Lake Chelan Central Park Hoodie

If you knit I think it’s almost required to make a Central Park Hoodie (CPH) at some point.  Naturally as I’ve taken up knitting in the past year I dutifully put it in my Ravelry queue and then went ahead and made one.  Now that it’s finally done I’m really glad I did.

Right off the bat the eagle eyed out there may notice that mine looks a little… wrong different than the small army of CPHs out there.  That’s because I completely spaced on how to knit and totally did it wrong – apparently I knitted into the back of the stitches.  My purling ability stayed the same resulting in nonstockinette stitch.

 

But like I remember my mom saying way before I learned to knit: if you’re consistent it’s not a mistake, it’s part of the design.  And I was very consistent.

I knitted this up with Cascade Yarn 220 Heather in the Lake Chelan colorway which is a bluish green with yellow flecks.  I liked using yarn from a local company (they’re located in Seattle) and have fond memories of vacationing on Lake Chelan as a kid.

There’s not much to say about this pattern that a thousand Ravelry members haven’t already.  I ended up knitting the body in one piece to try something new and avoid sewing up the side seams.

I waited to get some help from my mom picking up stitches for the hood and ribbing since I’ve never done it before.

I was looking forward to relearn how to properly knit before starting sweater #2 but wanted to wait until this one was finished.

I love these silver buttons I found during a ½ off sale.  I used the yarn separated into 2 ply to sew on the buttons using a long strand of yarn that is worked from button to button along where the stitches were picked up.  This technique is from Finishing School: AMaster Class for Knitters which includes tons of information on all sorts of finishes.  Not that the lack of buttons stopped me from wearing it.

Now that it’s officially sweater season here in Seattle this hoodie is warm and cozy and will get lots of wear. I’m really excited about finishing my first sweater and have already started on another.