An Outfit-A-Long (Or, Birds and Bows and Vianne)

Evening guys - this is a very exciting post, but will be short. It's Thursday night (technically Friday morning), I have work tomorrow, my alarm goes off in 5 hours. I should be going to bed, but I needed to get this post up now before the weekend.

So, last year Andi Satterlund of Untangling Knots and Lauren of Lladybird hosted the first ever Outfit Along, or OAL. I loved the idea, and also the dress (it's still in the queue - soon, soon...), and so I tried, but my knitting skills were not even nearly up to scratch! I failed before the first hurdle, as it were. But when they announced it was going to happen again this year, I was ALL. OVER. THAT. Because now I can actually knit things!


Birds and Bows 3
(So my hair is a bit crazy in all these shots - it was super windy! Also it bothers me that the bottom of the ribbing doesn't line up properly - I think that was my blocking. What a noob.)

I actually didn't follow the OAL exactly, but that's part of the beauty of it - you don't have to. I made a dress and cropped cardi, but as long as you sewed something and knit something within the time frame, it counted. I started my cardi about a week into the OAL, thinking I'd need all the time I could get, but actually got it finished a couple of weeks ago. The dress only took a couple of days now I've used the pattern a few times.

I chose Andi's pattern the Vianne for my cardigan, the official OAL pattern, but followed her guide to knit the back plain. I felt that plain meant more wearability. Also, you may notice mine looks different, it's more lines in the detail rather than lace... That's entirely my fault. At almost completing the cardigan, I was knitting it with my Mum, when she lent over and casually said, "You do know you're doing your yarnovers backwards, right?" FACEPALM. No. No I did not. But it looks okay, so I'm happy with it. The fit... I made a M, but shortened the sleeves slightly (just by trying as I went with the first and copying it for the second), and did half the ribbing on the body to match the number of rows on the sleeves. Next time, I'll go a size down on the sleeves - I like my cardigans a little tighter around the sleeve, but it's certainly nothing to frog about.


Birds and Bows 2

It's my first wholly completed cardigan (the first attempt I gave up on, the second is just needing a button band now that this one is finished), and I'm very happy with it. The pretty metal buttons I picked up for 15 cents each at the charity sewing store - so awesome!


Birds and Bows 1

AND now, on to the dress. This is another New Look 6048, size 16 with the tweaks I added to the bust (see my Blue Flowers dress or TARDIS dress for proper details). The bust sits properly flat and fits right now, which is awesome. I used this darling birds and bows cotton I bought last year in Melbourne (originally was being saved for a Cambie, but I'm glad I went with this instead), and the contrast is just plain white cotton sateen, for the extra weight. I love the fit and shape of this dress so much, I will certainly come back to it again - I just need to make some other things first!


Birds and Bows 5
(I look really grumpy, but I promise I'm not...)

The fabric only has the tiniest amount of grey in it, but I thought the grey cardigan would be a neutral (of sorts) which I could wear a lot. I'm super super happy with this outfit, in short, and in long, it's awesome and I'm wearing it out to dinner this weekend!

And now, it's bedtime. Someone has to be coherent enough to teach Year 6 tomorrow...

Comments

  1. Love everything about this! That's such a beautiful shade of grey for the cardigan, and the dress is just gorgeous. And, you know, even if the yarnovers are backwards - they still look pretty good to me :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you so much, Lauren! I figured, as long as all the yarnovers were backwards, it could be called a 'design feature'! It just means I'll have to knit another one with them the right way!

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