I haven’t blogged since Tuesday. And I can tell you that’s entirely due to the legends of the fall sweater. I just felt as if I didn’t have much to say, and it was moving along so very slowly, that I said nothing at all.

I’ll be honest, I’ve really struggled to complete the legends of the fall sweater. The turtleneck came close to doing me in, and each night I’d come home, knit a few rows on it during knitting time, and then go do something else completely. It was GREAT for getting stuff done around the house. It was terrible for completing the sweater.

I even took the On the Beach sweater to work and left it there so I wouldn’t be tempted to work on it at home.

Thankfully, by Saturday I was setting in the sleeves. Now, this pattern calls for seaming the sleeves onto the sweater with a single crochet edging. I set in the first sleeve and fought with it terribly. SO MUCH FIGHTING! The trouble seemed to be that I bound off too tightly when I finished the sleeves so I was trying to make the sleeves fit the armhole opening. I got one sleeve set in and tried the sweater on. I was trying to ignore the puckering. But it was there. I set it aside and worked on On the Beach for awhile.

Then I realized that the problem maybe could be fixed? So, despite the fact I used size 3 needles for this sweater, I grabbed a pair of size 6 needles, ripped out the sleeve cast off, then cast off again using size 6 needles AND that nice stretchy lace shawl bind off. I figured one of two things would happen. Either it would be perfect, or I’d have gone completely in the other direction and now the sleeves would pucker. I set in the newly bound off sleeve. And it was SO MUCH EASIER! Everything was lining up nicely. On Sunday morning, I ripped out the too tight sleeve, and started on that one. Pretty soon, this is what I was left with:

A gajillion ends. Thankfully the only ends left were those around the armhole, as I’d resolved every other end on the thing prior to starting the seaming of the sleeves. So it ended up going fairly quickly.

I found myself to be way too lazy on Sunday to get motivated to get a shower and show off the sweater though, so it’ll have to wait. I am wearing it today!

We can talk about other stuff until the great reveal. On Saturday, in a continued effort to avoid the sweater, I took Miss Butterfly shopping. Here’s the thing, I may not like shopping but it’s a thing we are doing so often right now because it seems to be a thing that we can do together which gets her off her phone and talking to me. I also made a nice big list of chores around the house and we rattled those off too. One of our stops was at the Lindt chocolate outlet store:

There was Lizzie time:

These two had their heads together under my chair for so long I really did wonder what they were up to. No one knows.

There was knitting, in fact I was able to divide the sleeves of my On the Beach sweater, which was totally exciting. Take a look!

How much faster a sweater on size 8 needles goes than one on size 3 needles! It’s really amazing.

And finally, a Lizzie story. Now, ever since we got her 5 months ago, she’s been playing with this cute plush pineapple. It’s got a tug rope, a squeaker, and some crispy paper in it to keep her entertained. This is by far her favorite toy. So much so that when the first pineapple showed signs of dying, Mr. Ink went out and bought two more. We went through the second pineapple and 2 days ago we called it done and threw it out. I figured we wouldn’t pull out pineapple 3 for awhile, allowing her to use some of her other toys first. She quickly destroyed one toy we’d picked up, played a bit with a few others, and then yesterday I noticed that she was kind of oddly depressed seeming. She was laying around and sighing. Or she was acting weird, staring at me and bumping her butt on the floor repeatedly for attention, but nothing we did alleviated her angst. She had a number of walks yesterday so I knew it was not a problem of no exercise. Then I realized she hadn’t played in a day. So I pulled out a toy and initiated play. She played fetch for a bit, but it was clear she wanted to tug. I used the toy I had chosen for this purpose but it was really killing my hands. So, I grabbed the third pineapple toy out of the closet. And Lizzie went crazy. I mean….completely insane. Running up and down the hall, squeaking the squeaker, shaking the toy all around, throwing it in the air and catching it. It was so loud and so over the top that both Mr. Ink and Miss Butterfly came out of their respective rooms to see what the commotion was all about! I guess I finally figured out what that goofy dog really wanted….

And doesn’t she look thrilled?