Sunday, May 05, 2013

Go West!

After a run of knitting dogs this winter (2 corgis, one basset hound), I decided to get back into sweaters. I found a pattern called "Go West" by Bente Geil, who makes some really clever designs, and decided to give it a whirl.

I had a little trouble getting started because there were some typos in the pattern. I always miss my Grandma Grace, but I miss her especially bad when I have a knitting problem and it dawns on me that I am now the most experienced knitter in the family. So I kept at it and pretty soon this:



Turned into this:



Which eventually turned into this:



Shortly after that point, you take the two ends and kind of overlap them at the sides and then start knitting in ever-increasing ribbing until you think you will Just. Lose. Your. Mind. But eventually I came to that very last round, cast off, wet it down, and blocked it on Mike's bed, where it looked--as my friend Deana put it--vaguely cephalapody:



We have had some freakishly cold weather, which is a good thing ONLY in that it gave me an opportunity to wear my new creation:



Unfortunately, I wasn't able to put my hands on the super-cute shawl pin I had bought to go with my sweater, so I'll have to wait until next winter to show this little guy off:



Overall, this was a lot of fun to knit, but it came out much bigger on me than I was expecting based on the photo from the pattern (and I did match the stitch gauge AND I knitted the smallest size). I would gladly knit it again, as the yarn (Geilsk Thin Wool) was an absolute dream to work with, but I think I would cut each section of ribbing by about a third or so.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Bonnie, this looks absolutely beautiful - and I can see the super hard work knitting all that ribbing! Good you never gave up!Sibylle

Bonnie said...

Thanks, Sibylle! It was a lot of fun to knit.

Cass said...

Hi, I am trying to knit Go West, and my back is looking like a jumbled up mess. Can you tell me more about the typo and how you corrected it? I've read rumors of an errata sheet, but my yarn store salesperson looked at me like I had two heads when I went back to ask for one.

I've started about 15 times, to include making a guage swatch, when also came out jumbled.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

Bonnie said...

Hi, Cass, I'm sorry that I'm just now seeing this! It looks like you figured it out? If not, send me an email (bonnieboydtaylor at gmail dot com), and we can try to figure it out.