I came home early from work last night, and I’m staying home today.  I’m not sure what’s wrong with me – sort of a general achy tiredness, combined with bad allergies.  Last night I felt faint through an entire lesson, and I don’t want to terrify any kids, so… I think I’d better stay home.  Hopefully it will sort itself out – I have tomorrow off as well, so that’s 2 days to rest.

Last night my cardigan pieces dried, so I approached seaming them together.  Dear god, I hate seaming so much.  Really, I just loathe it.  This was especially full of nightmares, as I had to make sure the stripes lined up on most of the pieces.  The selvedge  edge was also not very useful, as the changing stitch patterns kept causing me to lose track of it, and it would be alternately too loose or too tight.  The only easy part was seaming the side with the lace all the way down.  This lets me know that it’s not I suck that badly at seaming, this sweater was just especially hard.  I did pretty well though, except for the sleeves, which are just ok.  I don’t think it will bother me enough to redo them, because seriously – who is staring at my sleeve seams?

Well, you all are now that I mentioned it, but… this took me nearly three hours.  I still have to add the button band, and probably I will get to that tonight.  Yesterday I bought some pretty pearly buttons.  The fit of the cardigan so far is pretty good, with one exception.  The sleeves (as I feared) are huge.  And this is coming from someone with longer than average arms, I will have to fold them to wear them.  They’re also somewhat wide I think, but I can live with that.  But, as always, I reserve judgment until the sweater is finished.  Edgings and buttons can make an enormous difference in my opinion of a garment.

While I was waiting for the sweater to dry I also made a start on the Puff Sleeve Cardigan from Fitted knits.

I’m using Cotton Fleece again, since I was so happy with it the last time.  I’m hoping that it will have enough bounce to work as a sub here.  I did have to go down a needle size.  So far I’m loving this pattern.  It’s certainly a relief to do a top down sweater after all that seaming!  My row gauge is a little different, so I’ve already had to do some adjusting (I stopped my collar a few rows early, and I’m hoping it will stand up right when it’s finished – right now it seems big!)

I also received my yarn from the Knit Happens sale yesterday.  I was so good – I only ordered some Cascade 220 (the quattro is for the U neck vest from fitted knits, the sapphire is for the Bluebell Boatneck from the same, and the Sienna is for stash.)

Left to Right: Quattro in Aruba, Sienna, and Sapphire Heather.

As an aside, has anyone else noticed that the Cascade 220 heathers and quattros are much softer than the regular colors?   I usually only buy the heathers, so I was surprised to note that the Sienna is noticeably less soft (although it’s still nice.)