Fulmar Baby Steps

I got gauge! Woot! This gorgeous electric blue is going to be my Fulmar yarn. How hot is that? Have you ever seen such a saturated blue? One of the things I love about the Silver Creek Merino is that every single one of their colors is stunning. They're not all wild and bold like this one -- there are pastels and neutrals, too. But each color has that extra little oomph that makes it really sing.

And look at the way those stitches pop. This is going to be a fabulous Fulmar, which is a heavily textured sweater and needs great stitch definition. Yay, yarn!

Naturally, this yarn is discontinued. sigh....

Anyway, I am so close to spot-on with the gauge for this -- row gauge is as perfect as it gets, and stitch gauge is 30 stitches per 4 and 1/16 inches. To be flawless, that sixteenth of an inch would not be there. But really, I don't think that 1/16 is going to amount to a diddly of a difference, even over the two hundred eleventy thousand stitches I have to cast on for the front alone.

Getting gauge feels sort of momentous. This pattern scares me a little (okay, a lot), and I keep saying to myself, in a very soothing voice, "Just take it slow. One step at a time. It's just knits and purls, like any other sweater."

Ha! Is not! It's got extra voodoo and wicked skeery stuff! And tiny needles! And La Starmore herself says it requires patience!

*panic*

Step one was taking the plunge -- admitting I wanted to actually knit this thing and buying the yarn. Step two was corralling a whole mess of perfectly innocent bystander knitters into knitting this with me. The poor dears. They're being very good sports, and several of them are showing signs of being fiercely smart knitters. Honestly, they amaze me. The support and kindness in this group is -- well, it's what you would expect from a group of knitters. We have a way of blowing the curve in those departments.

So now, here we are at step three. I got gauge. This means I don't have any more excuses. I said I wanted to knit it, I have a few dozen charming co-knitters, and ... I got gauge. *gulp*

It feels a bit like standing on the edge of the high dive for the very first time, with a crowd of supporters lined up on the stairs waiting their turns to jump. No turning back now!