6/11/2017 - cast on 6mm for swatch.

7/11/2017 - measured swatch. 15.25 sts per 4”. Using the fourth size (42.5” in pattern) will give me a 50” finished bust, allows for the pattern ease.

COWYAK cast on; began knitting.

(first photo)

9/11/2017 - knit enough to join in the round. About halfway through the first skein of yarn.

(second photo)

11/11/2017 - finished first skein, started on second.

(third picture)

19/11/2017 - finished second skein, started on third.

Decided I’ll need to add a few short rows in the bust; have added three already, will add up to six. Currently following pattern to the point where sleeves are 60 sts wide; aiming for 66 (pattern for 42.5” bust, which works with my current yarn/gauge) or 70 (pattern with four extra rows just in case).

Almost thinking it might be worth it to knit the neck now, just so I have a better idea of how the finished yoke and neck will sit.

(fourth picture)

22/11/2017 - have knit five short rows, and am halfway through the round where the sleeves increase to 66 sts. Will take a look at the pattern later, and figure out exactly which row I’m supposed to divide bodies and sleeves on, and go from there. Just wanted to make a note now because I am crashing.

23/11/2017 - divided body and sleeves the row after the increase to 66 sts. (Knit an increase on either side of the front, knit the back straight.) CO 8 sts on each side under the arms, using backward loop. Knit a couple of rows; will get sleeves onto proper spare yarn, instead of a giant stitch-pin stitch holder, try on again, and get pictures.

26/11/2017 - got sleeves onto waste yarn, finished third skein and began knitting fourth.

(fifth picture)

8/12/2017 - used up the fourth skein a few days ago; given how much length it gives me, I think I will be okay for the sweater as long as the cabling on the sleeves does not take up too much yarn (I’m guessing a skein and change for each).

Cast on the neck from the fifth skein (one of the two from the second dye lot) and knit it to 5” with 5mm needles; will hopefully bind it off this weekend.

(sixth picture)

27/12/2017 - knit a third of the sleeve. Discovered the decreases were going too fast.

Ripped back, picked up again. Bought a special 16” cable needle to knit the sleeves with because the ends of my dpns were catching on everything. Knit nearly half the sleeve.

Discovered I’d been using 5mm, not 6mm.

Swore. Did not cry. More dealing with this later.

18/01/2018 - finished using up one skein of yarn on the sleeve! Got to about 1.5” short of the wrist-bone; it knit ~10.5 honeycombs, so ~42 rows.
Decreases were as follows:

• every six rows for eight repeats
• every four rows (so, on a cabling row) until the end of the skein.

I’ve got 47g left from the fifth skein (the one used for the neck); will use that one to finish up the sleeve. Should have at least two and a half skeins left for the body after the second sleeve is done.

(seventh photo)

19/01/2018 - finished the first sleeve; it took another 23g of yarn.

(eighth photo)

27/01/2018 - picked up and began knitting second sleeve. Since I didn’t note it earlier; picked up 10 stitches under the arm (5 before and 5 after knitting the sleeves). The first decrease row was the first cabling row.

12/02/2018 - finished the second sleeve! (20 sts in the cuff, before the super stretchy bind-off.) After the neck and the cuff-ends of both sleeves, I have eight feet left of the seventh skein. I am very proud of how close I managed to cut that.

(ninth photo)

Currently, I’m thinking that the sweater, being big enough in front, is a little overlarge in back. I’m thinking of frogging the body a little. I can’t frog it further back than the base of the sleeves, obs, but I thought maybe I could fold darts into the back, to decrease the width in back a little, and then knit down from the slightly smaller back width.

I don’t know. I’ll think about it a bit.

19/01/2018 - finally cleanly frogged back a skein and change’s worth on the body. Marked six decrease spots, each of which will carry four decreases. Knit until I’m ready to join the frogged skein in again.

I’m not decreasing the percentage done, but I admit to feeling a little disheartened.

25/03/2018 - after finishing the decreases, knitting on, and figuring out post-waist increases (one at each middle and each back increase, every six rounds until each point has five increases), I have knit enough to do two of the post waist-increases and finish the eighth skein. Also all ends so far have been woven in.

Progress continues. The fold behind the back neck isn’t as noticeable as I feared, and also there are ways to fix it.

(tenth picture)

06/04/2018 - finished the post-waist increases; thinking that another 4” will definitely be long enough, but not sure if that should include the ribbing or not. 59g left on the 9th skein; I think I’ll knit until I use up this skein and then decide.

08/04/2018 - finished the 9th skein. Joined 10th skein and knit to start of round, then began ribbing, adding 1 st every 11 sts.

14/04/2018 - marked how far I’ve knitted and weighed remaining yarn. Currently at 88g. Will weigh again after knitting two rows of ribbing; the difference should be enough yarn to do the super-stretchy bind-off.

16/04/2018 - two rows left me with ~74g of yarn, so it took up about 14g, and I will need to save that much for my bind-off. (This also means I can knit eight more rows of ribbing, or ten past my start-to-measure-marker.)

21/04/2018 - twelve rows took me down to ~30g of yarn, meaning twelve rows took up ~58g of yarn, suggesting that a row takes slightly less than 5g of yarn and I can do the bind-off with ~10g.

This also suggests to me that my scale is getting pretty flaky. I am not thrilled with this.

22/04/2018 - finished and bound off. Wove in ends. Complete. Pic to follow?