Raise your hand....

if you think I'm going to run out of roving before the sweater is finished! See that bump of dark roving and those little skeins of lilac yarn? That's it folks....that's all that's left.

Granted that the roving is compressed from being in a box and granted that I'm exactly half-way through the body of the sweater - there's still half the body, both sleeves, the big patch pockets and the collar left to do.

Exciting isn't it? And you thought knitting didn't qualify as an extreme sport!

OK. Here's the plan. I'm just going to keep going 'til I run out. If I run out before I'm finished (notice the optimism there?) I'll contact that nice lady from Fire Ant Ranch. She's the provider of the lilac Shetland batt that I'm using as accent material. If she can produce more of the same lilac it will be more than just an accent .... how much more? who knows? (insert maniacal laughter here) (ooh - I just noticed that she's got Black Welsh Mountain Sheep - I wonder ... would that be a reasonable match to my mystery roving?)

Who's going to be the first to say ... 'but Cynthia, didn't you do this on your other project, too?' Yes, I underestimated the Shine Worsted needed for my summer sweater. I swear it's not just lack of project planning. The Shine Worsted shrinks a lot more than I thought. The roving - I'm afraid I just assumed that a whole sheep's worth of roving would be plenty. This is the first time I've tried to spin enough for a garment. I'm going to go buy a scale and weigh the work-in-progress and the remaining roving so I can get a better estimate of where it all stands.

Speaking of the Shine Worsted sweater - the front and back are both finished!