Let’s start with the fun stuff, shall we…

Here is the cabled neckline of my Corona Hoodie.

An in-progress photo that gives you the general shape before the hood was finished.

This is the baby blanket that I'll be sending off to my friend Haley for her little boy.

As far as actual progress goes, I’ve sort of been piddling around with stuff.  I did manage to finish the first sock of my Overlapping Leaves pair.  Then, I did a bit more work on my Curried Cable jacket.  I got the shoulder and side seams sewn, but I’m really short on yarn at this point.  (Technically, I have plenty of yarn, since I have two more skeins left, but I really don’t want to start a new skein just to do the finishing.)  At this point, I think I’m going to take apart the placket, finish all the rest of the seams, attach the zipper, and then see if I want to open up another skein in order to make the placket.

Other than that tiny issue, all is going well.  I tried the sweater on today, and it looks lovely.  Not too tight, but not a sack either.  I can’t wait to finish, and hopefully the weather will cooperate by then and actually feel like autumn.

I’m also super excited about starting my next project, the Curried Cable Jacket.  I ended up buying yarn at my LYS.  (I couldn’t resist taking a trip over there this weekend, since I didn’t have any pressing plans on my calendar.)  The yarn I was really interested in using was going to be far too expensive, so I ended up going with the Cascade 220.  It’s a nice sturdy yarn that will wear well, plus it is a very reasonable price; both qualities which put it quite a bit ahead of anything else that might have felt or looked nicer.  When it comes down to it, I want this cardigan to be functional, not just pretty.  I also ended up compromising on the color–neither brown nor ivory, but a kind of buff color, still in the neutral range, but light enough to really show off the cable pattern.

So, I’ve started the second sleeve.  Yay!

In other news, I might break my promise that I wrote about in my previous post and buy yarn for my next project (the Curried Cable Jacket in the current issue of Interweave Crochet) before this one is done.  Joann’s is having a buy one, get one half off yarn sale, which includes the yarn I was eying for my this jacket.  I just have to decide what color I want.  The practical side of me says that I should make a brown cardigan because that’s what I’ll get the most use out of.  But the aesthetic side of me is saying ivory, because the cardi would just be gorgeous in that color.  Decisions, decisions!

I’ve been a little obsessed with getting the Corona hoodie finished.  (In fact, I’ve told myself that I don’t get to start a new project from the latest issue of Interweave Crochet until I get this sweater done.)  As of Friday, I had gotten it to the point where I need to begin the sleeves.  The only problem is that I don’t have size 8 double point needles, and I’m not sure I want to do the sleeves with dpns anyway.  I’m thinking I’m going to use the 2 circular method, and just picked up an additional size 8 circular today so that I can start the sleeves soon.

In the meantime, I picked up my Moss Coat again.  I had already finished the back and was a good way through the right front before setting it aside to work on socks several months ago.  I’m now finished with the right front and am a few rows into the left.  I still I have a long way to go with this project, but I’m pretty pleased with it so far.  Maybe I’ll have it finished in time for spring.

Then this evening, I returned my attention to the Log Cabin baby blanket.  It’s been mostly finished for a while now, just needing the ends woven in and clipped.  So, I sat in front of my computer to watch last week’s episode of Project Runway and got all the ends woven in.  So, that blanket is now ready to be shipped off to my friend in plenty of time for her new arrival.

While it’s been a bit of a hassle to be sick the past few days (I’m still nursing a soar throat), I’m glad that I’ve been able to use the time to cycle through my current projects.  I’ve also realized that it’s times like these that I appreciate the fact that I can never settle down to just one project–I loved being able to pick something new up when the mood struck or when the need arose.  Never a boring moment around here.

So, it’s no surprise that now that I’ve taken up knitting, I absolutely don’t hesitate to frog my work.  I’ve even frogged a nearly finished sweater because it turned out way too large.  I suppose I could pass some of my mistakes off as a gift intended for someone else, but I’d always know that it was really my own lack of skill and persistence that tripped me up.

All that was just a preface to say that I’ve frogged a lot of my progress on the Corona hoodie.  I’d gotten to the bust increases and finished about one repeat of the cable pattern before trying on the partly completed body.  Uh, way too big everywhere except for the hip ribbing.  Okay.  So, that’s where I frogged back to.

I really don’t want to go down a size in the hips.  The ribbing fits nicely without looking too stretched.  I decided that I’d increase the decreases, if that makes sense…work a decrease about every half inch instead of one every inch, until I’ve decreased the number of stitches enough to make the waist the next size down.  Right now, the slope of the sides looks a little extreme, but I think once it’s on, it will look much better than my first go.

So, I need to begin yet again, but I’m not sure I’m emotionally or mentally ready to even frog back yet.  It may result in a complete breakdown or a long hiatus from knitting, neither of which sound appealing right now.

Therefore, I’m starting yet another knitting project.  I’ve had this Cascade yarn lying around ever since my failed attempt to make the Boatneck Bluebell sweater from Fitted Knits.  While I’d eventually like to try that pattern again, I don’t feel the yen to work on that right now and also don’t feel like this yarn is really the best choice for that project.

Instead, I’m going to use the yarn to make the Corona Sweater by CanaryKnits.  It’s a really darling little hoodie that also doesn’t look too “young” like a lot of the ones you find in the department stores.  I just love the cable pattern that goes around the hood and down the v-neck.  It may end up being a little on the warm side to wear around the Bay Area, even in the winter, but it will be something much nicer than a sweatshirt to throw on in the evening.

Of course, I’ve already had one false start.  I got my cast on row twisted somehow.  I checked and recheck to make sure it wasn’t twisted when I joined it, but I put my work down for a few minutes before finishing that first row, and I think that may be when I twisted it and didn’t notice because it was still the first row.  Anyway, I’m all good now, and I must say that it is a relief to be working on something that doesn’t require so much mental effort.

In sort, this project is going to be very good for my sanity.  And the Vogue Stockings…

who knows…