Thursday, February 17, 2005

The Einstein coat is done. I define "done" as (1) being wearable and (2) having no needles in it. Property (2) is not redundant; the other day I had left the house without a jacket, and when I became cold, I put on the Einstein, complete with a circular needle hanging from the collar. The people at the pharmacy were rather amused.

Today I left the house without a coat AGAIN (doh!) and ended up buying a new winter coat. Now, mind you, I did not actually buy a coat BECAUSE I was cold; I bought it because it was on mega-clearance-sale and it was the perfect shape and the perfect shade of dusty purple. I was smart enough to buy it on the small side, so it should still fit me next winter. (A size 8! How cool is that!) I am really happy that I am sufficiently close to my goal weight that I can knit sweaters for myself that I expect to be able to wear long-term, instead of merely temporarily.

Monday, February 14, 2005

I finished the Wedge Pullover. It got rather larger when blocked, but it's a casual style, so it still looks good on CH. He's requested a cotton sweater for next time, though, as the wool gets rather warm in the building where he works. I thought this was a fine excuse to buy a Honking Great Pile of Classic Elite Spotlight off elann.com. Never mind that the colors I got were the ones that would look fabulous on ME...

Meanwhile, I'm nearly done with an Einstein Coat. River Wools recently offered an Einstein Coat class; a bunch of my friends were in it, so I dropped in to see their projects-in-progress, and got inspired. I had a ridiculous quantity of Jamieson's Chunky Shetland in stash and it seemed like a good use for it. I was tremendously pleased that, although at the time I bought the book I would have needed to make the largest size, I can now wear the adult Small. Comfortably. And I only had to make a couple of teensy-weensy changes. First, the underarm bulk was more than I could bear, so I sewed a short seam up each side (connecting the upper right front to the upper back, etc.) to raise the armhole. Perfect! Second, I needed to narrow the neck opening a bit, so I left fifteen bound-off stitches unsewn on each side instead of seventeen. Also perfect. I just have to finish re-knitting a sleeve and I'll be done.