Keep Calm, Knit On

Things are starting to calm down a bit here, but I wouldn't call it quiet just yet. After setting up the scaffolding late last week, the roofers started working in earnest here yesterday, taking advantage of a beautiful day to start removing the old slates from the roof. There was a lot of hammering going on, which made me very happy to go for my walk! My big work project is almost done, with the last read-through of the commencement program starting today, and Rainbow is back to school (remotely) this week. Somehow the craziness doesn't bother me as much when I have a routine to fall back on.

And, of course, knitting helps. I'm sure I'll need it much more as the roofing project goes on and the banging continues, too. My primary project has been my Aldous, which is finally looking like a sweater:

For once, the color is pretty accurate!

You're looking at the front of the sweater here; if you look carefully, you can see the column of purl stitches at the center back (obviously showing up as a column of knits on the reverse stockinette inside). I think I mentioned when I cast this on that I didn't swatch because I had knit a sweater at the same gauge in the same yarn previously, so I was pretty sure it would fit okay, but that didn't stop me from worrying -- gauge is such a fickle thing, after all. So over the weekend, once I had separated the sleeve stitches from the body and knit about an inch of fabric under the arms, I put half the body stitches on another needle and tried it on to be sure. I'm happy to report that all is well and the fit looks to be exactly as I hoped, just enough positive ease for the sweater to feel like a comfy (but not sloppy) sweatshirt.

My other WIP, which has been good mindless knitting for the more stressful moments of my day, is this pair of scrappy socks that I'm pretty sure I can finish up today.

I have just joined the final scrap to the second sock, which will take me through the final part of the foot and the toe. As much fun as these have been, I'm also looking forward to knitting a pair all in the same color and for which I don't constantly have to be weighing my scraps. The scrap bag is still very full, so I'm sure there will be more scrappy projects ahead, just maybe not socks!

I hope your week is off to a slightly less noisy start than mine and that all your WIPs are behaving nicely! See you back here tomorrow for a big reading update!