I’ve finished the first part of my training for my new job so I’m celebrating by casting on a new sweater for the winter (this winter hopefully).

I’m hoping for more of an A-line shape so using size M for the bottom and using 4mm for bottom ribbing.

6th Sept: I had knitted to the waist, but then found that I had a ‘balloon effect’ sort of a spare tyre just after the colourwork at the bottom, which wasn’t a good look! So I ripped right back to the top of the fairisle and did a couple of decreases. Hopefully that will do the trick….

I’ve no idea why the organic merino by sublime was discontinued as it is beautiful (although not washed yet so we’ll see) - Update! Within minutes of wearing it pills, so that might have had something to do with it (but it’s nothing my de-bobbler can’t handle…).
Unfortunately the green yarn I’m using isn’t 100% wool like the others, but it was the exact shade I needed!

I’m following the chart, but swapping the colours around a bit depending on what it looks like.

18th Oct: I’m finally on the yoke. I don’t think I’ll do a bottom-up sweater again - I couldn’t really check the fit properly, or not as well as with a top-down anyway.

21st Oct: All knitting finished and underarms grafted, and blocking!
I didn’t want a really high neck so I omitted the last bit of the pattern and inserted a shallow (3 row) ‘wave’ motif instead to make it lower. I then did some short rows to bring the back/sleeves up, finished with minimal ribbing. I had to redo the neck a couple of times to get it right, but I think it worked out ok.
The A-line fit I was hoping for hasn’t really happened - the body turned out longer after it was all done than I intended so it’s a good job I did it bigger at the bottom - otherwise it would have been too tight. That’s another reason I’m going to stick to top-down. It may all look different after blocking though…

After blocking it fits really well - just longer than planned, but that’s probably not a bad thing in winter.

The pattern is really great - I’m just not convinced about bottom up.