As soon as my yarn order comes in, I'll be knitting away on these lovely projects.

The first is the Salina sweater, from Rowan Vintage style, to be knit in Rowan Felted Tweed. I am under the impression that Felted Tweed is a lovely yarn, based on the rave reviews it gets around the blogs. The color I chose was "ginger", 155. This is a departure for me, because lately I am attracted soley to green. (Thus the blog color) I am looking forward to knitting with such a warm shade.

Hanging out with the felted tweed in the box that may or may not currently be in my lobby are 9 skeins of Rowan 4ply cotton. They are for the Lucky Clover Sweater from Stitch and Bitch Nation. I like the idea of it being in this true gren color, because then it can be a good luck charm. I was motivated to knit it by the Lucky Clover Knit Along. If only the yarn would arrive I could start!

I've swatched for the lucky clover sweater! Got gauge on the first try with size 3 metal circs.

Here's the washed and dried swatch.

Sam thinks the lucky swatch is his... he promptly curled up with it

I've also started on a sleeve, which is slooow going. I couldn't get used to the slippery-ness of cotton on metal needles, so switched to bamboo, Addi Naturas. Hopefully the gauge does not change much. I was looking for Crystal Palace circs since I love their DPNs so much, but it seems noone carries these. Perhaps they are no good.

Anyway, in my quasi search for CP circs, I went to the most fabulous yarn store - Seaport Yarns. They have *everything*. really everything. Its located downtown in an office building, and has a surprisingly huge selection of yarn and patterns. The best selection I've seen in NYC. And they are sooo nice. I was very very impressed.

So ostensibly, my main project is currently the Lucky Clover Sweater. But, off the record, not much progress is going on with this sweater. I have most of a sleeve done:

and every so often, I'll do a row or two and neither like nor dislike it. Its a decent project. Whenever I think about it, I think "yeah, I will knit this!" but somehow I just don't pick it up and work on it.

Recently, I am knitting small projects from stash yarn. Like this:

A striped sock! Its a new and exciting 2x2 ribbed variation on the standard striped sock, in Regia color #5340. I do most of my socks this way, with 2x2 ribbing on the cuff and continued over the instep. The ribbing makes them super comfy and fitted.

You know what's cool about ribbing in self-striping sock yarn? It makes the color changes less visible. The color changes in stockinette stitch look funky. Sometimes the stripes are two rows high, overlapping in areas to 3 rows high, resulting in a look specific to self-striping yarn. (Sorta visible in the image on the right)

But with the ribbing, the color changes are obscured. So the stripes just look like stripes, without the strange overlapping. Which makes me happy.

Okay. I have decided there is no reason to be a slacker on the Lucky Clover sweater. Its languished in my knitting bag for about a month now, just hanging out while I worked on socks and legwarmers. and I didn't really care either way about the one sleeve in progress.

until it threatened to become an eternal unfinished object. The yarn said, hey, I would look really nice as an orangina tank or even a phildar zippered cardigan. how about it?

Oh no, the lucky clover sweater will not defeat me. I will defeat the lucky clover sweater! I will knit it into submission. UFOs are not my thing.

So renewed effort has brought me here:

A close-up of the second sleeve:

One sleeve down, one sleeve to go. I just started the 3rd ball of yarn, and since the pattern calls for 8 balls of yarn, this means I am 25% in. 75% to go.

Some people are knitting the body of the sweater in one piece. This is a swell idea for avoiding seaming later, but how many stitches is that? How long would it take to finish a round? I am not sure if I am up for this kind of swellness. Knitting in pieces breaks up this huge task into manageable parts. If the end is in sight, I am much more likely to keep going. So I will knit the sweater in parts as the pattern states.

and I will finish it. yes. and wear it this summer.

ah yes, I now have two Lucky sleeves. Someday I may have the whole sweater. only time will tell if that day will ever come.

Working with this skinny yarn takes FOR-EVER. Seriously. I spent hours and hours and hours of knitting time before coming up with this second sleeve. 3/4 sleeves were looking really good.

I lengthened them, as I usually do, to about 19" before starting the sleeve cap. Other than that, I followed the directions per the pattern.

With regards to the clovers and how close they get to the edge: I preferred at least 3 stitches (including 1 selvedge stitch) between the edge and the first clover YO. In some cases, I let a clover get by only 2 sts away from the edge, but usually only when it was going to be decreased out of existence on a future row.

At the top, I skipped what would have been the uppermost row of clovers:

And finally, for all pieces of this sweater, I have opted for the ever-beautiful tubular cast on:

because hey, if you're going to spend a definable portion of your life knitting something, why not throw in some tubular cast-on action?? In the greater scheme of things, its just nothing at all.

