Despite my best intentions I did not finish Tesla by Friday night (I had told the ladies at Knitting Group I would). I came very close, but fell asleep in my knitting chair with only 3 1/2 rows to go. I made up for this by leaping out of bed at 5 AM, having been rousted by knitting dreams, and finishing before dawn. After knitting the last row I slipped the stitches onto a piece of yarn for a try-on before binding off; a good thing too, as it appears there is still more work to do.
As you may recall this sweater was for a rather wide boat neck, which might be fine in a wool with more elasticity and the possibility of a firmer bind-off. Tesla however wants to flow amoeba like wherever possible. I quickly realized that this sweater would have to be either so tight that it would be a struggle to get into, or it would skim the body rather loosely. There is actually a lot of shaping in the waist, about 5 inches total, but it only appears to keep the sweater from bulging out between sleeves and hem.
But back to the neckline:
The sweater is much like the original pattern, shown here except that it does not stay up or in place. Looking at this piece of knitting, I realize that there is no way I can use any bind-off I know and leave it as a finished neckline. I like the idea of using a coordinating yarn as a drawstring, like in my temporary try-on photo above, and then perhaps picking up an edge row from that. This would also allow me to firm up the structure of the neckline, as Tesla is not good at structure on its own.
But first I have much more knitting and quite a few more decreases and shaping to accomplish. I think I will have to guesstimate my way through this. I have a good idea how to start. Then I will just knit a few rows and do another try-on until done. Perhaps I better see if I have longer circulars, so I don't have to keep transferring the sweater on and off the circulars. Of course then the neckline will just flop all over the place....
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