Warning: Tale of Despair, Pt. 1

I hoped to post good news tonight. Alas, it is bittersweet, and heavier on the bitter side.

All day today I was working on my cabled sweater vest, knitting furiously away (and trying new techniques, to boot). I was so close to finishing it, you see. I finished one shoulder seam (thanks, Heidi, for the tip -- the crochet slipstich method worked great!) and I tried it on. Success! The sweater actually fit around me, which was my greatest concern.

After all my try-ons today, I had nothing but optimism. I modeled it one last time just a few minutes ago. I finished all the knitting on the neckband and armbands and had only the side seams to go. "It's going to be great," thought I.

I look like a linebacker.

Which is, needless to say, not the look I was going for. Yeah, as usual for me, the shoulders are way too big. I'm "blessed," as my mother reminds me, with a curvaceous figure. (Read: I've got a prow to make Barbie jealous.) There's no blessing about it (and I'm not fooled into believing that Mom's suggestion is anything other than a well-meaning parental lie). But the fact is that the biggest part of me is disproportionately large compared to my small shoulders, small upper chest, and small back.

Why didn't I consider that sooner? Why couldn't I remember what I learned a while back at a sewing seminar on fit that I attended? In the class, led by Sandra Betzina, no less, I discovered that I'm a victim of small, sloping shoulders, a neck that sits forward on said shoulders, and a number of other fitting nightmares. All of which require (pain-in-the-arse) alterations.

Yet I forge boldly ahead, assuming that if I just knit the pattern as it's written and cross my fingers while I'm doing it (an impressive display of dexterity, surely), that all will turn out well in the end.

Tomorrow I'll finish the side seams and give everything a final steaming with the iron. I know what magic an iron can work, so I'll put my faith in shaping the shoulders so they don't stand out from my body like the cut of the spacesuits worn by Erin Gray in Buck Rogers.

If that doesn't work, I'll try Plan B: I'll put my head in my arms and cry. Then I'll post a photo and we can all cry together.

* * *

But because I can't end unhappily, here's the photo I meant to post before Christmas. I intended to showcase only my favorite of the cookies I baked this year, but Groucho the Wonderpooch insisted on getting one of his best sides in the shot.