As soon as I heard about the Cherry Tree Hill Yarn contest I started imagining all kinds of beautiul multidirectional sweaters. I drew, I sketched, I swatched, but nothing came to me. Until 2 weeks ago. I don’t know where it came from, oh yeah, I was cleaning up the front clothes closet and as I was rehanging a 1960s swing coat…I thought this is it. So I started knitting, and knitting and knitting.

I thought June 10th is the deadline….the jokes on me…I double checked the date on the Cherry Tree Hill web site and it is June FIRST! Yikes!! I better get knitting. If I overnight it tomorrow, it should arrive on Friday. I feel really excited about this “swing coat” sweater. It is turning out even better than I imagined. I have most of the front and back done…it is going to be raglan sleeves…and I have one sleeve done. I had to put the other sleeve down last night at 2am…just couldn’t do it any more…my stitches were getting bigger and bigger. (so much for “perfect” gauge)

This yarn is growing on me. I’m glad I’m knitting something other than socks with it. It feels soft and strong and the garter stitch fabric I’m using hangs well and has a “rich” feel to it. Can’t wait to see it done!! I still need to figure out how to do the collar. I don’t know if I ‘m going to keep close to the the 1960s coat or change the collar a bit. I’ve already made the sweater smaller than the coat. (It would cost an arm and a leg to buy enough yarn to knit a sweater the same size as the coat)

Last fall I won third place in their sock contest. What a shock when I got the call! My mom was here with me and I couldn’t stop jumping up and down. Wow was I excited! You can see my sock here cherry tree hill sock design contest

Here’s hoping my head doesn’t fall off from looking down at my knitting all day. I also have some other knitting that has to be in the mail tomorrow. I think I’ll spend the day alternating hours on projects. Ooooh it’s gonna be a long one.