Paging all nurses!

After a rather depressing weekend of UFO searching last week, I decided to admit myself into the Pinhouse FWYS-programme (Finish What You Start). Otherwise known as the Blogger Mental Hospital.  Meaning I had to wrestle myself into picking 1 -one- item from a UFO-pile, and not touch anything else craft related until said item was finished.

Reason? I am a notorious non-finisher. I tend to throw myself at new projects with great enthusiasm, get it almost done, and then distract myself with something new and totally lose interest in what I was working on. This just has to stop! It is not very satisfying having nothing to show for all the time I do spend crafting, not to mention those pesky UFO's mocking me from every closet of my house.

SO! Cheered on by my lovely "nurses" on the previous post (you know who you are!),
I am now proud to say: I FINISHED SOMETHING! (Thanks, ladies)

My smug-face :)

Ta-Dah!!!

This lovely knitted sweater is a project I started almost three years ago, and is from a Norwegian knitting book written by Tine Solheim, called "Maskeball". It was published in 2009, so not vintage, but the pattern is kind of retro with those traditional roses and the "fleas" all over. It is quite typical Norwegian, but with a twist, color wise.

The body is knit on the round, and the sleeves and collar knitted separately. The ribbing is made with a sort of cable technique, so it looks twisted. It is a lot more interesting than regular ribbing, but hellishly slow to knit!

Twisted ribbing. Sloooooow :P

I did struggle with setting in the sleeves, because of so much ease in the sleeve heads. But after some stitching and unpicking, I got a result I can live with. The sweater is rather fitted, so any wrinkle would be stretched out some, luckily.

My pressing technique needs attention :/

The neckline is a bit special, and I think if I were to knit this again (which I most likely won't) I would lengthen the back piece just a little so that the collar would lie better. It sort of pulls to the back a little. I would also close the "border edge" at the shoulder a couple of inches, it gapes rather oddly now. Another thing I might change is the location of where ribbing ends. When I started this sweater, I had yet to learn about the natural waist. I find now, that things that hit the natural waist, looks so much better than things hitting the "modern" waist. The ribbing wants to find my waist (good luck...), and rides up, creating excess sweater around the waist, which is less flattering.

The "a bit too long"-bit.

ANYWAYZZ! The whole idea with this exercise was to finish, and I am very relieved that I did. I felt really good to fasten the last thread, and folding a sweater (!) neatly together (instead of cramming a bunch of random pieces in a bag and hide them). It would be lying to claim I 100% enjoyed the process. It was hard to take it up again, I constantly laid it down and wandered towards the sewing machine. I tell you , that thing is like a drug, not to mention my fabric- and pattern stash.... But I was good.
All in all, I am happy with the sweater, and I think it is a nice usable piece for the upcoming winter!