June 30: All but buttons! My hyacinth Romy is blocking in the infernal heat now. The overall fit is…okay. I got the armholes too deep, but I think it will work okay as a jacket-type cardigan over another layer or two. This has been a fantastic learning project and I’m eager to adapt this same pattern again and refine the fitting.

June 18: Must. Force. Myself. To finish it! Got tempted away by new yarn and the boredom of knitting sleeves. Here’s the deal: finish this by the 4th of July.

June 11: It fits! The body is done and it has come out beautifully. This pattern has been extremely pleasing to knit (once I broke it down into row-by-row instructions for myself).

May 25: I finally created a spreadsheet, detailing every row. It was the only way I could possibly wrap my brain around the multiple things going on at once in this pattern. It looks a bit like this:
68 Knit, front increase 3, RS-row sleeve increases 5
69 purl
70 Knit, BUTTONHOLE, RS-row sleeve increases 6
71 Purl, finish buttonhole
72 Knit, front increase 4, RS-row sleeve increases 7
73 Purl
74 Knit, RS-row sleeve increases 8
75 Purl
76 Knit, Front increase 5 RS-row sleeve increases 9
77 Purl

May 24: This pattern packs a LOT of detail into an efficient but hard-to-read format. Besides converting for left-handed knitting and recalculating row counts where it matters for my gauge, I also felt like I’d better transcribe the whole neck and shoulder section row by row.

That took a couple of days’ knitting time, but it was worth the trouble. I’ve finished the shoulder increases and short-row neck shaping, and everything is spot on.

May 2: Swatching. Can’t get gauge with this yarn on any needles. Hm.

Repurposing the gorgeous blue-violet “Hyacinth” Wool of the Andes for something I think I can actually accomplish.