I’ve mentioned before that I knit huge. My Olympics sweater is so big (even though I checked my gauge before knitting) that I’m considering lengthening the sleeves a little and trying to felt it just a little. Lately I’ve been knitting a (size medium) casual v-neck sweater for myself. Because really, who would appreciate a hand-knit sweater as much as I would?
I’d already knit up 5 balls (that’s 550 yards) of this really soft superwash Merino wool from Knitpicks when I looked at the sweater and thought, “Man, this is huge.”
N.B. In September I knit three different gauge swatches until I found my gauge, and then my Medium still knit into Large proportions. (It was only minimally reassuring that all the measurements matched the Large sweater.)
I asked Sam– who’s not a sweater guy– if he would wear it if I finished knitting it. I’m pretty sure I love him enough to knit him a sweater. He said, “I’d have to see what it looked like on.” Well. Apparently I don’t love him enough to knit him a sweater he won’t commit to wear. I need my commitment up front.
So: frog. Frog. Frog. I’m going to knit the Small size on the next-smaller size needle , since the measurements for the Medium are a little generous.
And can anyone (Bueller, Bueller) tell me what’s wrong with how I’m measuring my gauge?
Learning As We Go 
Lily Chin had an article about gage drift in Threads a few years ago, she really spends time on it in her book on finishing techniques. I STILL have a big difference between my gage in the round and done flat. I can sort of compensate by using the “knit back backwards” instead of purling back, but that comes out tighter than circular knitting…swatching, important, frustrating, important…
If your swatch is big (6 inches square, not 4) that helps, also, if you suspend it from a skirt hanger, let it hang for a few minutes with a gentle weight (like a skein of yarn stuck on the ends of a knitting needle squewering the bottom edge of the swatch to keep it level) that should make the rows grow, and maybe the stitches too so you will get something closer to what it will do on the body.
Since you already have a huge swatch in the sweater, measure THAT before it’s all frogged, and use that as your magic number (and check the designer’s math – maybe his/her tech editor or test knitters missed something)
Yeah, it’s a bit too exciting sometimes.
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