Six Days

Well, six days to go, and the state of the sweaters is… well, it’s not terrible, but it’s not great. I try not to panic because I can’t see how it helps speed anyone up,  but the urge to lose my scene entirely is starting to be a little bit tempting. I’ve got the fronts and the back of the Must Have done –

and just about the body of Remi. I’ve got a few centimetres of ribbing left on the bottom, though it seems a hair short to me. I’m quite short myself so this could work out just fine, tonight before I go any farther on the ribbing I’m going to slide all those stitches onto a longer needle and try it on. It measures what the pattern suggested, but perhaps the designer and I have different ideas about what length a sweater should be.  Personally, I like them not to show my belly button if I get something off a high shelf, and she may be unfettered by such desires, or perhaps has a far more elegant navel.

Tomorrow, if all goes well this evening, I shall find myself squarely on Sleeve Island, with four sleeves to knit in six days, which frankly seems like a bit much, but would be entirely doable if I hadn’t made a critical error in my planning, which is that I forgot that this weekend is Thanksgiving.  That sounds bad, I know, like maybe I’ve just remembered a major holiday with serious time commitments attached to it, and it’s not like that at all. I’ve been cleaning, organizing and shopping for days – It’s more like when I started this a few weeks ago I forgot to factor in time spent chopping mountains of onions and celery and souring the city for chestnuts and what the impact of that is on my knitting time.

I’m not going to panic though – I’m just going to knit. A sleeve a day will get this done, with a day left for buttonbands, sewing and making up. I’ll worry about packing… well. Later.

Sleep is overrated anyway.

51 thoughts on “Six Days

  1. Happy Thanksgiving! Dare I suggest pre-chopped onions from the grocery store? It would be more expensive but maybe the time saved is worth it? p.s. I had to click on the leaf. That seems seasonally appropriate. 🙂

  2. I suppose working on only one sweater and getting it done is entirely lacking in challenge?

    And I have to click on the light bulb – the universe agrees that this would be a great idea. 😉

  3. Your girls are grown and Joe is certainly capable. Enlist everyone’s help to get Thanksgiving duties done. Someone else can look for chestnuts, or chop celery. You may need those extra minutes – although you do knit like the wind and I’m sure they will both be done in time!

    (I had to touch the clock – and indication that time is running out?)

    • This was my thought exactly! Enlist the troops! Good luck on Sleeve Island. We’re all rooting for you. Happy Canadian Thanksgiving! I am thankful that the Canadian cold front made it down to Texas so now it feels like fall.

  4. You are a stronger person than I am. I have to practice the discipline of finish one before starting another one because I suffer from chronic debilitating startitis. I would be found years later buried under the hoard of half finished projects.

    Mine was a foot?… How is your sock club coming along?

  5. You got this! You’ve blocked in the hotel room before. Also, it’s a sweater per day right? So you can knit more at Rhinebeck. You aren’t going to be wearing them both at the same time- maybe you will…

  6. The drama continues! Will Stephanie ever get off Sleeve Island? Will she make the Remi longer, or will she just wear a shirt under it? Will she serve frozen pizza for Thanksgiving? Tune in again next week for another thrilling episode!

  7. Well, if I can’t get to Rhinebeck this year (failed last year in rolling over my reservation), then at least I can enjoy your travails with the sweaters. Wondering what your full (vegan) menu is.

  8. Oh my Steph, yet again I am in awe of your knitting prowess – you’d think after 15 years I would no longer be surprised by your ability to produce the amount of gorgeousness that you do, but such is not the case. How, may I ask, do you make this possible? Despite being in vastly different stages and contexts of life (I have 4 kids at home between 18 – 5, work virtually full time and am a single parent), I’m fairly sure our degrees of busy-ness are comparable yet if I can get one pair of socks finished in a calendar year, I’m doing well!
    Make no mistake, I’m not comparing myself to you in any way, shape or form, but I would love to know how you do what you do in reality. I’m sure I’m missing something somewhere!!

  9. Sleep may be overrated on sleeve island but here on earth having had the luxury of 11 hours sleep last night (the first in years as my children are small) I can certainly say that sleep is wonderful!

    All the best with your knitting frenzy and Thanksgiving celebrations

  10. You CAN do this. You have done many more difficult tasks and triumphed!
    Happy Thanksgiving. Such a wonderful holiday.

