Sweater is still not done; Pictures of FOs

As another month is about to tick over, my sweater is not yet complete.

I've been telling you for weeks that it's just "almost done", and that it's "so close"--I am practically checking it off as finished in my brain.

Of course, nothing happens if you don't actually knit on the thing. Knitting time has been sparse in the past 7 days, and for the bulk of what little I had, I have been working on a cowl that I've ripped out three times. after the third ripout, I realized I should just let it sit even if it is shaped wrong so I can still count it for stash dash, but yeah, that didn't occur to me until after I'd destroyed it. again.

So I picked up the sweater and did a few rows on it last night--really only like 100 stitches; I was quite tired so I ended up falling asleep with it in my lap. But tonight! tonight I have free time and an inclination to use it--and some video podcasts to watch (I think I'll add the Fat Squirrel Speaks to the sidebar once I catch up with her back episodes--she is very, very funny and great fun to watch). So, tonight will be sweater knitting. I would like to finish both sleeves--and I do think it's do-able, they're not that big and the first is only like a thousand stitches left (that sounds ominous, but think of a big shawl with 500 sts per row--that's only two rows, you know, and it may take a couple of hours but it isn't taking all week). That'll put me in a good mood for the end of July.

Meanwhile, a rarity: pictures. I got my sister to take some good shots for me when I was visiting the family, and I have a few crappy computer shots as well to share.

Stash Dash 2015 in pictures:

spinning has been very productive!

Sortedam So, 128 yards of 2 ply from a fat gorgeous batt

Dried Flowers, 220 yards of navajo-plied 3ply 100% BFL

Spring Flowers, 225 yards 2ply from Chilean (mystery) wool

I also finished off 375 yards of a beautiful skinny 50/50 merino/tencel 2ply from 4oz of Highland Handmades in gorgeous shades of purple.

As for knitting, I wanted to focus on finishing WIPs. This was pretty good motivation. I've finished:

a pair of socks for my twin; quite long

a hat and a matching pair of fingerless mitts for myself, out of some awesome Chilean yarn

A Clapotis in Handmaiden Casbah, one of my all time favorite yarns. Guess I should review this stuff at some point

and a little dress for a baby as one of my coworkers is sprogging; no pics yet though of that.

I still have in progress:

the eternal blue cowl. Beautiful MCN hand-dyed by a friend; a linen stitch border, but then I want to do some shaping and every time I do it, it's not quite right. *sigh*

This colorwork blanket that was inspired by Mason Dixon Knitting and by Rothko; I'm adding a border to it with the last two balls of yarn, so good progress on this sucker, but still not done.

The Sweater. unf, the color is much nicer in real life. Dragonfly Fibers is also one of my favorites so I suppose I should review them too!

So, it's been a productive summer, one way or another. But you see why I want to keep knitting? both the sweater and the blanket are so close to the end! and the cowl is so small, and I've got a hat and mittens and socks sitting around that are pretty small too that maybe I could finish if I could just focus on them...

The end is nigh!

After some diligent knitting over my break, discussion with my yarn and fashion inclined sisters, and a bit of "sucking it up" about actually starting the sleeves, I begin to see that I might yet finish this sweater by the end of the month!

I have knitted the bulk of the first sleeve. What remains is a knitted-on garter stitch edging that I want to do instead of the recommended garter stitch edging which is sideways. or. the normal way. I cast on about 15 stitches and knitted almost the whole way around before I realized 1) that my k2tog and k3tog at the joining point were kind of ugly; 2) that I'd started in the wrong place so if I do end up using buttons they'd be, oddly, on the underside of my arm; and 3) I definitely have enough yarn but I really should try the sweater on when it's not bunched up to make sure the length of the sleeve is correct.

When I finish this technical/tricky bit, I will do the other sleeve. Since they're half sleeves, and they started as raglan so they're half done, these are only about 5% each of the total sweater. And then when I am done I will use the rest of the yarn to make it longer, which is about another 5%. so right now I'm less than 15% from the end of my sweater and I've got more than a week left off the month.

Of course I need to do research first and foremost. but uhhh... when my brain reaches a breaking point then I take a little knitting time to give it a chance to heal.

No great pics of the sweater yet but if/when I finish it, I will be doing a photo shoot (if I can).

I can't believe I've knitted most of a sweater! I can't wait to have knitted a whole sweater!

Sweater progress

So, I was solidly monogamous on my sweater for about half a month--16 or 17 days. This includes me sitting through two movies without a knitting project. I only broke the monogamy for a three day conference where it wasn't sufficiently professional to have a giant sweater mass on my lap, and I worked on some socks instead. Then I went back to sweater knitting only--until I left on my road trip on the 25th of the month, and the sweater was not in-the-car knitting so my Clapotis got picked up.

Not-strictly-but-still-monogamous of a June, then. And it was pretty successful! I am almost done with the body of the sweater, which is worked as a whole back and forth of a large circ. I'm about three to four inches from the end. When I'm done I'll pick up the sleeves with some carefully matched colors and knit as much of those as I can.

The Stash Dash is going pretty well. If I polish off all this yarn with the sweater (which I suspect I will), I'll have knocked out another 1400 yards, on top of some 700 odd yards from spinning and the hat and mittens I finished before the month of monogamy began.

Almost typed monotony there. the sweater was.... hard. a bit of a drag, some times, when all I wanted to do was bust out something new and small. I am glad I tried it though, not in the least because I can look back at those times and recognize them as momentary distractions, little butterflies of thought in my brain of new shiny things. Staying committed to the project was a bit tough but I felt really good the week after I'd not-cheated on the sweater, a week after the urge to knit-soemthing-new-finish-it-rightrightnow had passed. I still love the sweater and want it, and with constant knitting and a dk/worsted yarn it's very satisfying to see how far I progress in a given span of time.

Separating for the sleeves was the most exciting so far, followed closely by switching to garter stitch here at the botttom.

Now it's July, and I'm on a week's vacation. I brought the sweater and am continuing my work on it, happily and with the long-term picture in mind--but the clapotis is here, just in case I finish it, or get bored, or run out of things to do.

couldn't stop myself from bringing a skein of sock yarn too, though, just in case.

Happy knitting to you :)