In one of my previous jobs, a great part of what I did consisted of negotiating transactions. Now I do it with my knitting as a (somewhat lame) means of remaining focused on certain projects. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Regardless, it's made knitting more fun for me. Recent thing I negotiated with myself? If I finished the sleeves of my son's raglan sweater in a timely and satisfactory fashion, I could swatch for a new project and begin work on one of the pieces. I did finish both sleeves in a satisfactory fashion - but only after I frogged part of the second sleeve a total of three times for no reason other than my gauge looked shot. And it was just straight stockinette stitch, which was a little discouraging. But eventually I finished, which means that I got to do this:

Cream-colored cotton yarn in a worsted weight, bamboo 5mm circs, and one of the busiest pattern charts I've ever followed. The above swatch shows only a portion of the entire stitch pattern, so I'm sure I'll be knitting
this pretty jacket through May. Happy Spring!