There is Little More Frustrating...

...than searching for a new ball of sweater yarn, only to realize that you're inexplicably out of said colorway. The pattern calls for two 25 gram balls of Twilight, and I'm woefully short. I knew that my row gauge was significantly smaller than the target, but I wasn't expecting to be quite this off. I've barely started the first sleeve, in fact! The worst part is that I can't remember if I have used both balls already or if I've misplaced one of them. Perhaps ball number two was a victim to the Great Move of 2007. Who knows? I think there is a Lincoln Park yarn store that sells Jamieson. (Any Chicagoans happen to remember the name of it? That would save me a trip to Des Plaines, or, even worse, Lake Forest.)

Running out of yarn is really only the icing on the cake. I had decided, before the Twilight yarn ran out, to take a break from knitting the sleeve to work on the collar. My decision was based not so much on the idea that I needed a break from sleeve knitting. Rather it was because of the fact that I accidentally broke my waste yarn stitch holder over the collar and dropped about 10 stitches in the process. Ergh.

Not only that, but I suspect that this sweater sleeve has been sleeping with the Gusset of Doom. My sock gussets usually consist of about 20 sets of decreases, alternating every row, for a total of 40 rows starting at 90-some stitches per row. This sleeve gusset, on the other hand, starts at 161 stitches per row, and decreases every third row for 72 rows, then every other row for 32 rows. At last count, I had only reached about halfway through the 72 rows. I guess the good news is that the rows can only get faster. But then I have a whole other sleeve to look forward to. I wonder if sweater knitters develop a Second Sleeve Syndrome similar to some sock knitters. Are there a whole bunch of one-sleeved sweaters in the world as a result?

So, as you can imagine, I haven't really felt that inspired recently about knitting. Between the recent vacation to Cape Breton, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and our most recent contra dance tour, I've had a lot of other things to think about. I'm sure the slump will soon end, though, after I figure out how much additional yarn I need to order from wherever it is I need to order it from.