Still working on the sweater...

I got lazy when it came time to do the back, so it took me longer than it should have. The sweater in the book has single-row stripes of something like four or five different colors (all the colors in the sweater). I've tried doing single-row stripes of single crochet before. It does not turn out well. So I have two-row stripes of red and brown for my backpiece.

One advantage of doing the stripes the way I did--I didn't have to cut and join after every stripe. Anyone who's done something striped knows what a royal PITA that is. But since my stripes began & ended on the same side, I was able to just carry the spare yarn up the side and switch off as I went. Not too difficult at all, and many fewer ends to weave in. Not as good as it could have been, as I stupidly started out doing it the normal way, and then accidentally cut it before it was long enough, but since I have something like sixteen separate stripes before the "armhole shaping" (and I use that term loosely), it definitely could have been worse.

There are a couple more significant changes with the sleeves. In the book, they're two different colors. Um, no. Not gonna happen over here. The other big change is that the book's pattern calls for them to be made flat, separately, and then sewn on to the body of the sweater itself. More trouble than it's worth, especially as they're made in single crochet as well. So I've already sewn the body together, and I'm crocheting them in place in the round. Much simpler. Here's a photo of the work so far:
I don't know why the brown part of the sweater looks pinkish in the photo. I'm not entirely thrilled with the way the stripes on the back part are intended to sort of wrap around to the front, but that's the way the garment is designed. Over all I am happy with it, and should have it completed within the next few days.

I've got plans for my next project as well. I'm going to do a similar girl's sweater, but with the intarsia piece on the back. I'm thinking of a unicorn. I downloaded some free charts today, and it's a manner of deciding exactly which I want to use and simplifying it enough that I only have to use two or at the most three colors. It's somewhat tempting to do a cat, since I love cats. But cats are so...done. I'm wanting to do something more unusual. The front of the sweater I intend to make into a sort of stitch sampler, but I'm not 100% positive on that yet. I know I want to make use of some fancier stitches. I have plenty of time to think of it.