Wartime Farm Goes to India

Today is my little brothers birthday, he's currently on an epic three week long backpacking trip around India. As with his holiday last year to China he has been sending me daily Whatsapp updates and pictures of his journey so that I can assure myself and my internet free parents that he is safe and sound and clearly having a wonderful time!

Today his travels took him to Uttar Pradesh where he sent me pictures of his birthday trip to the Taj Mahal and imagine my surprise when I saw the below!

It's only the flipping Wartime Farm Pullover outside the Taj Mahal!! This is getting to be one well travelled knitted!

Wendy x

Wartime Farm Goes to the Wall

My little brother is currently in China with one of his friends for a lovely few weeks seeing the sights as they travel from Shanghai to Beijing then to Xi'an and finally onto Hong Kong.

As you can see, he has been sending me lots of beautiful pictures via WhatsApp as he travels around, which has been really lovely and has even given me some great ideas for my Sew For Victory project! It's also made me just a little jealous, though until I get over my flying phobia I will stay a lovely 'one-day' dream. My favourite photos so far have to be the ones from his trip to the Great Wall.

I mean how flipping amazing does this look, puts my wet week walking Hadrian's wall to shame, that's for sure! But the most surprising thing was the next picture he sent, to be honest, it made me a little teary.

 It's not the greatest photo I grant you (it was taken on his old school Polaroid) but it made my year when I saw it! The Wartime Farm Pullover has made it to the Great Wall of China and that makes me so very proud, partly because I know it must mean that he actually really likes it!

Wendy x

Knit It - Wartime Farm Pullover

It made its debut at the Haven Street 1940s event, but getting my brother's pullover finished on time became a little bit of an event in itself!

My Dad and Brother rocking their hand knitted Fair Isle!
I agree they could both look a lot happier about it :)

Wartime Farm Sleeveless Pullover

Designer: Susan Crawford

Pattern: Wartime Farm Sleeveless Pullover £5

Ingredients:

Style Craft Special 4 ply: 100g Camel (1420), 50g Midnight (1011) Deramores

King Cole Big Value 4 ply : 50g Red (667), 50g Green (675), 50g Mustard (671)

Robin 4 ply: 50g Brown (51)

YouTube-ualr Know How: 

Cast On, Knit & Cast/Bind Off

Fair Isle Knitting

Pick up Stitches on Neck & Armholes

Circular Cast On

I don't think I need to tell you how much I wanted to knit this pullover, you can read all my January gushing here. I cast on not long my after in February for the 36-38 size, and made my way through the rounds and rounds of knit one purl one rib to reach the required 3 inches, then I flew straight into the pattern and was clicking along nicely until I had got up to the second star pattern repeat, it was then dawned on me that this might be a little big for my athletic little brother, who it's worth noting, prefers his clothes not to be too baggy. At all! - I guess if you've worked as hard as he does to keep fit you want to show it off!

Now, I know this pattern is designed to be a looser fitting style, just like the one in the show, but knowing my brother if I carried on regardless I knew he just wouldn't wear it. So, I ripped it all back (I hate doing this) and started again, this time, a size smaller 34" chest, which I knew would still be a little baggy, but better too large than too small.

It has to be said this set back killed my enthusiasm, I got through the rib welt quickly enough and then, I lost interest and got distracted. So it stayed just a stretchy waistband up until May.

During the last May bank holiday, I finally cracked on with the pattern, ever aware that my 6th of July deadline was, looming not so far off now. Once I got back into it I remembered how much fun it was to knit, and so my enthusiasm and the pullover grew with every stitch, meaning I was making steady progress and was now convinced I would be finished before my holidays.

Oh, I very nearly was. Before packing my knitting in my rucksack on the 4th of July I had just one pattern repeat to do on the front neck section and the arm and neck bands to do (and sew in all those pesky ends, of which there seemed to be thousands!) and 2 days left to do it.

Why don't my Instagram videos have sound, it's very annoying!
Please just imagine seagulls squawking and the waves lapping on the beach...
...Oh, and knitting needles frantically clicking!

This lead to me on the 5th of July, sitting at Colwell beach in the Isle Of Wight, desperately trying to finish the neck bands, whilst trying to enjoy the seaside and the company, with this playing over and over in my mind!

OK, so as dedicated as this all sounds, I should confess there were more than a few moments when this happened...

My knitting guru!

So after finishing all the bands, pin curling, both mine and my mum's hair, I managed to get to bed about 3am in the knowledge I still had the ends to sew in before we left in the morning. Thankfully, with my mum's stirling efforts, she did one side while I worked on the other, we finished it!

Tada!!!

Front & Back

I would have loved to have been able to have given this a quick wash and block before it was worn but sadly there was no time, so it's a little bit on the puckered side, I'd rather that though than it have been unfinished. In the end the fit was not as bad as I had feared, it's still quite baggy (not helped by my brother being ill the week before and losing about a stone) I could have probably gone down another size, but it's not as ridiculously big as it would have been if I had not frogged it in the beginning, so overall I think it's a win!

