A Fine Finnish

My eldest, Anne, made plans last year to travel to Finland in Jan 2020, and to then travel further north via car and ferry to visit Santa in the Arctic Circle

She asked me to make her a jumper

Much discussion ensued

We talked about colour, style, design, fit
Originally Anne asked for a Finnish design, however I thought it would be more interesting to have Australian motifs. A bit more chat and I told about design programs to make your own patterns, and how they would work for her architectural artwork style
Anne decided to give it some more thought.
Keeping in mind that we had agreed to a dark green background, and a bright feature yarn which would suit the Australian theme
A day later Anne sent me this design and
asked if it was possible. It is an element from a work in progress
Perfect

I wanted to do the jumper in the round, and to have the pattern repeats to alternate the straight bottom and the dip. It took a little juggling but I managed to do it with no row change colour jog visible (unless you really really looked 😀)

The nature of knitting means that there are zig zags. If I had increased the thickness of the pattern lines I would have lost the delicacy that is usual in Fair Isle styles

I love the blending colour change, and I am really pleased with the pattern design

And look how well I did keeping the reverse tidy!!
It is a very pleasing sight

All of that extra yarn will create hundreds of wonderful insulating air pockets

I considered finishing the design at the underarm. Being the type of mum who says 'zip up your jacket', I thought I would save time by just continuing all the way up (but straight so I didn't have to try "keeping pattern correct" while decreasing 😆)





Something I have wanted to try for some time--
a no seam shoulder, particularly with this piece. Other times I have grafted there hasn't been a pattern to match up, and I didn't want the lines blurring into adjacent columns

When I reached the cast off shoulder sections I would wrap and turn at each row, keeping all stitches live on the needle. I kept everything on the cable needle, others may want to use stitch holders
After all 4 shoulders were done I used a 3 needle knitted grafted bind off. There is a great video if you google that phrase
It looks a little bumpy here.....






.... but smoother here after blocking.
And with more wear and washing it should settle even more

With shoulders done I used a short cable needle to pick up stitches around the neck and make an extra long turtle neck. Great to double over, ruched, or to pull up over the face
The original pattern said to work back and forth. Again, I didn't want seams so I worked in the round






These are the only seams in the garment. Attaching the sleeves, and the sleeves. I wanted to figure a way for no seams but I was running out of time to get it done.

Btw- the original pattern I was working from was a Patons book with classic styles
We had chosen a jumper with set in sleeves, with options for v neck, crew neck, or turtle neck. I knew that I would need bigger needles to accommodate the Fair Isle style. To keep the finished size correct I chose the smaller size pattern than needle size I chose.

Btw- the yarn is from Bendigo Woollen Mills, Classic Hunter 8ply, and Bloom Autumn 8ply






All finished!!

I was very happy to get this done. I did most of it during 30 to 35 deg heat!
It was gratefully received, tested, and packed for the trip
















There was a slight issue during testing, that it was difficult to tell front from back. So while I did the construction, design tweaking, and pattern adaptation, the original pattern isn't mine, the design isn't mine, I had to use the only label I have












                                                                             
oh yes
there was some leftover yarn
so i made a beanie. well, 2 beanies. no photo of the green one yet
and that turtle neck is really useful 😁

Enjoying the snow at Karvalan Kestikievari, minus 13 deg, 

and happily snug in jumper, shorts, and thongs 

❄❅❆❅❄