The Garment - Upper Section

The Garment has really taken on a personality of its own. Like Stephen Maturin, it is polite and pleasant company but also like Stephen, it often seems to have secret missions of its own.  It leaves my lap of its own volition and loves to tangle the three working balls of wool no matter how much I work at keeping them all separate. It is also now taller than I am which is the first time I have made anything so large. The two blankets I knit years and years ago were only 5' and 6' long, respectively. 

Here is The Garment's upper sections being measured from the waistband up. I pinned the back and fronts together from the underarms up and then pinned the whole upper part to the bed.  Also on view are some of the many ends which will have to be woven in when the knitting is finished. 

The Garment - Stretching Upwards

I am up to the underarms where I split off for the back which is now knit up to the base of the neck. This photograph shows The Garment about halfway up the back. It has become rather unwieldy to knit, the creature! There is now so much of it, I have to lay it alongside me if I am sitting with my feet up or have it almost sitting next to me if I am sitting upright when knitting. It has also just about outgrown its cloth water bucket home. I have been taking advantage of the change in weather and although it is still chilly and windy, I can now sit by the water and knit in the glorious sunny daylight, listening to the waves and doing some long distance eye exercises.

The Garment - Double Waistband

 
                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

I have decided that a double waistband would be deeply rational as well as a more supportive link between the upper and lower parts. To do this I knit the outer waistband with the button hole and then ran the stitches onto the red wool as seen in the photo. Using a 1.50 mm 40 inch circular needle, I picked up the stitches of the waistband on the inside (purl side.) At this point, The Garment was sent to my model for a fitting, hence the red wool. Upon its return, I knit the inner waistband on the regular 4.50 mm needles to match the outer waistband (upper photograph, outer waistband curling forward) and afterwards ran the 1.50 circulars through the stitches on the outer waistband (lower photograph) so I could knit the two together and close the gap. The result is a nice firm waist area from which the upper part of The Garment is growing.  I had, sometime ago, began to knit an upper part with live stitches at the bottom but did not like its shaping so I ripped it out and am now knitting this part directly from the double waistband, increasing twice at both sides every inch.