Manly Gift Along

Ta Da!

Ed's sweater is finally done. He and I will go out this afternoon for some modeling shots, which I'll post on my blog.

Thanks for bearing with me for the ten months it took from start to finish on this sweater. I am planning a few more knits for Ed--another sweater, some hats, and some mitts. For the moment, though, I'm knitting for me.

Just About Finished

All the knitting is done on Ed's sweater. I knitted the last few rows on the sleeves this morning:

They're now in the process of being blocked.

I already assembled the fronts and back, and so only ends need weaving in around the collar and shoulder seams. When the sleeves are dry, I can attach them to the fronts and crochet the underarm and side seams. Then only tacking down the pocket ribbing and sewing the buttons remain. I'm beginning to think that our real autumn weather is holding off until I'm done with it completely.

I decided to crochet the seams on this sweater because I think they're sturdier than mattress stitch (here Montse Stanley and I disagree--she thinks they're not as sturdy). Ed is hard on his clothes, and I want to be sure the seams are secure.

I have a few small projects that I want to knit for Ed. I'm taking some simple hats with me to Stitches East to knit on the train and while I'm there. He also requested mitts. So I have a nice excuse to knit up some stash yarn before indulging in new purchases at Baltimore and Rhinebeck. And I do have some scarf yarn that I bought for him in the past. A scarf might be a good filler project for nights when I want something mindless to knit.

The next big sweater will be Ed-2, a design of my own using a slip-stitch pattern. The yarn from WEBS should be here in a few days, and I hope to post swatches of different slip-stitch patterns soon as I decide which one to use.

Inching Toward Completion

The sleeve knitting has been easy, but the measurements are not working out for me. When I measured from the top of the shoulder to Ed's wrist, I got 19 inches. I've been using a schematic for a Vogue Knitting sweater that is similar to this (all-over cables, shawl collar), and the large dimensions have been close to those I need. That schematic has a 20-inch sleeve, and right now, that doesn't seem sufficient either. The length shown is 17 inches, and so I'll knit to 19 inches and, much to his dismay, measure Ed again.

To keep things rolling and actually finish this sweater, I may start the other sleeve. I can do that even if I lack the brainpower on a weekday night to revise the chart for extra rows and figure out exactly where the armhole shaping has to be.