This was my first sweater ever. And I’m quite proud of it.

I was very nervous about embarking on my first sweater because I thought it would be really hard–and take a ridiculous amount of time. However, I had a really good first sweater experience! I took a 4 week (3 classes) class at The Cat and Crow in Mt. Horeb to knit the Lemongrass sweater, and it was super great (I finished in about 5 weeks).

The first week of class we talked about gauge, did some knitting MATH (I was a math major in college), and I learned what the word “ease” meant. Rebecca was an awesome teacher, and there was only two of us in the class, so we got all kinds of individualized attention (I even learned that I was purling weird, and how to compensate by knitting slightly differently, through the back loop, because that’s the leading leg).

For the record, there isn’t much wrong vs right in knitting, it’ll just create a different fabric, and my alternative way of purling created a bit of twist in the stockinette stitches. This hadn’t been a problem for me in my several previous years of knitting, and only would have been noticeable in this sweater because parts are done in the round and parts are done flat–so you would have seen the look of the fabric change. I’ve since corrected my muscle memory from wrapping the yarn clockwise to wrapping it counter-clockwise

The other woman in my class (Carol) is a brave, brave soul, and she unraveled and then re-knit most of the body of her sweater to change the size a bit and make sure it was something she would ultimately love–power to her! I was a little stingy with my stitches (it was my first sweater, give me a break), and had to block it pretty aggressively to get the size that I wanted (and I still think it’s a little snug). Thankfully got over my stinginess in my second sweater.

I don’t wear this sweater that often–it’s a bit itchy–but it was still an overall great experience, and I learned a lot! I really love the basket weave cable down the front (only 2 out of the 8 row repeat involve a cable needle!), so one day I think I’d like to knit this again, but entirely in the round–and probably with a few more stitches. 🙂