Ballerina Finished

Here is the Ballerina. I actually finished this in early November, but I've been lazy about taking pictures. I thought I'd go to Petra and take pictures there, but I've not been to Petra once in the time I've lived in Jordan. Now, it's going to get hot here, so when I went to California last month I took the Ballerina and left her there. So, no fancy photos, but here she is anyway:

Here you can see the big panel of stripes that goes under the arm. What I particularly liked about this jacket is that the sleeves are knit as-you-go, which is good for me since I hate knitting sleeves.



Here is the detail of the sleeve and neck. I really like the way the different angles of the ridges come up to the arm and meet.



What I don't like about the jacket is how it just hangs off of me. It is pretty heavy, and it wants to pull back and make my shirt choke me while it just droops over the front of me. Still, I wore it a lot here this winter.



Here is the back. I love the shaping of this jacket. My husband picked the colors. I would have gone with one of the three color choices, but I'm really glad he picked these. For one, this jacket goes with most everything I wear, and the simple colors of this combination make me look more at the knitting than the palette, and I just love the shaping.



Here are my two Hanne projects. Less than a year ago I found her web site and declared I'd never pay that much for a kit, and, well, here we are. I enjoyed knitting both of these, and I wear them both often. I am an experienced knitter, but I'd never done such a large project with short-row shaping, and I enjoyed learning something new.


Lessons from the Ballerina:
1. Hanne’s patterns are not perfect. I used them as guidelines. It's important to have symmetry with her patterns, but it's not the end of the world if you have 200 stitches going into a sleeve and you're supposed to have 204. Just do the same thing throughout, and it will turn out.
2. Hanne thinks that women have arms that are no less than 2 meters long. I'm short-ish, and I shortened the sleeve lengths for both the Mermaid and the Ballerina. When I began the first Ballerina sleeve, I read in her pattern that there is the option to shorten or lengthen within her guidelines, and I shortened even more than her pattern "permitted." Still, they are quite long on me. Don't be fearful about shortening sleeves on her patterns!
3. There is no use for me in reading the whole pattern ahead of time; I have no short-term memory. But, I did find it helpful to read each section prior to knitting and asking myself if her directions made sense. The garments are beautiful, but the patterns are not user-friendly. Focus on symmetry rather than strict adherence to her pattern.

Thanks for letting me join your knit-along!