Filled With Accomplishment

This past weekend I had a great feeling of accomplishment, as I finished not only the first of the Jaywalkers, but also the Urban Aran Cardigan, excepting the zipper. It still needs to be blocked, but I'm pleased with it. I especially like how the collar turned out. I wanted a stiffer, more turtleneck-y collar and so, using suggestions from Streets and YOs, Aesthetic Entanglementz, and Brooklyn Tweed, I came up with some modifications that worked well.

Here's basically what I did:

1. Using smaller (size 9) needles, picked up the "correct" amount of stitches, as specified in the pattern, however, I did a basic ribbed pattern, rather than following pattern panel A up the collar.

2. Knit for about 1 ".

3. Did strategic P2togs and K2togs so that the collar was K2 P2 ribbing all around

4. Knit this ribbing for about another 1"

5. Switched to smaller needles (size 8s), and did all of the P2s as P2togs around

6. Knit the rest of the collar as K2 P1 ribbing to the top

7. Cast off

Next challenge: installing the zipper!