Throwback Thursday | A Cabled Cardigan.

…I wore this cardigan to the shop yesterday and someone asked if I'd knit it. I said no, my grandmother did (about 35 years ago.)

She didn't knit it for me, but she brought it along when we went to Europe in August 1979 (my high school graduation gift from them) and by the end of the trip I'd "borrowed" it enough times that she said I could keep it. I have a handful of photos from that trip showing me wearing the cardigan, but this one, noted "outside the wooden shoe museum, August, 1979" is my favorite.

It's a classic fisherman pattern (I think my grandmother knit several similar ones), with raglan sleeves…all seamed - even the button bands.

It's acrylic (she lived in southern Alabama; I'm sure acrylic was all she could find and I'll bet she'd think a wool sweater might be a bit too warm for the climate) and boy has it worn well. In all the years I've had this sweater, I've had to repair it only once; a button came off and I sewed it back on.

It's my go-to sweater for comfortable cozy (especially because I can toss it into the washing machine and the dryer!) and I hope it lasts another 35 years. Because I could knit another one, but, quite simply, it would never be the same.