Where to start?

First off: Seaming Yarn. Since you pre-shrink all the denim pieces for this I spent a while thinking about what yarn to use for the seams. Of course one could pre-shrink some of the denim, but how? I decided to un-ravel my swatch and use that yarn. I think it worked pretty well. My main concern was that it had been knit up, and washed and dried twice, so it might be further stressed by sewing with it, but it held up okay. Another concern was that it would shrink a little more, but differently, when the sweater was washed again, but I don’t see that it did. Score ONE.

I was puzzled by one point in the finishing instruction. The pattern said to slip stitch the button bands to the fronts. I am familiar with using a crochet hook to “slip stitch” two pieces together (I did a lot of that on my first two sweaters,) but that seemed an odd choice in this instance, plus, when I tried it, I couldn’t hardly get my crochet hook through my two layers of shrunken-up denim. I wondered if it was some American/British terminology problem, and I looked all over the internet to find a Rowan Definition of Slip Stitch, but I couldn’t find it. I ended up backstitching mine. I also backstitched these sleeves into their armholes (twice, see prior entries.) This is still my favorite method of putting in sleeves, and my Confidence Continues to GROW in this area. Hooray!

I think I made a mistake with my M1 increases in the seed stitch panels on front. I tried to M1 purl-wise when the seed stitch indicated and I think that was wrong. Those increases look twisty and faulty to me. I should have just done a regular M1 and then worked it in pattern on the next row. I’ve done that on a different project since I did these fronts and it looks better.

Switching to decreases, I hate working decreases right on the edge (armholes, etc) because I think it makes sewing up harder and uglier. At least for me, with my Unfortunate Seaming Problems. I ALWAYS work the decreases one stitch in, but on this sweater I didn’t want the reverse stockinette part to look “Fully Fashioned.” I wanted to decreases to be discreet, so I slanted them TOWARD the seam, and I’m very pleased with the outcome.

In fact, I LOVE THIS SWEATER.