First of all, stripe knitting SUCKS ASS. *inhale… exhale*… May I present to you, TWO giant dish cloths. Yea, this is how far along I am on the Phildar sweater. And it has no shaping whatsoever. Do not be fooled by the slender edges of the pieces, it’s just the yarn curling. And short rows on top with stripe sequence? Har har har… bazillion loose end hell. What have I gotten myself into? That’s right, winnie, how very smart of you to do short rows AND switch yarns at the same time? *snicker snicker* I wanted to begin the sleeve knitting with tubular cast on, but at this point, screw it. Knitting 160 sts per row on sz 1 is just too, um, lovely, for words.

So, I’ve picked out my yarn for the Stitch Ya Neck Out scarf swap. And don’t worry, yet-to-be-determined-SYNO-pal, it ain’t black yarn. It’s a most lovely maroon-brown 100% superfine merino yarn. Wanna know what they’re destined to be? Click Here. Yup. I’ve wanted it since the first time I laid eyes on it, but the endless ribbing has kept me far far away. Oh don’t get me wrong, I have no qualms about ribbing, but 100% ribbing? *ponders* hm, I’d take lace knitting any day over ribbing. I am looking forward to knitting some Backyard Leaves, or Ruffles, or even Branching Out from Knitty. I understand that the first two are very popular picks.. so fear not, cuz here’s one happy volunteer who’s dying to knit them for ya.

Thanks to my fellow knit-bloggers who check me out from time to time, they’ve helped me figure out Phildar’s French-glish instructions. Special shout-out to Mari, who, out of the kindess of her heart, sent me an email with row-by-row instructions of the brain-fart-inducing shoulder/neck shaping described previously. The more I looked at the length of the sweater, the more it looks like pajama to me. I’ve decided to crop it down a little bit (only 2″), so we’ll see how this little stripey devil will turn out. Inspired by Tara’s short-row shoulder shaping for her short-sleeved Vogue top , I’ve insanely decided to be a short-row follower. With help from Nona’s “ask Nona” archives describing short-row shaping in detail, this Phildar stripey back currently has all its live stitches intact. Frankly, I have no idea what I am doing, but we’ll soon find out when the grafting happens. If it comes out well, I’m keeping the top. But if my spontaneous idea of cropping the top by 2″ turns out to be a disaster, I need to find me a shorter-torso buddy in a sz 4 to wear this baby.

This is OSW#2. And as luck would have it, I ran out of freakin’ yarn again. I only had the 1″ edging to knit, so I used some velour type yarn (cheapo) and it looks nasty — as in no stitch definition. Will frog that and use a proper cotton yarn. The purplish main body is knitted up with Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece, and it deserves better than the cheapo acrylic blah yarn.

Next up is my progress shot of the Phildar Stripey Top. Phildar calls it “Pull Manches Courtes”..um yea, whatever that is. It is being knit up on Sz 1 and 4 needles, and since my mom is here, knitting progress is s~l~o~w~~… this sweater will be growing very very minimally over the next few weeks. But I have one more picture to show you all, and…..

TADA!!!…. The no-sew knitted hem. Hee hee…that’s my biggest accomplishment with this sweater yet. So, I have a question for y’all. Is it just me or does Summer knitting progress slower than winter knitting? Maybe it’s just me.