Slogging Along!

I'm more than halfway up the front of the sweater, and I've got the pattern pretty well in hand. I find myself thinking about my mom a lot while I knit; I'm infusing the sweater with love, I hope!
I have found a couple errors, a couple rows down from my current work, and was able to fix them without frogging back, which was a triumph! Feeling confident, if a little bored. I have some lovely cashmere I want to knit into socks, but I'm afraid if I start another project I will stray from the Fulmer, and at the rate I'm going I need all the time I can get on this.

Gathering Steam

Alice and I are getting along splendidly, and I've just finished the bottom band of the sweater (just in time to have the pattern sussed out and memorized, of course!). I had to take some time off when a commissioned project came in, and I was also working a pair of socks (my "I don't need to concentrate on my knitting" project), but now I'm down to one project and she's getting all my love. I commissioned a set of stitch markers at the outset of this project (a nifty crafting trade with a jewelry-making friend) and they arrived yesterday, perfect timing for the start of the sweater front body. Whee!

Getting On With It

I'm about ten rows into the bottom ribbing; so far, so good. I have placed temporary markers every ten stitches, as the pattern I'm working is in tens and it's such a pain in the ass to try to figure out how far back you missed a stitch (as I did in the first row, before I placed the markers). My friend Joy is making some stitch markers for me to use in the main body of the sweater, labelled with the letters to prompt me which pattern to work (the sequence is B, C, D, E, B, C, D, and there's no way I'm going to keep it straight, at least in the beginning).

Snowed In

I have been eager to cast on, but we've been snowbound these past four days and unable to get to the yarn store. Not that I'm complaining, there is so much playing in the snow going on that I'm completely wiped out by day's end and there's no way I could concentrate enough to accurately count that high.
So instead I am working on two-at-a-time socks and biding my time...

Firstly

I bought Alice Starmore's Aran Knitting last April; I haven't knit anything from it yet, but am about to embark upon several firsts. First sweater. First Aran. First major knitting project for another person. First epic, daunting, legendary pattern. My timeline is one year. Intended recipient is my mom. Wish me luck!
I brought the book home with me at Christmas and showed it to my mom. I told her that for Christmas 2012 I'd like to knit a sweater for her, and had her choose the one she liked best. She chose the Fulmar pattern, and requested a light blue.
I decided to go with Cascade Yarns Cascade 220 Fingering, colorway 7815, and ordered eleven skeins from my LYS, which I picked up yesterday. I swatched today, my gauge is a bit off so I'm going to use a size smaller needle (also, from my reading about people's experiences with Fulmar, it tends to run big and my mom is quite petite).
I have to pick up some size 1 circular needles before I can cast on and "officially" start, but the project is definitely underway!