Finally Finished!

This would have been done many, many moons ago, were it not for the Work Trips from Hell. However, fortunately, it did get finished. And, it came in just under the wire.

The Cobblestone for the Hubster is FINISHED! And just in time for his birthday, too (it was today) (Happy Birthday!)

It was colder outside than I thought. That's why he looks semi-grumpy. That plus the fact that we were on our way to his b-day dinner with my family and he doesn't like to think he might be late, especially if it's because his crazy knit-blogging wife needs pictures of her latest FO. In the cold. With no jacket.

Pattern: Cobblestone by Jared Flood (Interweave Knits Fall 2007)
Yarn: Cascade 220 Heathers, 7 skeins
Color: Ocean Tweed (#9414)
Needles: US 9/5.5mm KnitPicks Options
Started: 19 January 2008
Finished: 16 March 2008

Mods: My gauge was a little small for the pattern, and I hated the fabric when I tried going up to a larger needle to get gauge. So I knitted one size up from what I had planned. As a result, I had to jerry-rig the neck a little bit.

Hubster insists that the sweater is fine. I’m not thrilled with it at all. Yeah, I’m glad it’s done, and as Alyson said on her blog when she knit this sweater for her husband, the garter in the round yoke is a soul-sucking black hole of knitting.

I like the length of the torso just fine. Yeah, it’s a tiny bit long, but that’s better than short. But, the sleeves are way too long and the whole thing is just kind of big on him. It’s better than being too small, which was my biggest worry. He has no intention of wearing it for work, and he’d rather have big and comfy than fitted. But this is the first fitted thing I’ve ever knit for someone other than myself, and I wish it had turned out better. Or at least not something that would fit Andre the Giant.

I thought I had the damn thing finished around lunchtime today, but the neck looked big, so I had Chris try it on. Yeah. Ginormous neck hole. So I ripped out the neck, did another round of closely-spaced decreases, another round of purl, then re-knit the neck. Much better. I’m pretty sure this was a function of me compensating for my off-kilter gauge and I do not blame this on the pattern.

It is an easy/quick knit. The length of time you see above is deceiving. Remember, I lost three FULL weeks of knitting to work. There is almost no finishing for this project. If you use wool (like I did), it’s easy to spit-splice the hanks of yarn together which almost entirely eliminates the ends to weave in. Finish the neck, kitchener the armpits and you’re left with fewer than a half-dozen ends to weave in. I'd give my finished object a "C" which is not what I like as a final grade on a finished object.

Ah well. The next pair of socks are on the needles, and this now leaves my Options set (in my kick-ass new case [mine is the last 3 pics in her photoset] by Zonda!) free to knit my Alpaca with a Twist Highlander into the top-down Raglan pattern that’s been patiently waiting in the queue for way too long.

This week should have at least the tiniest bit of fun. Keep your fingers crossed! ☺