NB! I only needed one skein of 188 Jaffa (orange) for a size M, not 2.

23/6 I finally completed my Franziska on the 21st and totally LOVE it. Almost, that is, as I bought only 12 skeins of the main colour instead of 13. Silly me. The turtleneck is 10 cm too short, and I will knit it longer, once I have ordered extra yarn from the UK. I also need to take pictures and upload them.

I chose to use the original colours as they are so very bold and very beautiful. Who can resist a yellow sweater with purple dots and purple, orange and turquoise pattern details? The result is stunning.

NOTES:
This is a very big knit. The yarn amount takes it on the other side of 2 sweaters … No wonder that it took me 6 weeks to knit! The end result is well worth it though … I just keep my fingers crossed that oversized sweaters will stay in fashion quite a bit longer!

Seeing that many knitters ended up with a garter stitch ‘flare’ at the bottom, I decided to skip the border to begin with and start with a provisional cast-on at the border. I also decided to knit in-the-round, as I hate purling in fair isle knitting. To avoid too much of a ‘step’ when changing rows in the pattern, I slipped the 1st stitch at key places in the pattern. I also made sure to have enough stitches to complete the pattern repeat, thus making it fit the whole way round.’

By accident, I cast on for a size L instead of a size M, as I had originally intended. I only found out when I reached the end of the fair isle pattern! It turned out to be ok, since in spite of being careful about it, my gauge on the pattern bit was much tighter than on the yoke bit!

When I changed to the yoke pattern (the little ‘lice’), I decreased to a size M and that worked wonderfully! I have no difference in with on the yoke and the fair isle pattern at the bottom. Make sure to check your gauge on both patterns!

To avoid the flare at the bottom, I picked up the stitches and decreased exactly as I did on the yoke, to a size M. After knitting the border, there is STILL a tiny flare, though it is not really noticeable. I could have knitted it on 3mm, though.

Another mistake I made was to knit the ‘lice’ on every 4rth row instead of on every 5th. I only discovered this when reaching the sleeve gaps, as I was forced to cut the purple yarn at the end of every row. Not too much bother though, as the sleeve gap is very small (17 cm).

Much inspired by Moonflower I decided to pick up for the sleeves on the body and knit them in the round. The result is both prettier (as decreasing just looks neater than increasing) and quicker (no seaming). One does need dpns, of course.

I crocheted the shoulders together using a slip stich, a trick I originally picked up from Dayana. It looks so much neater than sewing, and it is easier to unravel, if this is ever necessary.

I rinsed the sweater in cold water (no soap), pressed it between to towels, and dried it flat. The felted tweed blooms and softens wonderfully after such a rinse! No wonder it is so popular. I would never steam this yarn unless I would need to block something to make it larger. After drying there is not a crinkle in the knit!

I love this knit. The fit is much as in the magazine, except for the neck, which is still 10 cm too short. As noted above, I will be VERY annoyed if oversized sweaters fall out of fashion too quickly. Right now, I cannot wait to wear it.