09-01-2018

Made a swatch with 2 strands of 11 stitches and 3 rows. 8 triple crochets with 2 strands measured 4”. I guess I’m ready to start.

I worked the pattern best I could and the back ended up quite a bit larger than the front. There was also an A4 segment I was reluctant to work on the back panel because I felt like it was already a little too big, and didn’t want to add more length or width.

09-27-2018

After consulting with some group friends, we determined that the front and back should be the same size. Since the front seems to offer just the right amount of coverage, and the back is a bit oversized, I’m going to rip the back so that it matches the size of the front panel. I ripped back, but I think I’m done for today.

For tomorrow:
I need to work A2, A3 & A4 on the back panel, and A4 on the front panel. Then the shoulders should be ready for seaming.

To summarize for a XXL:
Work front and back square until you’ve done 7 rounds of the main color, and finish with that sc-round (per the chart) of contrast color.

Then work A2 & A3. Now you should be able to work A4 without thinking your sweater will be enormous.

09-28-2018

A2 & A3 are done. I cannot figure out what A4 is. It seems like A4 only applies to the pattern if you’re making the XL size. When making XXL you simply continue A2 & A3 until your piece measures 29”.

Right now my front and back pieces are 28” each. One more go around on each piece will exceed 29”, but I think that is ok. I will do that, snap my progress pic and call it done for the week.

My piece each measured 31”. I can live with this!

Next time:
Work on seaming, figure out the neck, and hopefully get the sleeves done.

10-16-2018

I seamed the shoulders yesterday afternoon. I started the first sleeve at knit night and I finished the sleeve this morning. I’ll make the other sleeve tomorrow.

10-17-2018

Second sleeve came out pretty good. This one is slightly wider than the first one, but they’re identical in length so I’m just going to call it good. Now I need to figure out how to work the neck…

I did the neck. During the set-up round I realized that the neck opening was huge and the pattern did not call for any decreasing whatsoever. I decided that I need to decrease every stitch around, so I did that once, and it was still huge. I decreased all the way around a second time, and the neck looked about right. I tried it on, and yes, the neckline was perfect. Large enough to get my head through, and small enough that it landed just about where a t-shirt would land. The flaw now is that my neckline has puffy pleats all the way around. This doesn’t bother me too bad. I think it looks kinda cute.

I sewed on the sleeves and seamed the sides. This was easy, but fiddly. I turned the sweater right side out, and tried the whole thing on. The sleeves are too long, so I need to rip back about 3 rows of brown.

The shoulders are a bit saggy, I think that’s because of the weight of the sweater. On a small person this sweater wouldn’t be as heavy, but because my material is so big, it weighs.

Tomorrow or Friday I will go ahead and pull out 3 rows of brown on each sleeve and weave in the ends.

10-18-2018

I ripped out the yoke today and started with a new strategy. Hopefully this will end up more of what I’m looking for.

What I had was a V in the front and back. All I did was fill-in the V with straight rows in the front and back. I didn’t know how to join them with the shoulders because there was no way to join them. I took the yarn tails from the adjacent sides and tied them together in knots. I tried it on and the yoke is now smooth and the sleeves are pulled up to where they should be. You can’t even see where I tied the tails together. Tomorrow I will finish the neck.

10-19-2018

I finished the neck and it is much better than before. I have a cowl/turtleneck. It is a little bit bunchy, but I can fold it in if I don’t want it grazing my chin.

The shoulders are sitting where they should, and now the sleeves end where they should on my wrists, and I didn’t even have to pull out any rows.

Also, the knots that I spoke of above, didn’t exactly fly, I had to go back and reinforce what I had done with some stitching, but all is now secure.

Finally, I even weaved the ends in which didn’t take as long as I figured.

Summary
This sweater is wonderfully soft, and will totally keep me warm on the very coldest of days. I’m going to give the pattern 3 stars. No matter how many times I read about the A4 section, I could not understand it. I know it has something to do with the yoke, but the instructions were not clear, and that was the reason why I had to work it out on my own. This yarn is warm, soft and cozy. As one would guess by the nature of the yarn, it sheds like crazy. This is not a flaw in the yarn. I give it a 4 stars just because I don’t think it’s as versatile as most yarn options.