Relax - Progress

I've been knitting furiously on my Relax sweater and on Monday I got to the part where I had to start the under-arm increases.

Those were finished yesterday afternoon (24 rounds increasing from 302 sts per round to 350) so I then put the front half of the stitches on waste yarn and started knitting back and forth for the back yoke.  Because the yarn is self-striping, I made the decision to use three balls of yarn, changing ball each row so I -- hopefully -- don't get blobs of colour at either side of the back and front.  This does mean that the striping sequence won't match the body of the sweater, but you can't have it all!

Now, for the size I'm knitting (small, because I want an easy-fitting sweater, but not an overly baggy one), the pattern tells me to knit the back until it's 13cm tall.  I got out my tape measure and put it around my arm at the point where I think the sleeves are going to be joined to the rest of the sweater and 13cm is going to be much too small.  I need 16-17cm, so that's how long I'm going to knit the back and front.  I haven't read ahead in the pattern yet, but I'm assuming the sleeves are knitted by picking up stitches around the armholes and then knitting them down to the cuff (that seems sensible to me, anyway), which is going to involve more pattern-fiddling because I'm knitting at a different tension/gauge to the pattern.

Does that sound complicated?  I suppose it does, but it's not really.  It's a case of doing some maths scribbles on a scrap of paper and there's always Ravelry if I need to ask a question.  Someone on there has usually done something similar and is ready to lend a helping hand.

I finished Jamaica Inn a couple of days ago, so I'm now deciding which book to read next.  I'm not sure what I'm in the mood to read though.  I found Jamaica Inn good, but rather bleak, so maybe something much more light-hearted,  Or I might start reading Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's (aka The Yarn Harlot) latest book which is a series of essays (not necessarily knitting-related ones).

\I also received the e-book copy of Yokes by Kate Davies.  So far, I've resisted doing anything more than having a quick glance, but I know which design I'm going to make first.  Just got to decide if I want to knit another skinny-yarn sweater after I've finished Relax, or something in a heavier yarn!