Buttons Giveaway

Lots of exciting action going on over here these days. Between the dyeing, the designing and the knitting I am all a-flutter with the pure joy that I get from making things. Being able to spend my days making, I get such a high from it!

So, first the part you guys are all interested in, the giveaway! Pictured below is a lovely one of a kind colourway (actually, it was 4 of a kind, I dyed 4 skeins of this lovely lavender grey shade, 2 blue label's which have already found a new home thanks to my Etsy shop, and 2 green label's, one of which I'm giving away and the other which I am very greedily hoarding because I just love it so!) 

To enter the giveaway simply leave a comment on this post, the winner will be announced on Wednesday February 9th, and will be sent this lovely skein of Green Label Aran weight yarn in Lavender Grey and 5 pretty pearly buttons to knit their very own Buttons Cowl. Please remember to leave your e-mail address in the comments so I can get a hold of you if you're the winner.

Remember that little swatch that I showed you last week? Well, it is now a fully finished sweater!

I am beside myself with excitement about this one. It turned out exactly how I wanted it to. I swatched, I re-swatched, I washed and dried my swatch, I measured, I counted, I did lots and lots of math, took lots and lots of notes, knit, ripped, re-knit and am so glad that I put in the extra effort and took the extra time to do this sweater the right way. I am so proud of it that I am going to write up the pattern. It will be my first time sizing a sweater, so I am going to do it slowly and properly. Look for the pattern to be ready some time this spring, maybe I'll time it to be released around the time of the Knitter's Frolic since that's always good motivation. I'm hoping that I can con my mom into test knitting this for me. She's usually very compliant and happy to help, and I actually think that this sweater style would suit her really well, so hopefully she'll be gung-ho!

I'm calling this pattern I Heart Aran because that's what I kept saying to myself as I was knitting it, and because it has a very romantic hearts and x's and o's cable pattern. Plus my version is knit in my aran weight yarn in it's natural state, so it really is all about the yarn and I do love it. As several people guessed when I posted the swatch this cable pattern was totally inspired by my sweetheart socks. I re-worked the cable to be knit from the bottom up rather than top down and did it on a plain stockinette stitch background rather than reverse stockinette since I like the look better for this project. Yay, look for more details about this project soon!

Ok, a few more little details I wanted to mention. I had been struggling for a while with the blogger comments set-up. Basically, there isn't a way to respond directly by e-mail or a more personal venue to the comments. I would get questions in the comments and when I would want to answer them directly I wouldn't be able to send an e-mail because you don't need an e-mail account to leave a comment... anyways, I want everyone to know that I read all the comments and have just recently figured out that the best way to respond to them is in the comments section directly. So, if you have a question and you leave it in the comments I will respond by leaving my answer in the comments too, so check back after asking a question! Hopefully that makes sense.

And lastly, I've added a few new sweater quantities of yarn to my Etsy Shop. So hop on over and peruse if you're interested!