Sweater Weather

Last week I had one hell of a time at the cube farm my friends. Literally, I was buried under mountains of paper. It was nuts. So nuts in fact that I had little time to (i) read blogs, (ii) answer email and (iii) post on this here boggity blog blog. Needless to say I was so drained upon my return home Friday night that I could do little more than crawl into my bed and fall into deep slumber. Yeah, we're really living in the fast lane here at Chez Linoleum, let me tell ya.

However, despite my cube farm induced brain drain I was nonetheless able to complete a much anticipated (by moi of course) FO this morning! Here it 'tis in all of it's cotton glory...



I know! It's an actual sweater! Designed by me!

True, you've not seen many um, well, accessible items of clothing designed by this Lady of the Linoleum as of yet, but I assure you, I can do clothing. Clothing that is actually stylish! Okay, clothing that is also a little bit funky. But, you have to admit, this little striped and skulled diddy is quite wearable.

Anyhoo, this skully sweater is a pattern that I modified from an original design that I did during my February design for mags month from hell. The original sweater was done in a different size range (tweens to teens) and in a completely different fiber. I had to size upward for this baby and make a few modifications to fit my um, well, boobies. I also made a change from the original acrylic blend yarn to Brown Sheep's Cotton Fleece, which is a dream to work with.

Now really, I'm not a huge fan of crocheted form-fitting garments. Generally, I believe crochet to be too structured for this purpose. However, I swatched A LOT. And I came up with a hook to fiber ratio that allowed the fabric some give. Even the intarsia skull motif didn't turn out too stiff and thick. I do, however, plan to modify this pattern into a knitted version. I also plan to create a few alternate motifs, for this is a good "basic" Spring/Summer design that I can rock myriad ways.

I will definitely let you know when I spot this sweater pattern's kin on the shelves of your local bookseller's magazine section.

In addition, the publisher of Kooky Crochet sent out final cover pics for the book...



Pretty cool, eh?

Here's to a wonderful week ahead everyone! I missed you all!!

Copyright 2007 Regina Rioux Gonzalez. All rights reserved.