Finished!

The weather has been so unusually cold on a continuous basis, no chinooks, that it's no hardship at all to stay indoors knitting. So I've made excellent progress on the "two waistcoats" project. The second one is now finished, and the first one is being blocked right now.

Here's a snap to show adding the front ribbing and the collar. This was done all in one, so I used my Denise Interchangeable Knitting Needles. You can make them as long as you like by locking sections together.

The knitting is actually separated at the bottom, not hooked together.

There was an interesting method for making the collar: first pick up and knit an interminable number of stitches, (284) and work them in ribbing for two rows.
Then do a short row from the bottom hem to ten stitches beyond the opposite shoulder seam. Turn your work and come back to ten stitches beyond the other should seam. Turn and with each succeeding row add three stitches to the amount knitted. Eventually you will reach the rows on either front side where you began decreasing toward the neckline. It takes forever! And look how long the collar is at the center back! I'm anxious to see how this collar looks on the girls.

When you reach that midpoint on the front, continue to the end of the row and knit in ribbing until the lower front plackets are six rows long. Then bind off in ribbing.

I chose to knit the ribbing at the armholes on four needles, to eliminate a seam in the ribbing.

Sew on the button and block by pinning to size and covering with a damp cloth.

This second one for the 10 year old came out perfectly to the pattern size. The first one I made for the 7 year old had to be blocked to size as I early on switched to a smaller needle, not liking how loosely the fabric knit up on the larger needles.

Couldn't sleep for a while during last night, so I was up knitting. (Yeah, didn't get enough of it during the day!) And instead of knitting the armhole ribbing on #2, I indulged my curiosity about #3. This is for the youngest granddaughter, 5 years old, and is in a Bernat yarn called Satin. It's a pretty, lustrous yarn, but I don't care much for the "hand" of it, as it has no spring to it at all.

This pink one is going to have a "fun fur" collar. I know already that that yarn is a pain to work with, but I just think the final result will be worth the effort.

Of the first two waistcoats, the light blue one was knit with the yarn that came with the pattern from Mary Maxim--a Sirdar Super Soft Aran. That yarn also had no spring to it, and somewhat fuzzy stitch definition. But the second, darker blue waistcoat was knit with a Bernat Berella "4" (called an afghan yarn) that had a good hand, and also had good stitch definition.

These waistcoats were begun very late in November. The yarn for the darker blue was bought on November 28. They took longer to knit than I thought they would, but that's not surprising because all except the first seven rows have mostly k1 p1, or manipulated stitches. The pattern had a double seed stitch, i.e. the knit or purl was consistent for two rows, instead of changing every row. I found it easier to do the ordinary seed stitch, so that every knit stitch on the needle had to be purled, and the other way round. That just seemed easier to keep track of.

I did discover that it's a good idea for me to knit rather than sew when the weather is so confining. Jim has been spending most of his free time reading in the living room and it's very companionable to be knitting there with him. Especially when he shares little excerpts from his books, one history book of Alberta, and one of Canada. Sometimes it seems we are becoming iconic old folks, reading and knitting by the fireplace. Why then does it feel so good?