Resting on my laurels?

You may think I've been resting on my laurels but I assure you I've been doing no such thing. Someone asked me if I would knit "something " for her and she gave me a tiny photocopy of a waistcoat thingie (technical term). That's the trouble with being a knitter - non-knitters think you can work miracles. Remember that old joke? "My mother made me a homosexual." "If I buy the wool, will she make me one, too?" - I felt a bit like that knitter.

Considering that's all I had to go off, I think I did a good job. Here's the front:



and a close-up of the cable:



The collar presented certain difficulties. It looked very Elizabethan (the first one, not the present one) - standing up, a little ruff-like. The yarn I was using (Rowan Pure Wool Aran) was fairly sturdy before it was washed but after washing it turned a little "floppy" (tt). I had to work the collar double to make it stand up as it was supposed to do:



So I picked up and knitted stitches around the neckline and then worked double the length required. I then picked up the corresponding stitch from the base of the collar and worked that stitch together with the next stitch on my left needle. When I had two stitches on the right needle, I cast off in the normal way. Sometimes when I do this I work a purl row on the right side when the collar is the correct length and before I start working the "inside" of the collar. This acts as a fold line and makes the collar crisper. I didn't do that in this case because I wanted the collar to be softer and more rounded at the top.

The cast off edge of the armhole band also presented problems. I cast off three times and it just didn't look right. I tried a backstitch cast off - thread about three times the length of the edge to be cast off into a blunt pointed tapestry needle; put the needle into the first two stitches purlwise; pull yarn through but do not drop the stitches; put the needle into the first stitch knitwise; drop the stitch off the knitting needle; pull the yarn through and repeat. It looked like a dog's breakfast. I tried an Italian sewn cast off. It looked dreadful. I tried a sort of kitchener cast off using this marvelous explanation. This is a link to a post on Ravelry and I apologize if you are not able to access it but I have never really understood quite what I was doing with the Kitchener Stitch and now I do. In spite of the fact that I now know all there is to know about grafting - that didn't look good either. Eventually, I used a modified version of the two row cast off - first row in single rib and pull the knits over the purls as in a normal cast off; second row, slip each stitch purlwise onto left needle and pull the previous one over - no yarn used up. I don't think this looks too bad:



If anyone can suggest a better cast off for a 2x1 rib I am all ears.

There are twelve buttons:



and that's eight of them.

No sooner was that off the needles when I had a call from someone else. This lady has her own Soay sheep; she has her own Soay yarn and she wants me to knit it into a little "something" for her and her husband. Details of this will have to wait for another day but things are progressing.

Oh, and look what reappeared in my back field:



Better than a mean old horse anyday, wouldn't you say?