sleeve and garden

Leading with actual knitting content: I am making good progress on the second sleeve.

second sleeve! (and my bullet journal peeking through)

That is nine of the 15 sets of decreases done. I would like to get the sleeve done and then start on the hats I mentioned. After the sleeves, I will have to do a lot of picking up of stitches to knit the front bands and the collars, and that is no fun at all.

I also moved my garden today.

garden plotting (ha ha)

Last year in the early spring I got a spot in the community garden in our city which happens to be very close to my house. When you first get a spot, you get one back against the fence which might not get great sun so at renewal time I asked if I could move up, and I got a spot! I know this photo isn’t exciting but I am quite excited about moving up. I’m less excited that there are only two of my tomato cages in this photo, because the other two I had went missing somehow. (“Somehow.”) I sent an email to the gardener email list asking for them back so I am hoping someone returns them.

I’m not holding my breath, though.

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second sleeve, at last

I finished the first sleeve! I didn’t get a photo but here’s the second sleeve on the needles.

second sleeve! woot!

I will try to get a better photo tomorrow but I am not promising anything.

sleeve progress

I have made a lot of progress on my sweater sleeve!

sleeve sleeve sleeve

I think I have about two inches left before it is done and then I can pick up the stitches for the second sleeve and get to work on that side After that I think the biggest hurdle will be picking up the stitches for the collar. In any case, the end is in sight!

new filters and fuzzy friends

In case anyone is curious, this is my new air filter. It kind of looks like a giant version of the old iPod nano.

shiny

I bought it on Amazon, of course. For comparison, this is my old air filter, which doesn’t have fancy cycling modes or an air quality indicator (that blue light on the right goes red when the air is bad) and it is super loud but if the light on the new one is to be believed, it has been doing a pretty good job!

less shiny but still doing its duty

I need to figure out what model it is, actually, and buy a new filter. It has been running constantly for several days and I last replaced the filter last year during a bad fire week. I’m not sure how much of the smoke they can handle and I’d rather be safe than sorry!

In less boring, more cute news, my dog had a playdate today. They spent some time wrestling under the couch as usual, but then they had a rest, adorably.

doing a snoozle, as they say

I have been knitting on the sleeve since I last posted about the sweater problem but it’s too late to get a new picture. I’ll aim for that tomorrow!

sweater problems

I posted about my breezy cardigan in progress last year on November 3. As you can see, I have made almost no progress since then!

looks just like last year’s shot!

The problem is that i think the sleeve is too big. I knit a whole sleeve and didn’t like it and ripped back but I’m not sure it’s making any improvement.

bunch sleeve?

Then again, the store bought hoodies I wear aren’t exactly form-fitting either.

same problem, different sleeve

So maybe it is not so bad and I can just just keep knitting? That is the plan I am going with for now. The body of this sweater is just so much knitting. I can’t face frogging the whole thing and starting again. It’s an open, loose cardigan, it doesn’t matter if it has loose fitting sleeves as well.

Right?

(Please say right.)

current WIPs

As promised, here are my two current WIPs. First up is a Breezy Cardigan in ArtFibers Chutney.

Ravelry Project Page

I bought a sweater quantity of this yarn a while back and started another project with it but gave up on that one. It’s a top down wrap cardigan. I ‘m a little stuck because I knit most of one of the sleeves but it was too loose and I’m not sure how I can make the sleeve more snug when the number of stitches I start with is kind of set. If I decrease too fast it will end up poofy on the top. It’s a conundrum.

I had been working on the sweater pretty faithfully but I was going to travel by plane and I wanted to have a smaller project to bring a long, so I started a Deceit from the Curls book. This one is knit in ArtFibers Ginko.

Ravelry Project Page

This yarn must have been an end cone from ArtFibers because it randomly had 338 yards. The Curls book has these triangle scarves that you knit to any size you like. The increases are all on one side so it causes the edge to curl, hence the name. I am getting close to the end and I hope it blocks out a bit larger so that I can actually wear it when it is done!

There are, of course, other WIPs on my project page, but it might be time to make some decisions about those projects. We’ll see if I do, or if I just keep knitting what I have and starting new projects.