In Which I Am Whomped by the Gauge Bitch and a Few of Her Friends

The good news is that I've finished the knitting on Autumn Rose. Here she is after knitting, before I cut the steek:Here's the back view:

After I cut the steek:And, finally, after I picked up the neckline stitches and knit the neck border:

Unfortunately, somewhere along the way my gauge went awry. After knitting three different sleeve beginnings as swatches, I finally settled on a US3 to knit the sweater and get gauge. Somewhere along the line, I must have relaxed quite a bit, because my 39 inch sweater is now a 42 inch sweater. This might not matter in a boxy sweater that was meant to be oversized, but this sweater was meant to be somewhat form-fitting. The shoulders, especially, are meant to fit precisely. I would need some serious padding to fill out the shoulders as they are now.

The question of the day, then, is -- should I risk ruining the sweater by trying to *gently* full it down a little to get a better size, or should I call it a day and try to find someone it will fit? I know the shetland yarn will full, but I'm afraid it will full too much. Any thoughts?

In non-knitting news, I went out today to find a present to give to a friend at a playgroup get together later this week. I found something for her, which wasn't easy, but I also got something for my family as well. I had to wrap the family gift so they wouldn't see it when they got home, of course. This was not as easy as one would think. The first wrapping paper I tried was not quite opaque enough to hide what was inside. The second roll of wrapping paper turned out not to be one continuous sheet of paper, but two different sheets on one roll, neither of which was big enough to wrap this gift. I finally found wrapping paper that would work when, yes, you guessed it, I ran out of Scotch tape. Luckily, I had some clear packing tape on hand to finish the job, but I can't help but wonder what I've done to deserve these frustrations?