Sweet Scottie Dog Cardie

Every now and then, I drop into my favourite wool shop, The Bee Hive, located in Victoria, BC.  I'll spend an hour perusing, imagining the possibilities, and going through their binders of patterns.  I love Scottie dog motifs so when I came across Sirdar Pattern 1894, I knew that I had to make the sweater.  I decided to make it for my nephew Ethan's first birthday.  This little sweater ended up being one of my favourite knitting projects of 2011.

I used Sirdar Snuggly acrylic yarn in a turquoise blue and added a black trim.  In the original pattern, there is a black decorative stripe around the button band.  However, I finished the sweater while I was vacationing in Ontario and forgot to bring my skein of black yarn with me.  Looking at the finished sweater, I actually like the plain button band better and would skip the stripe if I were to make this sweater again.

Rather than using intarsia to add the Scottie dog, I hand stitched the motif using an embroidery needle.  I have attempted intarsia numerous times but it always ends up in a big mess.  What irks me the most is the way the wrong side ends up looking.  It's a disastrous mess.  Clearly, I must be doing something wrong.  Plus finishing all the ends is a pain!  Please tell me there's a better way! I'm sure I'm not alone in saying that I love knitting but I hate finishing.

I came very close to keeping the sweater for my son, Mackenzie (shown in the pictures modeling the sweater).  Mack looked so cute wearing it but I vowed to make him one as well.  That is on the "to knit" list.  Maybe I'll make my boys matching sweaters.  How cute would that be?