Life in Cleveland: Tomten Jackets.

So! I finished the Elizabeth Zimmerman Tomten Jackets!!!!!

I had to. Because I'm pretty sure that if I didn't summer would never arrive. Ok it sounds crazy. But follow my logic here - You know that phrase "the baby won't come until the knitting's done?" It's just one of those old adages that people like to say... that seems to be completely true. I think that's what's happening now. Summer can't come until the knitting is done. It's the only explanation for why it's mid May and the kids are still wearing footie jammies to bed. So I focused and finally did all of the finishing work on these. And I am SO happy with how they turned out:

SERIOUSLY.

I took the kids to the park for a little photo shoot. This was back on May 1. And right after that we had quite the warm spell. Even got out the water table for a bit:.... Aaaaand then the cold came back. And I had to (again!) dig through the attic to retrieve more warm clothes for the kids that I had put away (again!) BECAUSE WHY ISN'T IT SUMMER YET OMG. Is anyone else stuck in the wardrobe change out that never ends? Just me? Moving on.

So now I figure that summer won't come until the knitting is done and blogged about. That has to be it! Because otherwise it makes no sense that today is the first day of summer vacation and it's barely going to hit 60. So here we go:

Tomten Jackets for the brothers:

Pattern: Tomten by Elizabeth Zimmerman from the book Knitting without Tears.

"Tomten is the small Swedish elf who specializes in good deeds, and your child will resemble him strangely if you put a Tomten jacket on him or her." - Elizabeth Zimmerman in Knitting Without Tears.

Seems Legit:

My kids totally look like little elves in these:

The pointy hoods! I love the pointy hoods. It is the CUTENESS:

I actually made the blue one for my little guy and the green one for The Dude. But! Kids only grow in one direction. So I upsized everything. So the Dude is wearing his brother's sweater and The Girl is wearing The Dude's. Sounds confusing but basically each kid is wearing a sweater meant for their younger sibling:

Meh. By fall they will be wearing the right sweaters. Until then I think the Girl is rocking it:

Timeline: I started the Blue one WAY back in August of 2013. The Green one was started in Feb. as part of the Ravellenic Games. Both were completed at the end of April 2014. So this was a 9 month long project. WOW.

HE WAS SO TINY!!!!!!!!

Modifications: Basically none. It's a modular jacket so it's super easy to modify to make bigger or smaller following her directions. The blue one starts with 112 stitches and is modular from there. The green one starts with 128. For both of them I picked up a button band around the entire edge and around the hood. I think that gives it a nicer edge than just the garter stitch.

I did add in the slip stitch faux seam on the top of the sleeves on the green one. The directions are in the Brooklyn Tweed Adult Tomten version. I think it gives the sleeves a bit of detail and structure not necessary in the smaller size.

Yarn: Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted for the gray. It is deliciously sheepy and wooly and everything you want a sweater/jacket to be:

Then I used Patons Classic Merino for the blue stripes. The Green is Cascade 220 that was left over from The Dude's Green Hat. I had juuuuust enough to finish it. Like I was cutting off long ends and spit splicing trying desperately to make it through the bind off without having to buy another skein. My knitting group was quite amused.

Notions: The zippers were just basic zippers bought at JoAnn. I dragged both boys there one day with the intention that I WILL FINISH THESE TODAY. .... and bought non-separating zippers. YEAH. I would say that I'm an idiot but in all fairness I was wrangling two small boys in a JoAnn Fabric. That I made it out alive at all is a success story. I ordered the actual zippers that I needed online once I got home and realized my mistake.

The verdict: LOVE. Unabashedly love. The grey sheepy goodness! The pointy hoods! The zippers! The garter stitch! These are classics that my kids will wear for years. And then will get passed down to someone else because they are always going to be in style.