I had a very nice afternoon starting my sweater, as my yarn came in today! I did all the prep work, swatching, measuring, washing the swatch, measuring (it was mostly dry), re-reading the pattern, re-sizing myself, then I FINALLY cast-on.

Yes, it’s on straights. The pattern calls for circulars, and I even started with a set of circulars. I know it says to use circulars for ease of knitting, comfort, and they’re just plain better. However, tonight I learned something about myself and my knitting. I can’t really do circulars.

I realize now that the only times I’ve ever had severe soreness when knitting was when I did the ribbed neckwarmer on a short set of circulars, my first shawl on circulars, and the “Vintage Beaded Gloves” with the ribbing that gave me hell. Ribbing, and circulars hurt my hands a lot. I decided that I can’t knit this sweater on circulars if it means I can only knit a few rows at a time. It would kill me to pace myself like that! I think my main problem is with the really slippery circular needles, and the drop off from the needle thickness to the cable. The stitches tend to want to slip onto the cable, and I unconsciously tense my fingers to hold those stitches for dear life.

When I realized this an hour after I’d decided I had to take a break from knitting for the night (after only 7 agonizing rows), I tried to transfer it to straights and that felt so much better. My hands and wrists still felt sore, but they didn’t feel like they were getting worse. No more addi turbos (I love them so!). It’s sticking to straights, DPNs, and wooden circulars of size 5 or less. I could continue this project on circulars if I got some wooden needles in the right size, but we’ll see. Perhaps I’ll do it before I get to the yoke, because I have a feeling it will make all of those cables muuch easier.

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