It has arms!
Friday. We were supposed to get a lot of snow today, so the school district canceled school. But we didn’t get any snow (though the ice was wicked until the sun came up). So, I had all three kids home. After finding out that school was canceled, I went back to bed. When I got up my PowerBook had passed away. Now it makes horrible whirring sounds and occasional clunks. I’m writing from the DHs Mac, which is usually being used by him. I won’t have much time on the computer until I can save enough to buy a new one 
But the knitting machine and I did some bonding today. My sweater now has arms. I had to knit a total of three arms, but I now have two acceptable arms, plus an adequate front and back. The first arm was just, well, wrong. Then I tried to start piecing it together, but my brain just isn’t that sharp–when I put the shoulders together I put one right side against one wrong side. Instead of the wrong sides together. I took that out. Here’s what the pieces look like. They are obviously unblocked.
I should have taken a picture of the bad sleeve. Maybe someone with more machine knitting experience could tell me what I did wrong. My guess is that somehow one row got knit twice. I don’t exactly know hot to explain it.
Tomorrow I will attempt to sew one shoulder up, put the neckline on the machine, and knit a 3/4 inch roll collar. If I am somehow successful, I will then sew up the other shoulder and the sides/arms. If all goes well, that means I’ll have a completed child’s sweater in less than a week. And, if everything I had knit was usable, I’d have about three sweaters (let’s see: four backs, one front, three sleeves). The other two children have already asked for sweaters off the machine. I guess they’ve decided that machine made is better than handmade. Where did I get these kids?
