sambuca

I am finally able to share a test knit I finished last month! It's Sambuca from babycocktails, and it will be released tomorrow morning. Here it is!!

I do love the look of color work, but I rarely wear it. I guess it's because I dress pretty plain and anything busy just doesn't feel right. This design has a good amount, just enough to keep things interesting without overwhelming. This is good for someone new to color work as well, since it's not over the entire garment. One could even just leave it off the sleeves if one wanted to.

There are some short rows on the bottom of the back of the sweater for shaping. I've noticed a lot of sweaters have this feature recently. Did my husband warn me my new sweater was all bunched up over my butt before taking this picture? No, he did not. 

I only have about one good picture of me in this sweater. Sigh. Our back yard just isn't good for knitting photos. There are too many ugly things in the background. Not ugly in a cool, urban way, either. Just ugly.

I have no idea what I was stomping on here. Some stubborn pile of ice, probably.

It was cold, so I wore a hat.

Pattern: Sambuca (test knit) by Thea Coleman

Yarn: Berocco Ultra Alpaca (worsted weight 50/50 alpaca wool blend in 100g skeins), 4 skeins exactly of winter white, plus a bit of orange, medium red and dark red

Mods: This was a test knit, so I didn't want to go off the written pattern much. I did, however, make it about 1" smaller in the chest. The design is a top-down raglan so it was easy enough to eliminate one of the increases. I also added length to the body before the color work so it would hit at a flattering place, and I added length to the sleeves because I always do; I might be part orangutan. Lastly, on a whim, I did a little bit of a rolled edge on the neckline and sleeves just because I wanted to.

I've had this sweater finished for over a month, and I've worn it a lot. I'm happy to say it's holding up very nicely. Ultra Alpaca is good yarn, yo. The design calls for Stockbridge (also a 50/50 alpaca/wool blend) from WEBS, which I wanted to try, but at the time they were out of the colors I would have used, so I went stash-diving instead (probably a good thing considering the size of my stash.)