Purple monstrosity update

About a year ago I was highly enthusiastic at the prospect of knitting my own jumpers. It amuses me that the last time I posted an actual photo of my first ever jumper was 11 March 2013, so, as you can tell, my jumper knitting has been going well! In the interim, to be fair, I did make a seemingly endless array of scarves and cowls, as well as a pair of socks, so it's not like when I periodically abandoned this particular project I didn't knit at all. I just didn't make the progress I expected on the jumper. Or any progress at all, for long periods of time, if I'm honest.

So, here it is as of today. It's been this level of complete for about 10 days now but I've been struggling with a return of my Medical Mystery illness and so I haven't really felt like taking photos and writing blog posts, other than to laugh at Burda earlier this week.

As you can see, the body is complete and I've picked up the stitches for one of the sleeves ready to knit. The distance of the camera hides many flaws, and it's really pretty terrible if you get at all close to looking at it. Even more problematically, it's basically a TERRIBLE fit. It's long enough, but my weight has changed enough since I started knitting a year ago that it's not at all the right size, plus it's really not the right shape for my body. I've more or less decided to knit short sleeves and an inch of ribbing, then do the ribbing at the neckline and call it done just so I can "finish" it, rather than knitting proper long sleeves. My reasons for this decision are based on:

Things That I Have Learned From Knitting My First Jumper (So Far)

1. Cheap yarn is a waste of money and effort. It's taken me forever to knit this jumper and the single biggest problem with it is that the inexpensive acrylic yarn I used that felt so soft as a yarn ball quickly starts to acquire a plastic-like texture as you knit and, worse, actually started pilling while I was knitting. I still love the colour of the jumper, but I hate the texture and clearly, if it's already pilling now, it's not going to improve any with wearing and washing. All this time and effort, and at the end of it a sweater that already looks shabby? Ugh.
2. Don't start to knit a long project on cheap needles. I bought a very inexpensive set of circulars to try them out and they haven't been all bad, but I knit about a quarter of the body with sellotape holding the needles together and eventually had to replace them. The original needles were so cheap that I don't consider them to be a bad buy, irrespective of this failure, because if you're just doing a small part of a project on a different needle size, and you're just starting out, it doesn't make sense to buy expensive needles in a dozen sizes. But I wouldn't start a major project on a cheap set again.
3. The trade-off between time spent knitting and yarn weight is way more critical than I realized. The problem is, basically, I really only like wearing fine gauge knits and almost all my RTW jumpers are fine gauge. That's mainly because I'm a big fan of layers and would rather add warmth through many thin layers than one thick layer. I do have a couple of RTW jumpers that edge into DK weight, but I tend to wear them less often and I would probably never wear a sweater made in e.g. chunky weight, because I just don't like them (and, to be honest, they're just too bulky on me, given that I am top heavy to start with). However, just the thought of how long it would take to knit anything substantial in e.g. 4-ply or lace weight fills me with horror. I kind of knew this intellectually before I started, but it's taken actually making a sweater in DK for the real force of this trade-off to become apparent to me: I haven't got the crafty stamina to knit in the weights I like to wear best; I hate the idea of knitting in heavier weights where I'm more likely to finish before I get fed-up because I'm much less likely to use the output. I'm such a utilitarian with my sewing, and it's clearly also the case with my knitting. If I make something, I expect to use it, I WANT to use it, and I will consider my project a failure if I don't.
4. Whereas with sewing I feel an urge to learn about technique and improve how I do things, I feel a bit impatient with knitting intricacies. I can see why people are into it, and why it could potentially be fun to get into all the ins and outs of patterns and fitting and technique but... I don't really feel like I want to. Basically, what I'm saying is that I am happy doing basic, easy knitting and I feel lazy and unmotivated to achieve a higher skill level. I'm actually OK with that.
5. I really really hate WIPs and wasting time and resources making things that I don't want to wear or use. This jumper hanging about in a bag for a YEAR has actually been like a rock in my shoe -- a tiny but highly irritating nuisance. I feel like I am probably better off with shorter, smaller projects, and also with putting my money into better materials so that I WANT the thing I finish.

Funnily enough, not all that long ago I wrote a post about the things I do and don't want to sew and knit for myself, and on the knitting side I've had a complete reversal of opinion. At the time I did really want to knit jumpers (despite the fact that my purple monstrosity was already proving problematic) and I was TOTALLY opposed to the idea of knitting socks. It turns out my Socks Of Terribleness improved 100% when they were washed and dried, in terms of the knit tightening up and the flaws becoming less apparent. They're still terrible, of course, but I love them to absolute pieces and can't wait to make more. Maybe I'll just become a really really good sock knitter. :D?