  11. I know Canadian Thanksgiving is different from American Thanksgiving, but here part of the fun of the holiday is that everyone is involved in getting the dinner together, so I’m sure you could rope some family members into helping with the chopping. After all, they wouldn’t want your arms to be cold next weekend, would they?

  12. Four sleeves in a week? I only wish I could do one sleeve that fast. Does it have to be both sweaters neck-and-neck to the end? You always make going to Rhinebeck it’s own show…

  13. Since my row gauge always sucks, my Must Have Cardi has been languishing in the Bin of Shame for ages now. My sleeve caps are too short for the armholes & I’ve not been able to bring myself to rip them out & retry that. Also, I may not have enough yarn, so I may just frog the the whole thing & restart it with some other yarn.

    Sleeve Island is always more bearable with chocolate, so 4 sleeves probably calls for a lot of it.

  14. Happy Thanksgiving!!! Four sleeves in 4 days! I’ve been working on a shrug for a 6yr old since late Aug & haven’t gotten to the short sleeves. I’m betting you can do it since I’ve followed you pulling miracles out of 2 or 4 sticks & yarn. Good luck & enjoy family this weekend.

  15. I am not particularly tall but i apparently have a longer torso. So many of the modern cropped sweaters are laughably short for me, as in, not even to the bottom of my ribcage, much less the navel. I do like wearing layers but i think if it’s sweater weather i want the sweater to keep out the drafts to my midsection!

    Good luck!

  16. Wishing you every good knitting karma and seconding the question on vegan holiday menus – post Rhinebeck, please. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

  17. Given the speed at which you knit I have no doubt that you will finish the sleeves in good time. That said, if you don’t…well…then you don’t. The world will keep turning and everyone will still love you and be amazed at how beautifully you knit.
    Have a wonderful thanksgiving and remember to breathe. <3 (in texting world that is a heart. No idea if it will work here)

  18. Oh, I just love you. I also love your readers. Especially the suggestion that you focus on finishing one, because…

    Yeah, I love you, and the Blog, and the readers. That’s all.

    • because…a) that’s so obviously the most likely path to (at least partial) satisfactory, wearable success, and b) it’s so sensible (and therefore devoid of daunting challenge) that we pretty much know there’s no chance of her actually embracing this as an approach…am I close???

  19. How’s the yarn situation? I’m confident you’ll get them done, as long as you don’t have to play yarn chicken!
    Happy Thanksgiving!

  20. This is taking my mind off the 37 days I have before my baby’s eviction date (37 days maximum, I’m known to go early, my instinct tells me it’s more like 30 days…) to knit two blankets, a cardigan, a bonnet and a pair of booties as well as finish a jumper for my 3 year old.

  21. I humbly suggest making one of the sweaters either a vest or a short-sleeved version so as to have two “completed” garments for Rhinebeck. The modified second sweater can be completed later.

  22. Good Luck and all that… but let me suggest you consider this… finish one all the way first! Then work on the rest of sweater #2 as time permits.. you may have to finish en route or there but you will have one to wear there!!! And As to Thanksgiving… I think for all of us out here in internet land… We are so grateful for you and your sharing your life with us. Thank You.

  23. Stockinette knits faster than cables. Have you considered plain sleeves? Also, how about one sweater for the festival and the second somewhat later? Remember we knit because it is fun, not to make ourselves crazy.
    No fires near me this fall, yeah. LA has them pretty bad.
    Julie in San Diego.

    • I am pretty sure Stephanie has fun with these “challenges”, she just pretends. It’s like when we complain of our beloved children, parents, etc. We mostly enjoy their foibles. Adds spice to life, etc.

  24. My motto has always been, “Sleep is highly overrated.” (Modern science is disputing that, but those scientists clearly don’t know the magic incantation, “One More Row,” which defeats the need for sleep.

  25. If it makes anyone feel any better, I just finished a pair of socks only to discover that I knitted them on two different sizes of needles. No wonder one of them looked too big and sort of weird.
    Frog and start over.

  26. Ahhhhh, so nice to see the well-deserved return of normality following your significant commitment of the rally. This all feels about right.

  27. Ummm …self imposed dread (yes, dread) lines are way over rated. I hope you enjoyed the day with family and friends. Knitting can wait and should wait. One sweater can be finished while traveling to NY. An other sweater can be brought out of storage. The other sweater can be knit on when-ever.

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