The Four Day Sweater.

I did it. Stillwater is finished (well except for blocking which will most definitely happen today, I'm almost sure). 

I shared my progress on Instagram - many of you were following along and it was wonderful to have your support! - so I have lots of photos. This morning I put them all together - they tell quite a story!

I used just over 800 yards of yarn (I added an inch of length) and made about a 33" sweater (details on Ravelry here). It fits great for a summer cardigan. When I knit it again - in wool - for winter, I'll add a little more ease.

I love the pattern - it's easy to follow with nice details (mirrored shaping, lace, the beautiful 3x2 ribbing) and look forward to knitting more of Marie's designs.

I'm not so sure, though, that I'll knit anything in four days! It was way more knitting than I expected - yep, turns out both of those time trials were optimistic - maybe 20-22 hours total? And the cotton, especially in that lovely 3x2 ribbing was hard on my shoulder and elbow. It worked out well that I finished the body (the first 2-1/2" of ribbing) on Day 2 and rested until Day 3 to start the neckband (293 stitches and another 2-1/2" of ribbing).  The neckband took me all morning and I had to ice my shoulder before continuing. I knitted just a little more that day (half of the first sleeve). Yesterday (Day 4), I felt fine (whew - I was worried!) and had no trouble - or pain - finishing the sleeves. 

All that knitting went along great with audiobooks - I finished two: Kerouac's On  the Road (About travel) and Auster's New York Trilogy (Set in a place I want to know more about) and started Ivey's The Snow Child (which will finally give me a second bingo when I finish). 

I also got outside to walk and run - we had a little blue sky amidst all the thunder storms.

In the evenings, we watched a few movies - The Infiltrator (Bryan Cranston is wonderful as always but the story is really bloody), Manchester by the Sea (definitely award worthy, but whoa, not very uplifting) and the latest Mission Impossible (I am not a Tom Cruise fan, but it was entertaining and perfect summer fun) and caught up on Grantchester (sigh. I love that show) - while I worked on some mindless stockinette (yep, Stole 2.0 is out of hibernation!)

And now it's Wednesday - feels like I've been away for weeks, not just days. I'm happy to be back!

Here's to a short week ... and another weekend just three days away!

Linking up with Kat to see what are y'all are knitting and reading.