The 14-year-old sweater.

In 1995 I moved to Ottawa to start my first real grown-up job, working for Nortel (which, at the time, was still called BNR – Bell Northern Reasearch). I had a little one-bedroom apartment downtown, some disposable income, not many friends, and lots of free time. So I decided to knit myself a sweater. I found a local yarn shop, and bought a pattern, and some yarn, and a set of needles, and all the bits and pieces you need to knit a sweater, and I started knitting. My grandmother taught me to knit when I was about eight years old, and I practiced regularly during her visits and whenever I needed to knit something (Girl Guide badges, doll clothes, the occasional hat or pair of mittens) so the sweater went fairly well. It was an easy pattern: moss stitch with raglan sleeves.

Within the year (or so, my memory is quite fuzzy on the matter) I had knit the front and back and two sleeves, and had the remaining stitches for each segment on its individual stitch-holder. I started to sew up the seams… and ran out of yarn. I had the making up and the one-inch ribbed collar to go, and I was out of yarn. I failed to find any more of the same yarn, and so bought the closest I could find – which really wasn’t very close. The original yarn was a very lightly heathered beige in a wool blend (no idea what yarn it is, the ball bands were lost years ago). The new yarn I bought was a fairly close colour match for the beige, without the heather flecking, and 100% acrylic. It was the closest I could find, and I didn’t like it.

So the sweater pieces got put away in a box. Yep, I had a whole sweater 97% finished, and I stuck it in a box rather than finish it with the best matching yarn I could find. The box containing the sweater moved to the UK with me in 1997. It moved in the UK with me from my apartment to the house I bought in  Reading. It moved back to Canada with me in 2003. It moved from my house in Montreal to our homestead in Maxville with me 14 months ago.

And last month, I took it out of its box and took it to a crafting weekend organized by my friends who knit. They Oooh-ed and Aaah-ed over my sweater pieces and gave me lots of helpful advice and suggestions, and leant their moral support while I sewed up the rest of the seams and started to knit the neck with the not-matching yarn. I finished the neck a few days later at home, and had to research how to cast off – it had been so many years since I knit anything.

Disaster! My cast-off was way too tight, and the neck of the sweater won’t go over my head.

I was trying for a roll-neck, but I think I need to stay with the original (long-lost, but interpolated from the cuffs and waistband) pattern, and do an inch of ribbing for the neck instead. So I’m going to rip out what I have, back down to the stitches at the top of the of the front, back, and sleeves (yes, the same stitches that sat on stitch-holders for 14 years), and re-knit the neck in ribbing. I’ve found a bind-off that’s supposed to be extra-stretchy just for things like  sweater necks.

Wish me luck.