It’s all over apart from the neckband and front bands, which are in progress now.

Loki’s contribution:

I finished the left side front of my Beadwork Cardi on Friday. Here are both side fronts:

I am pleased to report that they match. 🙂

I am now working on a sleeve:

The sleeves are far less labor-intensive than the body of the cardi because there is none of the complicated twisty stitch pattern. This cardi features a saddle shoulder, so that small center cable will extend up along the shoulder after binding off the stitches on either side. I’m thinking I will not bind off the sleeve stitches, but rather pick up stitches along the front and back sides and attach via three-needle bind-off. It will make for a much neater seam.

While I knit, Loki is relaxing on the floor, watching a tiger on Animal
Planet.

Last week I showed you the back of Beadwork that I had just completed. Here is the left side front:

It looks like I’ve not made much progress since last week, doesn’t it? Psych!

I finished the right side front yesterday. 😛

It took me two weeks to complete the back, and a week to finish the right side front. Therefore, I’m hoping to get the left side front done this week so that next Sunday I’ll be starting on a sleeve.

While there is nothing inherently difficult about this pattern, it is extremely labor-intensive. Worked on small needles at a tight gauge, it has patterning up the wazoo, worked on both the right and wrong sides.

That said, I am loving knitting it.

And Loki has been no help at all.

I finished the back of my Beadwork Cardi last night.

That’s approximately 44,469 stitches. But who’s counting?

Here’s a close-up of the main pattern:

I have just started on the right side front. I’m planning on an afternoon of binge-watching something and knitting.

Loki wants to know if he can select what we are going to watch.

Last week I mentioned that I was embarking on a project that is labor-intensive.It is this:

This is Jade Starmore’s adult version of her Beadwork sweater, published in Interweave Knits in the Winter 1999/2000 issue. That’s almost 20 years ago.

The child’s version of this sweater was published first — in Jade’s book A Collector’s Item. I loved it on sight, so I was very pleased when she released an adult-sized version of the design. Took me long enough to get around to knitting it, didn’t it?

I am using Wendy Guernsey yarn, which is basically interchangeable with the yarn called for — Alice Starmore’s Scottish Fleet. The gauge for this sweater is 31 stitches and 41 rows to 4″. I achieved gauge with a 2.75mm needle.

The design is labor-intensive because you work cables/twisted stitches on both the right and the wrong side of the work. At a very tight gauge. I am using a Hiya Hiya needle that at this small size is very sharp and pointy, so I have to be careful not to poke holes in my fingers as I knit.

It’s slow going (41 rows to 4″!) but extremely fun to knit!

Meanwhile, Loki is taking a nap in his tote.