I chose to use Stylecraft 4 ply for the main body, I've not used it before but it was recommended to me by lovely Lucy from 1940's Style For You - it was what she used to make the beautiful turban she made for me at Christmas; I am so glad I did as it's the first acrylic yarn I've ever used that feels as soft as wool, and doesn't become all fuzzy as your knitting, plus it is a great price and the range of shades it's available in is pretty vast. The other colours were what I had leftover from my dad's pullover, I'd actually bought the pale green for my dad's version but decided against it at the last minute, so this makes this pullover it a bit of a (much needed) stash buster too!

The pattern was very simple to follow, and actually despite my best efforts did knit up quite quickly once I got going. The only problem I had was just after I had divided for the front and back, I could not for the life of me seem to make sense of how many more rows I had to do, I had a look at the photo in the pattern and winged it from there, which luckily worked out perfectly. I am convinced that if I reread that part now, it would all make perfect sense, I think the pressure of finishing it on time was getting to me!

By my staggered stars!

Well, there was one other goof. The star pattern which runs up the pullover should all be in line, on my version they alternate, this was caused by me thinking I knew what I was doing rather than actually reading the pattern! I actually rather like how it has turned out (perhaps it was my subconscious making choices for me) so I am claiming it was a decision rather than an overconfident accident!

My brother's opinion? Well, as he is a man of few words, I think this last photo says it all...

Double thumbs up! Must be good!

And if he's happy I'm flipping ecstatic!

Wendy x

Things To Make & Do - Wartime Farm Pullover

As you may have seen in yesterday's post, at Christmas I got my little brother to model my dad's pullover for me, simply so that I could take a few snaps for the blog and also, more importantly, to make sure it would fit its recipient. Whilst he did his modelling turn, my brother became rather taken with dad gift, so foolishly (big mouth strikes again) I suggested that I could knit him his very own if he would like?

 "Yeah OK...a bit longer though" 

Agreed. 

"Oh, and while you're at it could you knit me a Christmas jumper too!"  

Yeah OK, no problem... big head gets bigger...ooh....what have I done!

Flattering as it is to have my knitting skills wanted, it was no mean feat knitting my Dad's pullover, and with the addition of a Christmas jumper, with fair isle snowflakes to match a pair of gloves he bought from Primark (or Top Man, I forget which) it could mean I will be knitting solely for him all flipping year! - Though I do have a cunning plan which might save me a few hours on the Christmas Sweater, if it works, but more on that later.

The gloves in question - I just hope they survive till next Christmas!

Anyway as Christmas is another twelve months away I've decided to take on the Fair Isle Pullover first. Now I don't know if it's just me, but once I have knitted a pattern I find it very hard to summon up the same level of enthusiasm for the Mark II version. So I have decided, instead of repeating the pattern again I'm opting for a similar pattern and one that was the inspiration for my Dad's pullover in the first place!

If any of you saw the BBC's recent Wartime Farm series then you will recognise the pullover pattern in question, worn by Alex Langlands.

Peter Ginn, Ruth Goodman & Alex Langlands the BBC's Wartime Farm Team
(Photo Source)

Now it's never been a hardship to stare at Alex, as my mum would say he is rather 'dishy', but in this series, I found it was mainly his Fair Isle Pullover that I was ogling. Naturally the knitter and obsessive clothes watcher, in me was drawn to the intricate fair isle, so I spent a lot of time trying to get a better look at the pattern. This pullover had such an effect -it was in every episode and aptly re-named Stank-Top by the eagle-eyed Mim:)- that even my Dad mentioned how 'smart' he thought it was! Sparking my Christmas knitting frenzy.

Purchase the Pattern Here

So you can imagine my delight when just before Christmas I read on the lovely Charly's blog Landgirl1980 that she had been contacted by the queen of Vintage knitting Susan Crawford to help her gain the necessary permission to re-create the 'Official' Wartime Farm Knitting pattern, meaning that we can all have our very own versions of Alex's fabulous pullover!  It appears that Susan had become just as obsessed as I was by the pullover and had found within her (very envious) collection a pattern from the 30s which was clearly the inspiration for Alex's vintage version. You can read all about her detective work here.

But not only can you buy this fabulous Fair Isle pattern, in every size you could possibly need, but by purchasing it you'll also be giving to a worthwhile cause. The ladies have chosen to donate half the money from every sale to the Women's Land Army Tribute, who are raising money to create a long overdue monument to the Girls of the Women's Land Army!

The pattern costs a mere £5, with a whopping £2.50 of that going directly to the WLA Tribute, so purchasing the pattern should definitely leave you with a warm and woolly feeling inside and out - though the 'out' will certainly take a little longer to achieve :)

I have just downloaded my copy - it's fabulous so many sizes and already converted to round knitting hurrah! So I will be casting it on very soon, well, once I have finished my Custard Cable Cardigan which as of tomorrow will have been a year in the knitting, oh and that pesky Land Girl pullover I started ages ago and have yet to finish, both of which are for greedy old me!

Update: Have a look at my version here!

Wendy x