Is there more to knitting than 4-ply cotton and clover lace? Because I am starting to forget what that's like.

and can you really start anything without the tubular cast-on process? I am not sure anymore. This one is 4 rows deep, and its lovelieness has yet to wear off.

Last night, I went to see my favorite knitter at Lord and Taylor. Stephanie was excellent, and I felt fan-like flutters to see her in person. Plus, Lord and Taylor served wine, and had hors d'ourves, and gave out gift bags! so very nice of them.

Everyone was knitting. I brought the ribbed striped sock. Working on this wool sock and DPNs felt positively strange. My hands are being converted to the 4-ply cotton way of things.

So, amoung other things, Stephanie mentioned an anecdote about a garter stitch blanket, and how it may be dead boring to knit, but the accomplishment comes upon completing it and finding your will to knit intact. The lucky clover sweater is this way. I am determined to finish it now. A week ago I seriously contemplated abandoning it. But now, knitting is starting to MEAN 4-ply cotton on size 3 bamboo circs, with clover lace of course.

the end is in sight! I am under the impression that the fronts are going to go really fast. they pretty much just fly off the needles! I am practically done just thinking about them!

Here's the start of the right front.

So you might see cute Lucky pictures (and I can only *hope* one is forthcoming here) and say "that is cuuuuuute. I am going to make one." Winnie, Carolyn, and Dee have finished, and did a great job. Seems like it might be a fun project to knit, right? My advice to you: DON'T DO IT. Seriously, I could have made five, no fifteen, sweaters in the time it took to make this one. The neckband alone probably took like 7 hours. There is no reason to do that to yourself. Please, don't do it.

There is one circumstance in which I'd recommend someone knitting this: If you have about $60 total yarn budget for the next 3 months and already own SnB Nation. hey, this will keep you busy! go for it! see you on the other side!

I spent much of today seaming, seaming and seaming.

Here it is. The neckband is still in progress, but its getting cloooose.

Yea for a finished Lucky Clover Sweater!
Check it out!

Yarn: Rowan 4-ply cottom in shade 135, Fennel.
Pattern: by Melissa from Stitch and Bitch: Nation; Size Small
Gauge: 26sts/4" in stitch pattern on size 3 bamboo circs
Pattern Modifications: Adjusted sleeve length to 19 inches before cap. Also lengthened body to 13.5 inches.

So this project takes a while. But its definitely do-able. I rushed at the end and went into 4-ply cotton overload when finishing it. I took off some about-to-expire vaca days in order to do productive things like spring cleaning and updating my resume, but ended up knitting right through them! I was a knitter on a mission. My mission: finish Lucky and gain freedom to knit something else. But when it became apparent that the neckband was going to take just as long as the other pieces, 4-ply cotton overload set in. In retrospect, it would have been okay not to rush it.

Lucky knitters out there: take your time. Labor day is the perfect time for a sweater to be done. Knit it all summer. Knit other things too. Its all good.

Neckband Installation:
After reading Winnie's report, I took care when seaming the neckband for a nice v-neck style. I used the mattress stitch to seam the neckband evenly along the left and right fronts. Along the sleeves and back of neck, its necessary to pull in the sweater more. I seamed two rows of the neckband with two stitches of the sweater like this:

It might appear to be way off during the seaming process, but once the yarn is pulled tight, the neckband gathers the sleeves and back neck quite invisibly.

This is a super comfy sweater. The cotton is nice and soft. It is a bit loose, but for summer, that might be very comfortable. If I were to knit it again, I'd probably adjust the pattern so it would be smaller in the body, and longer. Not to say that I am doing that! This is my one and only Lucky!

So yesterday, Lucky was done. ostensibly. All parts were in place, and it worked as planned.

But something kept bugging me. After taking the photos and going through them, I wished it fit better. The body was loose, but when I tied the inner and outer ties extra tight, the sides wrinkled in an unattractive way. I knew even before starting that I was in-between sizes and had decided to go for this one. But it bugged me now. Was there any way to make it fit closer?

Since the inner ribbon tie was tricky to tie and somewhat bulky, I decided to try modifying the ties so that the inner tie threads through the right side seam and wraps around the back, meeting the other one at the left side. It would eliminate the inner ribbon tie. The Rebecca wrap is done this way, as are some commercially-knit wrap sweaters.

I'm not sure if you'll be able to tell in the photos, but the fit is really improved!

I am picky in this way, but for me this was the difference between an OK sweater and a favorite sweater. It feels more secure. Although it did require more knitting of the 1x1 ribbing!

*now* its done! really. I promise.