was so easy when I was ready to cast on to remember what I liked about the original and what I wanted to change.  Sometimes all the info on Ravelry can get me quite muddled and I can't remember where I saw this, or where the info was on that, you know.  It really helped to have the info right there to remind me and help me achieve a sweater to my liking. Quite a few of the ladies in my knit group had knit this so I really had a good look at some FOs in this pattern and knew exactly what I wanted to modify.  The buttons I got at G Street Fabrics in Rockville. Dolly helped me pick them out.  Ok, if you have Dolly helping you do anything, you know it's gonna be awesome!

The yarn is Heartland by Miss Babs in the Beach Glass colorway.  This yarn has held up over many wearings quite nicely.  It has pilled a little...easily fixed with a snip here and there.  Don't pull your pills people...snip them.

Anyway, I know it's been a while since I posted.  Thought I'd share this sweater with you.  I have many, many projects on the needles and a bunch to share.  I'll work on that and blog about it soon.  I should post again today with a Ten for Tuesday on my knitting projects.  I probably have close to ten on the needles.  At least that many spinning around in my head to cast on soon.  Please starteritis, keep yourself at bay till I cast off a few projects!