Something Red?

I've been working on the pattern "Something Red" with this really cool ribbon yarn that I got on clearance from JoAnn's last year. I've never worked a top-down sweater before, so it didn't occur to me until quite late that row gauge is just as important as the stitch gauge.

*Sigh*. That means I'm going to have to frog all of this. My stitch gauge is okay, but since the row gauge is much narrower, that means by the time I've gotten the correct length, the width is waaaaayy off. I've been mulling over what to do, and I think if I increase every 3rd row instead of every other row, that should fix the problem. I still need to assess if I've got enough yarn for this, though, since that means I'll need more than the pattern calls for. Bother, bother, bother.

When it started to dawn on me that I was running into difficulties, I switched to the other sweater that I'm doing in the same pattern. This one is knitted with recycled cotton yarn. I figured that it was easier to tell what I was doing with a yarn that isn't fuzzy like that ribbon stuff.

It came out alright, but again, quite a bit bigger than I had intended. Still, although it won't fit the person I had originally intended it for - - - -
it will fit me!!!!!!!! Perhaps my subconscious knitting mind had something to do with that . . .

So, honestly, what do you think of the color? It started out white, but I knew I didn't want to keep it that color, so I dyed it black, which didn't quite work but ended up gray.

Should I try over-dyeing it with red to get a nice maroon shade?

From there, if that doesn't work, I can always darken it again to black. That's the nice thing with being pregnant - people expect you to be fickle.

(Sorry for the blurry photos. I now know that I need to wash my mirror. How nice that everyone else now knows that too. Any volunteers out there for housecleaning? Any? None?)