“Wow! Did you really knit that?” is a phrase I have been basking in hearing for the last couple of weeks 😀

Why? Because I have been wearing my finished Esme!

Esme is so pretty!

Esme has turned out to be a beautiful garment 🙂

Because I chose the cream alpaca yarn, it is spun slightly differently to the other colours (a worsted spin?) it is slightly thinner than the other yarns so has given a lighter, airier garment (which I quite like) but it did come up slightly small even after increasing the needle size from 4mm to 4.5mm. With hindsight, maybe I should have kept the needle size and knitted a medium. I have put on a little weight!

The great thing about a this yarn though, is that once you wear it it does relax and mould to your curves so I can report that after a couple of wears, it’s not quite so snug 🙂

Wanna see the back?

So love those cables….

The cables look great and the clever peplum nicely disguises how big my bum is getting!

I did find that the neck kept popping up…

See what I mean?

nearly a standup collar!

So after these photos I slip stitched the back of the neck, between those two cables, down in place. I should also share with you that after my first attempt at casting off was too tight and unyielding, I redid it with an elastic cast off that works SO much better.  It lays beautifully now 🙂

I also discovered that a couple of carefully inserted safety pins in the top of the cup of my bra, hold the neck of my top down to it doesn’t peep out of the neck 🙂

I wore Esme when I went after work to the late night at the Olympia Spring Knitting and Stitching Show – it’s a great time to go – no crowds and I didn’t have to take any time off work!

I took my coat off to put it in the cloak room and immediately the woman behind me said the headswellingly welcome line of “Wow! Did you knit that?” I grinned for about an hour!

I did, of course, have to go to the Purl Alpaca stand and show Tracey and Kari Helene our creation – they were impressed and immediately tweeted me in Esme !

It was actually a nicer picture of Esme – this is with the top pinned out of the way, the neck stitched down and relaxed a little after wearing and matching  jewelry that I first wore for my wedding! The only thing wrong with this piccy is the goofy look on my face!

Goofy speccy Susan in a lovely Esme….