Doubts...

Jordan's Whale01
Originally uploaded by runawaypenguin

I finished up the back of Jordan's sweater yesterday, and I am having second thoughts about several things. The first is sizing; 30" is way too big. This can be easily remedied.

The second is this combination of yarn and pattern. It has definitely been nice (and fast) knitting with worsted weight wool, and the stitches themselves look gorgeous. However, if I'm going to start over with this yarn in a smaller size, I will have fewer stitches, and I really don't want to loose any more detail with the whale on the front.

One thing I'm not having regrets about is this garter stitch border. In fact, I think it may be the only thing I will really miss when I start ripping this out. I started thinking about designs that incorporate an abundance of garter stitch. Everything by Elizabeth Zimmerman came to mind, especially the Baby Surprise Jacket and the Tomtom jacket, although I had a disturbingly difficult time finding anything she has written, despite my absolute certainty that 2 books and 1 pattern sheet are hidden in my bedroom. ("Disturbingly difficult" may be interpreted to mean that I did not actually find any of them) After this brief interlude I thought of Jared Flood's Cobblestone, clearly inspired by Zimmerman, and everything seems to have clicked into place.

I refuse to buy more yarn to make this sweater before I have used up the Zenith. Pangs of guilt will eat through me like Coke on a car bonnet if I take a trip to Webs before the final blocking. Conveniently enough for me, Jordan is a twin. The Zenith can remain designated as Jordan's yarn, re-purposed for a toddler sized Cobblestone, and his sister Isla will now be the lucky recipient of a whale sweater. Doubly lucky for me, because when I switch to a smaller yarn (I'm thinking Dale Falk or Baby Ull) I'll also be able to make a smaller sweater overall; Jordan is much taller than his sister. If I'm going to switch to a sport or even fingering weight yarn, though, I'm definitely going to take a less cavalier attitude about measurements before casting on. The last fingering weight sweater I cast on was Allouette, and the only appropriate description of its status is...languishing.

(Just a note--there is a fantastic example of a scaled-down Cobblestone here)