FO: Timberline Sweater

My dad is great at posing!

I have been pretty monogamous with my projects over the past few weeks. Part of that had to do with getting ready to move across the country and needing to pack. The other part was I had a tight deadline, which I missed … by two weeks. In the end, though, I’m happy to say the project is complete!

I have been working on the Timberline sweater by Jared Flood, one of my absolute favourite designers (and pretty much the entire Brooklyn Tweed team). The sweater is made out of  Wool of the Andes Superwash in the colorway Briar Heather. Despite a sometimes daunting and rough time along the way, I’m extremely happy with how this sweater turned out.

The project was dreamed up by my mom and me after she saw Ken’s Hugo sweater this past October. We decided a great birthday present for dad would be his own sweater, but something different. Like books, I don’t often repeat patterns (there are so many amazing designs and books out there, I figure). I love everything that Brooklyn Tweed designs, so naturally that’s where I first gravitated. We ordered the yarn in December, and I might’ve not started until the second week of January, hence a lot of the monogamy.

The schematics in this pattern were part of my hesitation. They’re really daunting to look at, at least for a relatively new sweater knitter. I just took a deep breath and decided to ignore the schematic, for now, and focus on the instructions. Luckily, as with all Brooklyn Tweed patterns, the directions are very easy to follow. They include all the information you will need in the pattern. Sometimes you have to jump around a bit, which is why their patterns in particular are ones you should read through completely first. There are also a bunch of charts, but in the end, you’ll find it’s all the same design repeated. By the time I was a quarter of the way through the body, I only needed one of the three charts.

I did hold onto my hesitation for a while and procrastinated much longer than I should’ve. I completed one sleeve before heading up to Michigan for my interview, and the final sleeve wasn’t done until two weeks after my dad’s birthday, just before my husband and I moved to Michigan.

Overall, I am really happy with this sweater. There are some things I would do differently. For instance, I have now made it a rule that sweaters are not surprises. I freaked out when I thought the sweater wasn’t going to fit, and it did turn out a little short (though not by the schematics). If it wasn’t a surprise, dad could’ve tried it on regularly, or I could’ve held it up to him to make sure everything worked out perfectly. It’s still a great sweater and still fits, but it could be better.

Dad sewing on his own buttons

I also um … made him sew on his own buttons. This happened accidentally, but now you can see where I get my crafting gene. By the time I got to the buttons, it was really late on my last day in Texas. I had no more energy, my tapestry needle was too big to fit through the buttons, and I just about felt like sewing up the button holes and pretending they didn’t exist. Dad doesn’t give up that easily. He went digging in their sewing kit, found the perfect size needle, and added them all himself.

I enjoyed working with the Wool of the Andes Superwash yarn. It did split something awful, which happened repeatedly as I was trying to knit too quickly at times. Once it did split, I couldn’t get the yarn to not look snagged. The plus side, though, is you can put it in the washing machine and dryer. That being said, other than my swatch, I didn’t do either of those things. I hand washed the sweater with Soak and then used the lay flat to dry setting in my parents’ dryer so that it would dry faster. (I left the darn thing to dry for a week and it was still heavily damp!) I would use this yarn again, but I don’t know about with a sweater. Maybe with the right project and without a tight deadline.

Well, we’re all moved in (but still unpacking), which means I can start knitting again! I haven’t decided if I’ll stay monogamous or not, but I don’t have any deadlines or big projects at the moment. It’ll be nice to work on something small and quick at whatever pace I choose.

What projects have you been working on?

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