On the great outdoors

One of the things I'm most looking forward to about having a house is actually something outside the house: the yard.

In a condo or apartment, your access to the great outdoors is generally limited. We are fortunate enough to have a lovely stream and trail running behind our building, but it's still not the same as having your own yard. No veggie garden, for starters, and no fresh flowers. No where to play in the snow (if we had any). No backyard picnics. No tree swing. No place for the cats to sniff around and eat grass that they'll promptly throw up.

And I can't, for example, just dash outside to take a few photos of my knits. Instead I have to gather up camera, knits, husband and myself, trudge down to the exit, dash across the parking lot, find a spot with appropriate lighting, and then pose for the camera while passersby look at me like I'm insane.

Which is pretty much what I did here, after failing miserably to get any decent photos indoors:

Pattern: Ginevra Pullover, Amy Polcyn, Interweave Knits Winter 2010
Yarn: Knit Picks Gloss HW (70% merino, 30% silk) in Blackberry, 4 skeins; and Knit Picks Shadow lace (100% merino) in Vineyard Heather, 3/4 skein
Needles: Szs 8 and 9
Rav link

I knit this sweater, start to finish, in February. The yarn was thick and it was mostly stockinette in the round, with some waist shaping. It's knit from the top down, sleeves are knit in the round as well, and then the lace inset is knit separately and sewn in--I think that part took the longest. Or at least it felt like it. The pattern instructs you to knit in stockinette for 32"--I stopped somewhere around 28", and it worked out just fine. I don't enjoy knitting skinny yarn on fat needles. But the yarn itself was lovely, particularly the Gloss, which is soft and cozy.

I didn't knit a gauge swatch, which is a colossal sin, but here was my reasoning: the pattern called for size 9 needles; I usually knit tightly, forcing me to go up a needle size, and there was just no way I was going to knit this sweater on size 10 needles. Size 9 is about my limit for comfortable knitting. I can use something bigger for a small project, but not for a whole sweater. So I just hoped for the best, and in an astonishing turn of events, things actually worked out. The sweater fits perfectly.

Except for the sleeves, that is. They're much too large around the upper arm, which makes no sense because, when it came time to start the sleeves, I realized I didn't have size 9 DPNs, and had to move down to size 8s. I'm stumped.

With this sweater complete, I can refocus my efforts on the Wildflower Cardigan, and pick up the Dahlia Cardigan that I started a few months ago and put aside in favor of Christmas knitting. More weather in the 60s this week, so it's looking more and more likely that neither of those sweaters will be worn until next fall, sadly.

Just a reminder, in a couple weeks I'll be starting the raffle benefiting the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America. If you're an indie dyer, designer, or LYS owner and are interested in donating a raffle prize to this wonderful cause, please shoot me an email: mediaperuana@gmail.com. I've already got a few good prizes lined up, but the more the merrier!

(I am, incidentally, also looking forward to having mail delivered to my home--no more dealing with the incompetent front desk staff who either fail to send me notices about packages received, or do send me notices, but manage to lose the package in the 5 minutes it takes for me to read the notice and go downstairs to pick said package up.)