Resurrection and Ravellenics

Since giving up the regular desk job and taking up freelance work I've got out of the habit of blogging because sitting at the computer has meant work, work and more work. This is a very good thing for me but not so good for developing a readership and blog presence. (Let's face it I was never really in the habit in the first place but it's high time that changed.)
So to kick things off I'm going to write about my entry in the Winter Ravellenics. Knitters (and crocheters, spinners and other fibrey folk) challenge themselves to do something a bit different for the duration of the sporting games and plot their progress on Ravelry. There are even medals, but not quite yet because of the sheer volume of entrants this year.
I had recently come by a lucky find in the New Year sales - eight balls of lovely Wendy Roam in a pale greenish blue colour. This, I felt, would make an ideal cardigan. Light, neutral enough to go with most of my clothes and the nylon content would ensure durability. The only slight issue was that it's 4-ply and so a cardigan for me takes a rather eye-watering 1500m or so.
This got me wondering whether it would actually be possible to knit this in just over two weeks. Friends said it was 'barking' and 'impossible' and so of course I had to do it.
I cast on during the opening ceremony, having 'trained' by swatching beforehand and things went well. The pattern I chose was Tivoli by Cecily Glowik MacDonald which is worked in one piece top down, with the sleeves worked down from the armholes afterwards. This meant in theory I could work on straight needles for much of the knit which are much faster for me than a circular worked flat. The only problem being whether all the stitches would fit on.

It turned out that they did (just) and all went off speedily. I did slow down towards the end and I took the precaution of putting the body on hold while I knitted the sleeves and then returning to the body to maximise the length I could finish in the time. Since I'm quite tall I added about 3 inches to the body length but I didn't do any other modifications. With hindsight and more time I think I'd have knit a smaller size with some bust darts as although it fits beautifully on the bust it's a little big at the neck.
The buttons I chose are small clear plastic that look just like ice - a lovely reminder of the Winter Games. I've loved seeing what others have entered, there have been a lot of rainbow projects this time around. The virtual medal procedures are apparently chugging along so with any luck I'll have one soon (assuming I filled in all the forms properly!)