Brown Yoke Sweater Part 2 - the actual swatch

I finished the swatch prior to the Super Bowl kickoff (I know better than to knit anything critical during a sporting event - your knitting tension can vary with your emotional tension!), and washed and blocked it as I discussed in my last post on the design process for this sweater.

Then I placed two pins exactly 2" / 5 cm apart and carefully counted the number of stitches horizontally.  Be sure to count along a single row.

Then do the same vertically.  Here I didn't get my pins in along the same column of stitches, but did get the ruler placed correctly.  

I ended up with 10 stitches and 13 rows over 2 inches = 5 stitches per inch and 6.5 rows per inch.  Stitches per inch is the more critical number because that will inform your cast on number and therefore the diameter.   Length is a more flexable and fixable.  If a sleeve is too long, for example, you can drop the cuff off, rip back to shorten and reknit the cuff.  But if the entire thing is too tight, only a complete frogging and reknitting can really fix the issue.  

As far as the changes with blocking - the change in size / stitch count was minimal, but the fabric softened up and the yarn 'bloomed' quite a bit.   I do like the feel of the finished fabric.  

Next time - running the numbers and a cast on (or two).