Results of the Sweater Challenge

Today was the final day. The bet was that I couldn't finish knitting my cardigan by midnight on 30 May -

Ta Daa! . Even though my husband tried to sabotage my efforts with extra pheasant duties, I finished it with 9 hours to spare. This included having to spin the rest of the fleece to have enough yarn to finish the job and learning a new technique out of a book to make the neckline.

It is the very definition of "homespun" and not exactly a complicated pattern. It's unintentionally more complicated when you use hand spun wool that has a lot of variation in thickness. The front of one sleeve was a good 4 inches shorter than the back, but I worked out how to add some stitches. When the sleeves are rolled up you can hardly tell. A blind man galloping by on a horse would never notice it.

In hindsight, I might have reversed it before sewing it together (the inside seems to be the better side!) but it fits and it's warm. I gave it a trial run picking up eggs this evening. Not too itchy, comfortable, and the sleeves stay rolled up. And the silver colour matches my hair - well, my roots anyway.

I win the princely sum of nothing, as it was a "double or quits" bet. But I do get the satisfaction of meeting a goal I set for myself, in spite of extra work and some gentle ribbing from Mike. In future I might not race to finish knitting projects as it means I'm more likely to drop a stitch or lose count on a row as my competitive streak kicks in.

Each time I knit a new project I gain more knitting skills in the process. That's the best part. And knitting is the only thing that encourages me to build up my feeble math skills. If you really want to geek out on the knitting/maths combo, there are a selection of resources to choose from. Unfortunately our local knitting group has folded (if it were an origami group, that would be a great joke). It's back to knitting from books and You Tube videos. I've got some fleeces to prepare first.