About 7 days before the big trade show in Columbus this month, I decided that I wanted a new project to wear on the show floor. The Columbus Convention Center is generally 20-25 degrees cooler than the rest of the world. I don’t know if they turn the AC up for the knitters specifically or if it is a norm in the convention center industry.  With the recent arrival of Techno, I had become fixated on knitting the Metro Jacket pattern from Blue Sky Alpacas and Laura Grutzeck – designed specifically for this new wonderful yarn. The patterns weren’t due to land until after the trade show but I just had to knit this sweater right away! The lovely ladies at Blue Sky Alpacas sent the pattern along to me if I promised to wear the sweater at the show..which of course meant that it had to be done in time!

The project took 6 hanks of the main color and one each of the contract colors. I have enough of the contrast colors leftover to make a hat. It worked up very quickly! I knitted the smallest size but sized it up a bit for the chest and shoulders and still used less than the pattern called for. I also went up one needle size in order to get gauge.

The project features a slip stitch color work that looks like textured fair isle but without the trouble of doing actual stranded colorwork. It is worked from the bottom up and in one piece. I knit the bottom and then each sleeve, put them together on one needle and finished it all up. Overall, pretty quick and easy project! The fabric is surprisingly light for a bulky yarn and it is so fuzzy and warm and soft…

I did indeed wear it at the trade show. It was boiling hot outside, so I tore it off as soon as I got outside.  The ladies at Blue Sky loved it and were quite happy to find out that it could be knitted in a few days 😉