Knitted Nativity (Jean Greenhowe)
I had not done any knitting for years. But I'd hankered after a knitted Nativity set since seeing one at a friend's house, and tracked down the pattern book, Jean Greenhowe's Christmas Special, on Amazon. I was given it for my birthday in April 2016, and bought plenty of double knitting yarn in a variety of colours, so I could start in May. I began with one of the three magi (wise men), for no particular reason. Almost all the basic figures are the same, so I took it slowly and followed instructions carefully. The one thing I changed was to make all the skin tones olive or brown, suitable for characters from the Middle East and Asia, rather than pink, as suggested in the patterns. I was told to 'block' the cloak by dampening it in water and the pinning it to the figure overnight. I didn't much like doing this, but I was pleased that I took the time to sort out my bobble-headed pins, which have been immensely useful in other projects. I'm not con...