I have a few sweaters now that I have made for myself, but have been avoiding wearing because I haven’t washed them and they are in need of a wash.
I have been wanting to make a wooly board for a while, but kept putting it off. After the great success of the blocking board and my shawl, I decided it was time to do it.
I didn’t have a pattern, so I used Google Images and searched on both “Wooly Board” and “Wooly Horse”, and then used those images, along with a pattern found here to make my own.

Here are the parts, all laid out.

On one end of the sleeve poles, I put straight ends, for sweaters with square sleeves, like my kimono sweater.

For the rest, angled ends, so the sleeves are more arm shaped.
If I were to make another, I would create a jig to make all the holes line up properly. Some of them are a little wonky, but it seems to work ok. I’ve only run into one problem so far, the smaller dowels I used for the pegs is a little soft, and I’ve already broken a few of them. Luckily, I could see that coming and made a few extras. It’s a pain drilling out the holes from the pole ends. When I can find some harder wood, I’ll replace them all. I didn’t use any wood glue to hold those pegs in, so I will be able to pull out the non-broken ones.
So today, I want to block my first sweater.

This was the first one I ever made for myself, and I never blocked it or washed it. I’ve been wearing it since May or June of 2004 when I finished it. It’s made with Cascade 220, and it’s also a little pilly, so blocking it out will give me a chance to clear off the pills.

Here it is stretched out on the wooly board. I soaked it in soapy water, rinsed carefully, and sent it for a spin in the washer to mostly dry it out, then placed it on the board and adjusted to the dimensions I need. I had marked the inches on the board so I would know where to put the upright pegs to stretch it to the right width.

And here with the button band sewn up to keep the buttons from pulling.
While it was stretched out, I discovered that there is a hole in the back!! Ack.

But lucky for me, I still have some yarn left from when I made the sweater. The original pattern called for a Fun Fur collar. Anyone who knows me knows that I could never stand to have that stuff near my face, so I just made a small ribbed collar, but I have always hated it.
So much so, that I took a class last year at Stitches West called Collar Obedience Training. I had always planned to re-knit the collar and button bands, and this was an excellent class to teach me all I need to know to make the collar look right.

I keep the handout in my knitting notebook, along with other class handouts, articles printed fro Interweave Knits (Beyond the Basics and other technique articles) and patterns that I want to try one day.
I’ll post after I replace the collar, which I plan to do before starting the still undecided lace project.