peach sleeves

Remember that big chunky cotton sweater I started a while ago? I finished the front and back and collar a couple days ago and am embarking on the sleeves. They should go fairly quickly. I put the frontback contraption over my head like a tabard and pinched the side seams together; it will be a snug sweater, but cotton sags so I think it will end up being just right. Remind me to make the sleeves shorter than I think they should be. And while we're on the subject, does anyone have a formula for how much smaller to make cotton sweaters so that when you wear them you don't look like you are swimming in a boyfriend sweater, where the boyfriend is a 6'11" giant who does body building?

My Knitter's Magazine came yesterday. I am underwhelmed with everything except for the lily-of-the-valley shawl. No surprise--if I got it correctly in the glance I gave the text while oohing over the delicate sprays of flowers, it is designed by the same Galina who wrote the Orenburg lace books. I've knit the palatine shawl and the medallion shawl is this year's year long project. I don't think I have any yarn on hand for the lilies right now-- although she mentions cashmere as an alternative; I wonder if fine baby alpaca would work? -- but it will go on my shawls-to-be list.

All of which brings me around to something that's been niggling at me lately as I wander around my rooms and see sad half-done sweater backs languishing in baskets and bins: I don't think I like to knit sweaters. I love to wear sweaters. I love to look at sweater patterns, and fantasize about wearing them. I love to design sweaters. I love to dream about having a wardrobe of gorgeous unique handknits I can choose from for every occasion. But the reality, at least right now, is that I'd rather be knitting lace. Huge expansive shawl-scope type lace with tiny needles and very fine yarn. The odd thing is that my lace shawls are kept carefully in drawers, while I do actually wear the few sweaters I've completed. So I don't know what this is all about, I'm simply observing. Is it heresy for a knitter to *not like* making sweaters? Would it be a terrible thing if I just knit lace and bought sweaters when needed? I guess not. Knitting should be fun, not a chore.

Comments

[claudia]

Do you need a permission slip to just go to TJMaxx and buy sweaters?

OK. here it is.....From now on, Carrie is allowed to only knit wildly impractical lace.

All set.

[Bill]

I second that! I also give Carrie permission to create whatever whimsical, possibly impractical fabric structures that come to mind. Play! Have fun!

On a completely unrelated note, given Carrie's title of this blog entry, I am now singing "Peachsleeves" to the tune of Greensleeves. Hmmph.

[Robin]

Oh yeah, I have that same fascination with lace--does it fit with my jeans-and-tshirt idiom? No. But I'm convinced I had a previous life on Unst. Maybe we were related.