Feeling blue, baby boy? Wear some stripes.

Item: Wannabe baby surprise sweater from Garnstudio
Yarn: Dale Merino baby woolin beige, baby blue, and sky blue
Grams: 163 g

 Knitting baby clothing from unusual patterns is always a treat to me. Naturally, since babies are tiny, their clothing is tiny as well, which makes it a quick knit.

This jacket pattern from Garnstudio is a twist on the ever-so-famous Elizabeth Zimmerman Baby Surprise Jacket. I've been planning to knit the real Baby Surprise jacket ever since I read about it the first time, but still haven't got round to it (it's still in my "Planned yarn consumptions" list, tututut). However, I came across this pattern, and by some mysterious inspiration decided to knit this first. Perhaps having something to do with taking a look at the original pattern for the EZ BSJ, and feeling a certain lack of motivation for interpreting a 40 year old machine-typed knitting pattern, however charming it might present itself?

The twist of the Garnstudio pattern is that it is knit in two pieces, which are sewn together in the end, straight across the back of the jacket (from neck to waist). In other words, you'll knit each sleeve with it's half of the jacket separately, and sew them together afterwards. This technique allows for longer sleeves than the original EZ BSJ (the EZ BSJ only has three-quarter length sleeves), which is not a bad thing in Norway (even though we're headed for summer, it's still only 7 degrees celcius today, brrr).

The most interesting part is that you knit each half identical, and that one of the halves is reversed (i.e., inside-out) before sewing them together. This gave me some additional problem-solving to consider, as I wanted a stripy sweater. When knitting the to identical halves, I had to consider that in one half, the stripes had to be knit from the reverse. Not at all difficult, really, it's just important to remember this during the knitting. It's rather annoying to realise what's going to happen at sewing time ;)

If you take care when sewing the two halves together and fastening loose ends, you'll actually be able to use the sweater inside out. Not very fancy-pancy if the sweater is knitting in one colour, but the stripy effect that comes from garter stitch with several colours is very nice on both sides, I think.  Nice to have the possibility of variation!

I knitted an attached I-cord along all the edges, This helps conceal fastening of loose ends. If you are knitting a garment that is to be reversible, it is always a good idea to change yarn on the ends of your knitting, rather than in the middle of a row. The attached I-cord also helps keeping the shape of the jacket, garter stitch easily stretches and can potentially ruin the shape of the jacket.

The size of this jacket came out rather bigger than imagined. It's a birthday present for my soon-to-be 1-year-old nephew, and by the current rates, it will still fit him on his second birthday. 

So for my baby nephew: if you're feeling blue, wear some stripes, they'll keep you warm! Happy birthday!