Friday, December 19, 2008

Guernsey!

It's not the best weather day for photos, as you can see from the current radar.


We are, however, getting rain. We are blessed. Originally the prediction was for hours of freezing rain and then snow. Watching the Weather Channel this morning, the overnight was not kind to many areas and the day today will not be kind to many others. All that snow and ice from the Pacific to the Atlantic! Just to get these pictures, the overhead lights were on full-force ay 9:45 AM!



The buttons were last night's guernsey work. I decided not to back them until I saw how they set on the button band. So, I put the first two top ones on and then tried the Guernsey vest on. They were fragile, but working! Yeah! So, continuing onward, the other 7 buttons were attached. In all reality, I may still attach the steek facings to the button band. I haven't made that decision yet. Doing that would give more stability. Since the vest has already been blocked with a washing, there shouldn't be shrinking. The other possibility is to steam all the facings, and I most probably will do that.


Ta Da! The modeling shots come next under artificial light and flash. Shots are by DH, pre-nap.



The Back




The Front



A Side

As we all know, I'm not thrilled with getting my picture taken. I did want to show that this does, indeed, fit. I am pretty proud that it does with all my calculations and changes to the original.

The Statistics:

Cast On: September 1, 2008 (119 stitches plus 7 for steek)
Finished: December 18, 2008 (There was a Pansy Shawl in a great part of this time!)

Source: "Wool Gathering #76" plus DVD

This has been a KAL with the Gansey Yahoo List, led by Terry Morris.

Yarn: J&S 2 ply jumperweight, color #30 Lovat (now discontinued)

Needle: #3 circular 24" and #2 circular 40"

Buttons: KnitPicks Harmony

Finished gauge: 8 sts/in.

The Gansey KAL, being based on the WG, was for the Guernsey Pullover. In the WG, Meg shows a picture of her daughter Liesl in a vest version. Although Meg used Quebecoise, she stated that she had used J&S 2 ply shetland for guernseys in the past. I just so happen to have one and a half dresser drawers of 2 ply Shetland. The vest has no instructions for the alteration from pullover to vest. Being a 'thinking knitter', I needed to work through all calculations for my gauge, patterning, armhole size and shape, neckline shaping, buttonband type and shaping, choice of and number of buttons and their placement.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

it's really lovely! and the fit is great, you can really wear it with pride!

Well done!

yarn elf said...

WOW What a nice Christmas gift for you by you. Fits well and the look is great. Do like your choice of buttons.

Understand about directions but not really directions, did the concept but made it fit me. Knit in the forn of self expression.

Linda said...

Very Nice!

You know, Nikki and Squeek could be siblings...

Terry Sailingknitter said...

Whooo hooo! Great job! Enjoy!
Terry - sailingknitter

Helen said...

Hey! Nancy, I just got the most beautiful Christmas card! So good to hear from you!!!! I am so excited about your blog, too. Your vest is beautiful!
Gotta run for now, but will look forward to keeping up with your blog.
I am new to the blog world, but mine is jollyjfarm.blogspot.com. From there you will also find the kids' blogs. Thanks so much for the beautiful card and for remembering us!
We love and miss you and Russ!
Helen

Anonymous said...

Congratulations! I had never thought of using Shetland for Gansey patterning--opens up a whole new world (not that I have any Shetland...). I look forward to seeing this next summer! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!