Alpaca Wheat Sweater. Pattern Cocktail

Jun 17

Written By

Vintage collection that I created almost a year ago for Moeke yarns will always be special to me. It is a combination of what I love in knitwear - nice drape, clean lines, textures and a mix of basic stitch patterns to create a unique fabric. As you might remember from my Wheat Photo Album post, I have gifted the original version to my dear friend, but after I received a gorgeous baby alpaca from my friend, I knew I wanted to recreate one version for myself to wear, because I love those cables so much! Plus I was in need of a knitting project where I don't have to take notes every step of the way. So I started in Fall, knitting a couple of rounds here and there, and just like that, slowly but steadily, the sweater is off the needles almost 9 months later!Instead of repeating the pattern as it is, I decided to play a little bit and make a pattern cocktail. Ingredients: baby alpaca by Magliamania, Wheat and Heritage sweater patterns.

[ezcol_1half]W H E A T[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]H E R I T A G E[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]- Shaping[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]- Raglan lines[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]- Elongated back[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]- Slip stitch center line[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]- Cables[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]- I-cord bind off at the hem[/ezcol_1half_end]

This baby alpaca is slightly thicker than the merino by Moeke, so I followed the instructions for size XS, instead of my usual S. It turned out just right - following my shoulder lines, but nice an loose in the body. Alpaca has such a nice drape and the fabric created is so soft, it is such a tactile pleasure to have it right next to bare skin. The whole experiment went pretty smoothly, I only had to rip once when I realized that the i-cord bind off is way too tight and pulling on the fabric. I went up one needle size and redid it. Now it has the perfect flow around my hips.Here you can see that the raglan line shaping is done, following the instructions for Wheat, but the slip stitch raglan lines are from Heritage.Wheat pattern, like all of my top down raglans, has a step-by-step yoke instructions, written individually for each size and to help you keep track of the cabling, it has a note after each yoke round what cable round you are supposed to work. Though I must admit writing this part of the pattern is pretty time consuming, in actual knitting it makes the whole process so much easier, especially if you are working on the project the way I did on this one - couple of inches in several days. So when you come back to your knitting, you have all the information that you need, without trying to figure out what cable round you are supposed to work on. I love knitting sleeves, when they have some cabling - even better. I just love those basic stitch crosses that create such a beautiful texture.I hope you will experiment some day and mix design features of several projects in one. It is always nice to see different variations of one pattern!