Christmas in April

TW's Christmas gift vest is done and fits him perfectly! He loves it (and is wearing it as I type, I might add). He's such a good sport he even was willing to pose for me in the vest while holding the little "paper doll" that I made as the actual gift I wrapped up for him last Christmas.

My fears about running out of yarn were well-founded but were circumvented by cannibalizing my gauge swatch to do the final armband. I am especially pleased with the fit, as this is the very first knitted garment I have made for TW (and that is due to his reluctance to have the sweaters, not to mine to make them for him.) I've sewn many shirts for him and so have a sense of what degree of ease he likes in his clothes, but knitting is so different that it still involved a certain amount of educated guesswork as I went along. He did give me the important clue that he greatly preferred erring on the larger than smaller side so anytime I was puzzled over how big/small/whatever to make something I always went with whatever resulted in the larger garment.

I am amazed how much larger men are than women, or at least bigger than I am. While I'm not the slender thing I used to be I am overall still on the petite side. TW is very broad in the shoulders and upper back and I was astonished to see how quickly the yarn vanished as I worked across those looooonnnggg rows. But it's done, he's happy, and so am I. What he doesn't know is that this is just the beginning of a wardrobe full of knitwear to come........