Jewel cardigan? Finished!

It is finished! In just over 3 weeks, which has to be some kind of record for me. Just a warning, there are a lot of photos in this post. Dave and I headed down to the Lake Washington Ship Canal for the photo shoot. If the rocks look familiar, it's because this was also the site of the zucchini graffiti last fall... I finished the Jewel cardigan (aka short-sleeved cardigan with ribbing) Sunday morning at about 10:15. There was a slight snafu when I realized the purl ridges didn't line up after I attached the buttons, but that was quickly rectified.
Project Stats: Short-sleeved Cardigan with Ribbing (Jewel cardigan)
Pattern: Short-sleeved cardigan with ribbing from Fitted Knits. I made the smallest size.
Yarn: Cascade Jewel, slightly less than 4 skeins. Yarn acquired from Little Knits. I've not seen it for sale anywhere else, so I'm glad to got my hands on it, because it's great yarn! Needles: Clover bamboo circulars, size 10.5 and 9. I'm a tight knitter so I had to go up a needle size on both needles to get gauge. I believe my gauge was spot-on, which is a miracle for me. Usually I'm pretty good with the stitch gauge and I wing it on the row gauge. That's actually what I did here, now that I think about it, but it worked out pretty well.
Time to knit: April 12-May 6, 2007. Just over three weeks, and it could've gone faster but there were some pauses while I found buttons and then blocked the sweater. The actual knitting was super speedy. Big needles = fast progress!
Knitalong: The Fitted Knits Along was great for help and inspiration! Thanks to all of you for dropping by!Impressions: I'm really happy with the way this turned out! It's not the most slimming sweater I've ever seen, but such is life with a tight-fitting bulky sweater! The fit is great, despite my concern about the bottom ribbing being too tight. I was able to block it out quite a bit and the added width from the buttonbands was all it needed to fit perfectly. It could be a bit smaller in the bust region, but it's fine. I will concede that it might enhance the cleavage, but that's not really what I was going for. Although there were several errors in the pattern (check the errata), it was easy to follow and well-written overall. This was the first garment I've made from the top-down and I really liked it because the progress seemed so fast, and it looked like a sweater almost immediately. For me the one-piece construction was key to my quick finishing of this sweater. I'm scared to death of screwing up all my hard work in the seaming of garments - hence I have a sweater that is completely finished apart from the sewing together, and has been completely finished for months and months now. The minimal finishing on this meant I wasn't intimidated and I could finish it quickly. The only finishing was the buttonbands, and I'm good at picking up stitches :) I loved working with this yarn, and highly recommend it to anyone who can get their hands on some. It's a bit thick/thin but knits up to be fairly solid, in that I could wear this sweater without anything underneath (although it is slightly itchy, due to the tight fit). I'm really happy with my sweater! Now onto the next - progress photos soon!