I need a new knitting project.  Gee, what a dilemma.  As you can imagine, I have several (to put it mildly) options, so need to narrow the criteria.  Bill and I are traveling to Scotland at the end of the month, so it needs to be portable (no beads, please).  It would be nice to knit with Scottish yarn, which narrows the field significantly.  Wasn’t I working on a cabled sweater for Bill awhile back that got side-lined for some reason?  I knew where I had stored it, and pulled it out.  It seemed like just yesterday, but it must have been years ago, that I started the Duxbury Pullover.  And, this definitely didn’t deserve to be a UFO, so it is now on the fast track to completion.

Simply Shetland yarn is distributed in the US by Karen Campbell, who I got to know when we were both working on Level II of the TKGA Master Handknitting Program in the 1990’s.  Way before I was teaching knitting or designing, and before she started a yarn business.  We were just trying to figure out how to do a perfect seam in seed stitch.

Fast Forward several years, and the book “Simply Shetland 4, at Tomales Bay” was published. I knit the Autumn Rose Pullover (by Eunny Jang) from this book for my daughter, the Box Stripe pullover (by Beatrice Smith), for Bill, and I was pretty sure that I had knit the Duxbury pullover (also designed by Beatrice Smith). Karen verified that I did, indeed,knit one for her company. I think that what happened is that Bill liked the sweater, because I apparently ordered enough Simply Shetland silk & lambswool in colour Lochmaben, for a sweater for him. The book was published in 2007, so I probably started this project in 2008.

I got pretty far along before putting it down.

It appears that I was knitting the 45 in chest size, and Bill has, ahem, grown a bit in the past few years.  So we got out the measuring tape, and considered whether I should start over with a bigger size.  But I probably don’t have enough yarn.  The pattern for this size calls for 11 balls, and I have 8.  I am assuming that the knitting has the other 3 balls in there. Karen assures me that I can order more yarn, if needed. We decided that I will finish the sweater in this size, and it will fit somebody.  Also, Bill really wants to lose a few inches, and this is good motivation!

The silk and lambs wool blend is luscious, and when I began knitting, I fell right back into the rhythm.

I haven’t knit a cabled sweater in awhile, and have been having a longing to do so, and am relishing this project!  If you also would like to knit Scottish this season, yarn and patterns can be found at Feralknitter.com