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I'm so happy to finally be able to show you my Coraline cardigan, which I have been working on for a good while now, and which waited for a long time in my shelf before I got the right buttons for it (and actually sewed them on!). But here it is now - and I love it!

The pattern is Coraline by Ysolda. I did make quite a lot of modifications, read on for more.

I used Novita Julia, a Finnish wool/acrylic blend which is pretty much my "workhorse" yarn. I've previously used it for my Xylem sweater and a lot of mittens. My needle was a 3,5 mm Knitpics circular (is circular needle plurar or singular, by the way? It sounds weird to say just needle, not needles)

Don't you just love it when you dare to try something new, and it works out just perfect? That's what happened with this shrug. I had quite a lot of this yarn left from Nick's Eccentric Sweater so I decided to make myself this shrug, on which I've had my eye on for a good while now. I originally planned to do the cuffs and ribbing in black, but I didn't really have enough yarn to give it a try, so I sticked with the orange.

Now, orange and turqoise is not the kind of combination I'd wear every day, so I was a bit suspicious, but then I thought that something really eccentric in my closet is not so bad, either! So I cast on, knit, cast off and was very happy with the results.

The sad sweater you read about a while back is sad no more - it's done and gorgeous!

Now this is a truly modular sweater. Part top-down, part bottom-up, part both: one sleeve is top-down, one bottom-up and still I had to rip and reknit both cuffs as they were too short (like the hem, too). I'm so proud of myself not giving up on this project; I didn't even want to at any point!

This is the second year when I'm knitting from my stash (not exclusively though!) with the Ravelry Stash knit down group, in particular the Personal Small Items "club". The idea is simply to (before the year) starts pack one small project per month -yarn from stash plus pattern- and work these projects month by month.

The idea is that by packing the yarn and patterns beforehand you quite quickly forget what you packed and are happily surprised with what lovely yarn and a nice pattern you get to reveal from its bag monthly! Well, that's what happens me most of the time. These here are the two fun projects I've made this year.

So this thing... it's not quite as pretty as I hoped, and it's not very flattering on me, but hey, I knit it so I will show it here as well.

Pattern: Cloud Bolero by Ysolda Teague
Yarn: Marengo by G-B (a local German brand, the yarn is wool and acrylic)
Needles: 7mm KnitPicks circular
Modifications: none

I knit the size M, and it fits me well. However this type of garment doesn't look too good on me I have noticed. Not sure how much use this will get... it does warm my shoulders nicely! We'll see, maybe I'll even end up giving it to someone.

I did it! I've knit Owls! Not that that makes me so special - it is currently the most knit sweater pattern on Ravelry , but if you read my blog, you will know that I'm not the big sweater knitter. So every sweater feels like an accomplishment, like having climbed a mountain. In this case, rather small mountain, as this sweater was really quick to knit! And I love it!

Pattern: Owls
Needles: 5,5mm circular, must have been 80 cm long
Yarn: Marks & Kattens Eko Ull, 100% organic wool from New Zealand. I used 380 grams, that's a little less than 8 balls.

Here it is. Finally! I bought the yarn for it in March, and finally I have started knitting my Owls sweater.

Due to my loose hand and Marks&Kattens Eco Ull yarn (lovely organic 100% wool) I'm knitting on 5mm needles instead of 6,5. I'm still working the L size, hoping that my gauge will match the one given! If not I'll need to lose a few pounds!

Oh and the Irish knitters are having an Owls KAL at the moment, so I'm kind of secretly joining them :)

I proudly present to you my second sweater this year! Well, ok, it's a vest, but it'll do for a sweater for me (I set a goal to knit two sweaters in 2009).

It's really red and absolutely gorgeous. The pattern is called Bramblewood vest from the Knotions knitting web-magazine (free!). The yarn I used is called Novita Anni, a aran weight yarn with 40% wool, 35% acrylic and 25% polyamide. Cheap, machine washable and pretty. What else do you need! I used less than 300 grams of it.

I knit it on 4mm circular needles, and due to my loose hand the size 41 in became more like 43... so the vest is kind of loose now. It's ok though, it's for winter anyway, and now I can layer up all kinds of shirts underneath it.

I noticed I haven't made a work-in-progress post in a very, very long time! So to fix the loss, here are some of my current WIPs.

The first one is my current pride and joy, the Bramblewood vest in the making. I'm making the 40 in size, and was afraid it will be too small, as my gauge was a bit off, but as usual it seems I don't need to worry about that. Even when I measure gauge and everything seems fine, the garment ends up one size too big. So I'm hoping this vest, which should according to calculation be snug, will fit perfectly!

Finally, finally I get to show this! I kept forgetting and then the wedding came and and..!

But here it finally is. My lovely first-ever knitted t-shirt. Let's look at the specs:

Pattern: Easy Peasy Tee
Yarn: Junghans Opal in petrol blue, 3,5 balls, that is 175 grams.
Needles: 4.5mm circular, 60cm long.
Mods: My gauge was something quite different from the original pattern, so I CO 128 stitches for size medium/large and adjusted the other numbers accordingly (like left only 10 stitches between the side stitch marker and the PINK stitch marker when doing increases and decreases instead of 20). I also shortened the tee a bit by leaving out one decrease to the waist.

Very easy and quick knit!