11th Feb 10 First ball of yarn wound in preparation. Started a swatch, but the 5.5mm needles I used were way too big. #swatchfail (oops, too much twittering happening around here :)

12th Feb - Swatching again. Got gauge on 4mm needles, didn’t like fabric, so tried 4.5mm’s. Big improvement, and only 0.5 stitches over gauge, so I’ll try those and go for a slightly roomier sweater.

13th Feb 10 And we have cast on! An inch of neckline done, and it’s looking good so far.

17th Feb 10 - Neckline finished, half the raglan armhole increases knitted. It’s going well, but the rows are really long so progress at this stage is sloooow.

23rd Feb 10 - After knitting 8 rows to many on the armhole section, I frogged back, split off the armholes and am now working on the body section. It’s going a lot faster now that the sleeve sections have been separated off. I tried the sweater on for fit, and it’s marvellous, I can’t wait to finish it!

14th March 10 - Almost finished on the body section, just working on the ridged edging. It looks short, but I’ll make the sleeves first, and if I have some yarn left over then, I’ll go back and add some length to the body.

21st March 10 - As I guessed. the body has turned out very short, I’ll definitely have to add the the length. Have now started sleeve one, and will probably knit it straight after the initial decreases as I prefer a straight sleeve to the bell-shaped one in the pattern.

11th April 10 Nearly finished, just the hem on the body to finish. I’ve added 5/6” to the body length and it now looks just right. The sleeves are still at 3/4 length. I quite like them like that, but if I end up with some yarn left over after casting off the body, I might extend the sleeves some. Gotta use up all that lovely handspun yarn :)

16th April 10 All the knitting’s complete, yay! Now I just have the ends to sew in, and final project photos to take. The photo of the ball of yarn with the penny is all the yarn I had left, probably around 20g.