FO Friday: Honeycomb Vest

 

I finally have a finished object for Friday. O is back in school this week--I have a middle-schooler!--so I've had some free time to finish up this vest, which I began knitting way back in June. This summer I had no desire to knit, which is odd because I knit year-round. However, I did get back into sewing this year (more on that below). There was no urgency to finish this vest over the summer, and now I have something nice and new to wear for the fall transition season.

The pattern is from Knitty spring 2008, the Honeycomb Vest by Sarah Castor. It was a fairly easy knit. The only tricky part was figuring out the increases/decreases in pattern when I first started knitting, but after a few rows, the process became intuitive.

 

 



I'm happy with how this turned out. Don't you just love that color? It reminds me of a peacock feather (the yarn is Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool in Mallard, a silk/wool blend). It may be my best "finishing" job. I took great care with my mattress stitching and I like how the ribbing turned out (a twisted rib). Vests are not a wardrobe staple for me, but I like how this vest looks with its deep scooped neck and figure-hugging shape. I've got it paired with my favorite Brooks Brothers blouse here, and with a pair of jeans and flats, it'll be a nice look for me -- not too casual, but not too dressy either.

My Ravelry notes are here.

Anyway, sewing ... last month O and I spent a weekend in Connecticut at my parents' house. When I returned home, DH met us in the kitchen.

"When you're ready, I want to show you what I've done to our office upstairs," he said. He looked a tad nervous.

OK, backstory ... in July, I gave up my downstairs office so O could have it as his bedroom. This way he got his own bathroom and a little more privacy. I don't really need an office anymore since I'm going back to school for my nursing degree, so if I have to do computer work, I can work in the livingroom. My DH did the lion's share of moving stuff around one weekend; O is happy in his new private room, I have a small desk in the livingroom, and we turned O's old crowded bedroom into a shared office.

Now DH and I have completely different aesthetics so when he said he'd done something to our office, my stomach dropped. He is more tolerant of clutter and visual distractions than I am, let's just leave it at that.

So it was with great trepidation that I entered our new "shared office." And what I saw what he'd done, I began jumping up and down like a crazy woman ... thrilled!

He turned "my side" into a sewing studio!!!

I was absolutely thrilled. He had built me a cutting table where I could lay out fabric for cutting (instead of using our downstairs dining room table). Underneath was storage for my (many) patterns. My notions were neatly boxed up or displayed on a bookcase. And I had two tables set up, one for my Viking sewing machine, the other for my serger. I even had room to permanently set up my iron and ironing board (if you sew regularly, you know what a hassle it is to continually have to set up your pressing equipment.)

"I can change it if you don't like it," he said.

Don't like it? I loved it! Right now it's still kind of messy because I'm in the middle of a big sewing project, but when I get it cleaned up, I'll post photos. DH scored major brownie points for such a thoughtful surprise. I did save him a boatload of money this spring by tailoring all his dress shirts, so I guess this was my reward. :)