A Current Project!

Now that we're all caught up with previously finished projects, I'm ready to show you current projects in progress!  

This is the Sipila pullover and it's actually my second attempt to make this design.  I tried to knit this several years ago, but I wasn't happy with it, so I frogged what I had, and decided to try again later.  The pattern is written to be knit in fingering weight singles yarn (which I generally love by the way), and my first attempt was using Tosh Merino Light from Madelinetosh (a fingering weight singles yarn, in case you're not familiar with it).  I was getting gauge, but as I was completing the colorwork yoke, I just really wasn't happy with the way it looked.  The stitches felt too big for the yarn, they seemed to be slipping around a lot (which sounds weird, but I don't know how else to explain it), and I just didn't like the overall look of the fabric.  I put the project in time out so I could think about it and when I came back I actually steam blocked it just to see what, if anything, that changed, and then I made some decisions.  Despite getting gauge, it just wasn't feeling right to me.  I decided that either I would need to start over and use smaller needles (and refigure the sizing for my new, tighter gauge), or I would need to start over and use sportweight yarn at the original pattern gauge.  Either way, I was going to have to frog and restart the whole thing.  So I frogged it, and set it aside for a few years.  

In the meantime, my brain kept thinking about it, and I definitely still wanted to knit it.  I went through my notes from the previous attempt and decided I'd use sportweight yarn (and avoid the maths).  This time around I'm using Malabrigo Arroyo in Hollyhock and White.  I'm much happier with the look of the knitted fabric, and as you can see, I've knit the colorwork yoke, separated the sleeve stitches from the body stitches and I'm currently knitting the length of the body.  It's to the autopilot phase of the body, so I can pick it up and put it down without a bunch of figuring out where I am right now, and I've definitely taking my time knitting this!  It's good for TV knitting and knitting while brain dead at this point.  That will all change once I get the body finished and start the sleeves, because then we're back to colorwork!  The polka dotted sleeves are one of the reasons I fell in love with this design and I'm looking forward to knitting those, but there's no hurry - it's going to be months before I can even think about wearing something like this!