Prelims are Over

If I were an alpine skier, I just caught too much air on a jump.

If I were a figure skater, I just turned my triple into a double.

If I were a biathlete, I just missed three of my five shots.

If I were a certain hockey team, I just lost the last game of the round robin.

In other words: I'm not out, but I am risking my place on the medal stand.

The back. I'm through my first section of

three-colour stranding. (Thank goodness!)

Things have slowed quite a bit. Saturday was a wash out for knitting; nothing got done til the very end of the day. Then I made myself put everything else aside and set myself up for some travel knitting on Sunday.

And then on Sunday I got the sleeves started. Now, before you get excited, this does not mean that I got the front/back done (which would be the normal order of things). But I had the [brilliant] idea that I could start the sleeves to take with me now that the body of the sweater was confined to the house.

It was a [brilliant] idea that has worked out quite well. So on the drive to/from church on Sunday I got both sleeves done up to the colourwork. that afternoon I worked on the body of the sweater at home. And then in the evening I took the sleeves with me as I went to watch a certain round robin hockey game and got the bottom colourwork done on both of them.

Now that I just have miles of grey stocking stitch to do on the sleeves, I am going to do them two at a time on two cable needles. I've never done this before, but I think this is a nice project to try it out on.

Oh--surprise! I did the inside hem of the sleeves in goldenrod.

Since it will be folded into the inside and never seen,

it's a nice little happy detail just for myself.

Two-at-a-time is supposed to be a little more efficient, and at the very least I will only have to count the rows between in the increases once instead of twice, and the increases will match exactly on both sleeves. (Not that I've ever had the problem of them not matching before but preventive measures can still be appreciated even if they might seem unnecessary.)

Will it be confusing working on the body of the sweater and the sleeves at the same time? I don't think so. One thing that makes this possible is the interchangeable tips of my cable needle "system." I only have one set of the right sized needle tips, but I can unscrew them from the needles in the body and then use them on the sleeves. A little inconvenient, but not that bad. Or at least that's what I think going into it.

The very astute of you will realize that I actually have two sets of cable needles going in the sleeves, and shouldn't I need two sets of tips the right size then? Well, no. The only needle that really matters is the right one, the one that forms the new stitches. The left one is just there to let the old one go and really doesn't get a say in anything.

So I put a pair of smaller tips on the left side and the right sized tips on the right side. Then I still don't have to buy two sets of tips. Am I cheap or what? (Resourceful too.)

Alright, enough for now. I have to get back to knitting. Wish me luck on the two at a time and all this needle swapping!!