At the beginning of March I started on this cardigan. I had followed Kate Davies’ blog for a few years but never had the courage to start one of her projects – many of them looked to complicated for someone of my experience. I only plucked up the courage this year, and decided to cut my teeth on the Bláithín (Gaelic for ‘little flower’) cardigan.

From Kate’s blog posts I got an inkling that this cardigan was to be my most complex project ever, and after reading the pattern I knew I wasn’t too wrong. It basically combined all the techniques I’d learned in the last 3 years, plus many more. Knitting in-the-round, short rows, provisional cast-on for starters, followed by i-cord bind off, insert pockets, Fair Isle colourwork, and scariest of all, steeking. That’s when you cut your work in half to turn it from a jumper into a cardigan. Argh!

In the end, the cardigan took me almost 4 months to complete, with many trials and tribulations along the way. Luckily, it didn’t turn out too badly.

As a bonus, I’ll even get some use out of it this winter! Note to self: next project will definitely be a short one.

After the cardigan, I made a few quick and easy projects, with a few twists, of course.

After my old K-Mart lunch bag gave up the ghost, I had a quick look around Ravelry and found this pattern. For a knitted, and felted lunch bag. I was nervous about felting anything, but in the end it was very easy, even with a front-loading washing machine.

I also knitted up this beanie for my nephew J’s birthday. The original pattern was quite plain so to challenge myself I did a stranded fair isle pattern that I found in one of my knitting books.

That was good practice as I will be knitting up a very big colour strand project next.

I’ve been knitting up a storm so far this year. The longest project so far has been a jumper for my father-in-law (using this old favourite). It took me about four months to complete.

Since then I’ve taken on projects that were quicker. Like this cosy for my hot water bottle, as last winter I was sick of having to wrap and pin it in a makeshift tea towel cover.

I also wanted to do more challenging projects. This girl’s cardigan involved quite a bit of lace knitting, which was new to me. Luckily it was relatively quick to do – it took only a month.