I knit a sweater!
More specifically, I finally finished a sweater I have been knitting since August of 2020. Oops!
This is the Grace Pullover by Denise Bayron of Bayron Handmade (see it here on Ravelry). The Grace is a cable-front pullover with a mock neck, dolman sleeves, and a semi-cropped boxy body. It's knit seamlessly from the top down with raglan increases for the yoke and sleeves. It has German short rows for neck shaping.
The pattern called for Puffin by Quince and Co, a bulky, soft, squishy single ply yarn. So that's what I ended up using. I chose a beautiful orange colorway called Nasturtium. I ended up using U.S. size 10.5 needles to get gauge.
The Grace pattern comes in 10 sizes, up to a finished bust size of 64 inches with recommended positive ease of 2-4 inches. I chose a size 6, with a finished bust measurement of 52 inches.
I found the Grace pattern very easy to follow, and it knit up very quickly... in fact I had the entire body and one sleeve done by October of 2020, at which point I tried it on and was annoyed with how long the raglan seams were and how much sweater there was at the underarm.
From there I agonized over whether to frog everything I had knit and try to figure out some mathematical equation for doing the raglan increases in a way that would make the sleeve smaller and arm pit higher. I think the repeats shouldn't have been symmetrical between the body and sleeve, but I didn't have it in me to figure out the right ratio.
Then I just gave up and shoved the whole thing in a corner. I landed on sleeve island. For two years.
After a friend suggested a monthly craft night to work on knitting and crochet projects, I pulled my Grace back out, tried it on again and decided although the fit wasn't perfect, it was good enough, and I should just finish the damn thing and start wearing it this winter.
So I did! I navigated myself off sleeve island and was able to wrap up the project. Huzzah! Not without a little bit of peril, though...
As I neared the end of the second sleeve I was playing some serious yarn chicken. I had 4 rows of ribbing left to knit on the sleeve cuff when I ran out.
I ended up weaving in all my ends and combing those ends (I had left myself a lot) plus some other leftover bits (annoyingly there were a lot of knots in the skeins of Puffin I had). I wet spliced all those bits and bobs together (using this video/method) to get enough yarn to make it to the end of the cuff. Dicey, but I made it through.
I haven't blocked it yet. Denise recommends gentle blocking with this yarn, maybe just steam blocking. I'd love to get a tiny bit more length on the sleeves so my underlayer (a Vermont winter necessity) doesn't peek out like you see here.
But I made it and I'm pretty happy with my Grace sweater!
I wish I had the patience and skills to fix the fit issue, but honestly I'll wear anyway and I'm so glad I powered through.
