You must be as bored with my “knitted some more blanket squares….” posts as I am trying to finish the damned Flower Blanket. Be assured I’m still slogging over the purple monster 😐

So just by way of some light relief for all of us, I’ve dug out an old, pre blog , never seen before on the internet, knit of mine!
Now then, stop jumping up and down with excitement or I won’t tell you about Maria.

Maria dates back (I think) to about 2005  – about the time I discovered the John Lewis yarn sales. I had greedily snapped up a big bag full of Rowan Linen Print in and unusual colourway for me…
(This is a scraplet I had left)…

From Maria

I didn’t have a clue what to make with it so I bought the Linen Print book too – designs by the lovely Kim Hargreaves (which at the time meant little to me!!!)

From Maria

So wanna see Maria??

Here she is…

From Maria

The reason I’m so fascinated with the sleeve in that piccy is that the yarn is very soft and drapy, making the slit in the back of the sleeve design a feature I love -it just flaps around in a decadent, bohemian way 🙂 The picture was a result of “naughty Ben” snapping me doing the “how can we get the sleeve in? conversation!! 😀

Here’s a much better shot of the sleeve slit (it is a slit in the sleeve and not just the seam left unsewn BTW!!!)

From Maria

I remember sitting down in the garden to start Maria, thinking she’d be nice and easy – the first thing you do on Maria is short row shaping to make that nice curved bottom edge – EEEK – I’d never done short row shaping! 😯

The deep V in the front also had some “Gottchas” – there is a nice slipped stitch edging that makes a neat finished edge – all new to me at the time – here’s a front close up  – and YES you do need to wear something under Maria!…

From Maria

In case you’re wondering – the beads on the crocheted ties were my idea – some I had bought them for a long forgotten necklace!

I suppose I should show you the back too…

From Maria

So was Maria worth it – most definitely “Yes” – I learnt to do short row shaping, learnt to make sleeve slits (obvious if you’ve done it but it was my first time) and I got an unusual garment for me in colours that I wouldn’t normally go straight for.

Any problems? Only one – I sat in the garden sewing up Maria. When sewn, I proudly put Maria on – unfortunately, because of the sleeve slits there was a left sleeve and a right sleeve – guess who sewed them in the wrong way round?  -Swearing ensued!  😯  Followed by some bad tempered resewing 😉

If I’m still wearing her 5 years later,  think she tuned out OK in the end- wonky sleeves of not!