A few weeks ago, I took a class with Kathy Zimmerman at Stitches West. Kathy designs beautiful sweaters, and cabling is definitely her signature design element. She's also the author (star?) of an instructional DVD on cabling, and owns a yarn store in Ligonier PA.

Kathy showed off some of her sweaters, which was a class unto itself on proper finishing techniques. She introduced cabling charting, which I already love, and got us started customizing charts. I was inspired by a couple of her cables and immediately started sketching freehand, then translated into this:

Then we spent the rest of the class swatching our designs. I knit the bottom chart of of handspun three-ply from Frank the sheep

and the top one out of white worsted Plymouth Yarn Encore, which shows off cables nicely.

We also sketched out a plan for an entire sweater based on the brown sample! I don't know yet if that's what I'll make from that yarn when I'm done spinning it, but possibly. I'll need to check how much yardage I have when I'm done.