Channel.

After four months of knitting, procrastinating, dragging feet and knitting, I'm happy to say that we have finished our Channel Sweaters. HOORAY! 

I'm not sure why it took us as long as it did to finish this project. Sure, it is a lot of knitting, but more than that, I think the four of us had a hard time enjoying the process of knitting this sweater.

The pattern is rated as difficult. I don't necessarily think that's accurate. The stitches are very basic. The charts are all knits and purls. No cabling. No lace. Nothing unusual.

In my opinion, the only difficult part of this pattern is navigating it. It's long. Eighteen pages!

I very much appreciate a pattern loaded with special techniques. With so many free patterns available, it's nice to get something extra for a pattern with a price tag.

What annoys me is having to flip flop through pages to find information. This is further annoying, because I don't print my patterns.

I prefer to read my patterns on either my phone or iPad. It makes sense to me that patterns being sold in digital formats should be more compatible for use on devices. For instance, special technique links embedded in the pattern where I need them. If that's not possible, easy to read bold faced text identifying pattern sections would make all the scrolling more bearable.

While I didn't enjoy the process of knitting this sweater, I'm absolutely thrilled with the product this project produced. Knowing that I would love this sweater when I finished it helped keep me motivated.

I chose to follow the recommendation and knit my sweater to incorporate 4 inches of overall positive ease.

This cardigan is going to be wonderful for layering! And, I know I'm going to wear it a lot.

Lately, I've been trying to choose my yarn color based on gaps in my closet. I have a large percentage of neutrals and few colorful options.

For this project, I used HiKoo Kenzie. It took me nearly 11 skeins(1,760 yards) to finish the cardigan. It was a pricey project, at roughly $10 a skein, but I'm really thrilled with this yarn.

The yarn is 50% merino, 25%nylon, 10% angora, 10% alpaca and 5% silk- all my favorite things rolled into one. I think each of the fibers contributes to the blend. The merino gives good definition, the nylon give strength, the alpaca gives a little drape, the angora provides a slight haze, and the silk gives a little luster. It's beautiful yarn.

I do think my collar could do with a bit more structure, but I like it fine the way it is.

I got perfect gague using Kenzie to knit this sweater. I didn't have to make any modifications, which was delightful! However, I decided not to block my sleeves to the sizes in the schematic- read Liz's post to know why! (We have some theories on why there are no rear views of this sweater on the project page!)

While we were knitting, Liz repeatedly referred to her Channel as a housecoat. It was her plan, from the very start to have a cardigan she could throw on while she was at home. I think it's worthy for wear beyond! The neutral color looks wonderful with everything. Liz even added little pockets to to the front for extra functionality. Liz made a whole MESS of modifications to the sizing of this pattern in order to get it to fit. Hop over to her post to read more about them!

Meg chose to knit her sweater with closer to zero ease. Oddly, she and Liz used the same variety of yarn on this project and they had extremely different gague. And, where Liz had to make adjustments, Meg was able to knit directly from the pattern without issue. It goes to show, it's important to swatch! Poor Meg will always have to knit more sweater than most in order to make sure sleeves and hemlines are long enough. In the end, it's well worth the extra headache!

Mari started to knit her sweater with the suggested ease but found that her sleeves were much larger than she had hoped. When Mari dropped down sizes to accommodate her gague, she got better fitting sleeves, but the body of her sweater ended up tighter than she had expected.

Ultimately, I think we're all happy with our sweaters. Or, maybe we're happy to be done. Or both! Be sure to check out what the other girls have to say about knitting the Channel Cardigan by following the links above.

Also, swing over to see Sara's Channel! Sara jumped in on the knitting about the time we finished our sleeves. And, she schooled us all by finishing first!

We finished just in time for summer! No bother, we'll be glad to have our wooly warm cardigans once fall rolls in. And winter. Oh gosh. Winter. It's too soon. I'm still hurting from the abuse last winter brought with it. I can't even think about cold weather!

Mike and Felix. Our lovely and talented photographers! They make us look good!