Catching up some old stuff...

...a few posts ago, before my long absence, I told you that I am on a yarn diet.  My purchase for Marina was to be my last purchase--my last "want" until my stash is drastically reduced.  Here is a Ravelry link for Marina.  Here is my lovely box of yarns:

Since I started the yarn diet, I have only purchased some "musts=needs":  the yarn for the Master Knitter, since I had nothing appropriate in stash, some black sock yarn for some gift socks, and some samples from Knit Picks, since my girls want machine wash-and dry yarns, and I will soon be out of my acrylic stash--I ordered one ball each of different yarns to knit swatches to wash with laundry a few times to see how they behave.

A dear friend on Ravelry lost his wife last year.  Her journey from the diagnosis to her passing took about a year, and he shared it with us in our group.  Another designer friend wanted to gift him with a Fair-Isle style sweater that she designed.  When she had completed the body, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and asked me if I could knit the sleeves.  I did a test swatch to see if I could match her gauge.  Just as I was finishing it up, to my horror, I saw that I had used a darker color in one stripe.  That's from knitting at night with poor light.
The only solution was surgery.  I picked out one stitch, unpicked the row completely so the lower part would fall off.  I did the same thing below the offending stripe.  Then I picked up the stitches, re-knit the stripe correctly and finally, grafted the lower part back on. Here it is in pictures:

 Notice the darker part on the left side of the severed strip:

 Picking up stitches to re-knit the stripe:

 Grafting--this is very loose.  The stitches were later all snugged up to the correct tension:

 Good as new--took about 1 1/2 hours all together.

Here is the whole sweater Misty Gardens:

 And a view of the special garter stitch trim.  The recipient was thrilled with it.

 Also since then, my yarn shop put me in touch with a gentleman who wanted  an Aran vest knit.  He chose cables from a library book, let me borrow a vest that fits him and this is the result:  Aran vest for Richard 
(this is a Ravelry link).

 One of my friends at knit group was excited because the fans with bobbles at the end reminded her of fireworks.

I do not know why the pictures loaded here sideways--they are in correct alignment in my file.

Have a great day, everyone.