For Mojo

C'mon Red Wings. Let's do this.

This is what we brought E home in (over a month ago!). I knit it in about a week. It's a top-down raglan sweater with no shaping whatsoever, therefore the front of the collar sits a bit high. I did insert a placket on the left shoulder to make it easier to get on. I then sewed two or three snaps in to close it. I had initially intended to put buttons on, but snaps are SO much easier to manage on a squirming baby. And boy does he squirm.

I knit the logo across the chest as I went after I initially planned to use duplicate stitch. If I recall correctly, I was feeling pressed for time and thought this would be faster. I'm glad I did it this way, I think it looks better. To manage it in the round, I cut long lengths of the white yarn and started the first row in the middle of that length of yarn. I then had approximately the same length left waiting for me when I came around for the next row. Lather, rinse, repeat.

It ended up being a tad long, but hopefully that means he can wear it again when hockey resumes this fall. He's little guy, but he's also gaining weight quickly. If he outgrows it, I'll be knitting another one.

FO: Mini Hockey Sweaters

Pattern: the beer sweater
Yarn: Knit Picks Palette
Needle: 2.0 mm bamboo needles
Started: late June 2009
Finished: July 14, 2009
Ravel It!

I knit this Vancouver Canucks sweater for our first off-season swap in the Puck This! group on Ravelry. The sweater has 4 row hem at the bottom to keep it from curling up. The sleeve and body stripes are all duplicate knit, which added more bulk than I anticipated. Normally it probably wouldn't be an issue, but on a sweater this small, it shows a little. I decreased sharply at the neck to keep it from curling and to make it more like a real sweater. Therefore, it will not actually fit on a beer bottle.

The logo is needle felted using Knit Picks Palette yarn. I outlined the green oval twice to give it more thickness. This was my first time needle felting and I learned that white can be tricky to use. The felting needle tends to pick up fibers from the surrounding space - in this case blue - and they can muddle the white color. Also, I think the white yarn I was using was a bit thinner than the green.



Pattern: the beer sweater
Yarn: Knit Picks Palette
Needle: 2.5mm bamboo needles
Started: August 23, 2009
Finished: September 3 2009
Ravel It!

The Boston Bruins sweater was also knit for a Puck This! swap, the second round during the off-season. Using what I learned from knitting the Canucks sweater, I went up a needle size and added a few stitches to the body and sleeves. I also knit the yellow stripes on the sleeves and body, and then duplicate stitched the small white and black accent stripes over top of the yellow. This worked better to reduce the bulk of the stripes.

The original pattern has you put stitches on hold where the body and sleeves meet and graft them together when finished knitting. Since these aren't meant to be worn and that method left some bulk under the arms, I omitted those stitches. The yoke of the Bruins sweater was different than the Canucks sweater as well. I switched to yellow for the last 5 rows and continued to decrease until the neck opening was small enough. I then came back and duplicate stitched the black yoke accents.

Again the logo was needle felted and I'm proud to say that I did the entire logo at lunch one day sitting in my car. It was tricky to free hand the circle and B, but very rewarding once I got it right. With this sweater, I also doubled the yarn (essentially) to bulk up the lines of the logo.

I'm really please with how these turned out. I even received a Detroit Red Wings jersey of my own in the swap!