lulu slipover

I cast-on for the back basically a week ago, and just finished the Italian bind off tonight. I would have likely been further along had I not a) been distracted by knitting part of my purim costume and b) been home earlier. We had a site visit today and I decided even though there was some traffic I wasn't binding off in the car (I worked on a new sock toe instead).

It's impossible for me to remember the last time I worked this bind off and I can tell I'm a much more patient knitter now. It was straightforward once I had the rhythm and paused to think how the stitches would be arranged if they were on two needles. I did find myself gripping the left hand needle a bit hard and feel soreness in both my thumb and upper back as a result. For anyone else working it, I will advocate better posture and arm support than I maintained (curled up on the couch with nothing on my lap and leaning into my task light) and even transferring all the stitches to a long straight bamboo needle. That said, it was worth it. There's other tubular bind-offs that can be worked but this one is good.

Now to join for the left shoulder and see how long the front takes.

I have experience with the final stages of this slipover as I finished it for a student last year. I'm looking forward to working them again.

I'm not completely in love with this yarn choice. It's a design that sings in solids but I think my marled fabric will look nice. It's goal is for warmth and I believe I'll have that in spades. Ok, enough updating, time to pick up and knit.

a little more speedy and a little more — wow I love this! It’s tempting to stay up even later past my bedtime to knit the front. I know I’m not as close to the end as I think I am, but there’s a blizzard coming so maybe I’ll take some extra time away from my desk to knit.

I won’t but I’m definitely tempted. I really want to finish this so I can wear it.

lots of Italian tubular bind off. This design features it everywhere so it’s good I finally have the *(knit off, purl on, purl off, knit on); repeat from * in my hands and my head. Every edge requires it.

I finished an armhole tonight. That’s going to be a lot of stitches!

As I stated back in February, this lulu pullover practically knit itself. However, I discovered I needed to be the one holding the needles and yarns. With everything happening earlier this year, I set this pullover aside for several months and when I pulled out the WIP I was disappointed to discover it wasn’t finished. So in about two days of on and off knitting, I finished it.

A quick unblocked fit test and I have a feeling I will get a lot out of this vest come cooler temperatures.

While I successfully did the italian bindoff on the bottoms, neck edge, and one of the button plackets, yesterday I for some reason my brain struggled with it being offset by one (starting with a purl), so for the last three plackets, it was faster to split them on two needles and quickly graft the handful of stitches. Similar end result, different path to get there.

While my wardrobe has shifted away from greens, it makes me happy to give this yarn a new life in a more appropriate fabric than what I’d initially knit it into back in 2011. The alpaca silk held with the single ply fingering makes a very beautiful effect.

I also borrowed a technique I found on social media (ok, two):

1. What really helped this semi-unwiedly fabric get finished is I saw somewhere dumping the project in a small bowl and turning it in that instead of wrangling it loose. That kept everything tidier and actually made it easier to work today when it was quite humid and I didn’t want all that wool on my lap. I bought a plastic bowl at Amazing Savings for Pesach. Unfortunately (by design) it doesn’t fit in the storage boxes so it became a year-round knitting bowl.
2. For the plackets, I modified a long tail cast-on to be tubular. It’s based on some tutorials you can find on social media/online and I practiced so I can show some students later this week a few different ways to work a 1x1 rib tubular cast on. Again, for the handful of placket stitches it made sense. And this is the real reason I pulled the project out this week and finished it. I need to keep ahead of my students, some of whom plan to knit the summer tee I started. I need to be prepared for their questions!

I wonder how long until I weave in all the ends and find the buttons I had in mind for it.