What's not to love about the Top-down sweater?

Still toiling away on the Simple Knitted Bodice. I finished up the sleeve increases and am now just knitting away on one sleeve at a time (since they're large enough for a single circular needle). The pattern says to knit the sleeves until they are 16" or desired length, then knit the 10 rows of purl ridges. My desired length is long, like on the model in the picture. Not quite that long, but long. Now I don't have long arms by any stretch of the imagination but when I put that on last night after knitting 10 rows after the increases and measuring on the table that it was 15" at that point ... well, it was still way too short. So I think I'll knit the sleeves to at least 17" before I knit the purl ridges. It could very well be that the Tilly Tomas yarn is stretchy, or stretchier than the yarn I'm using anyway. But one of the things I really like about this pattern is the belled, longer sleeves. So my point is that it's very nice to be able to just slip that thing on over my head and really, truly see how long the sleeves are! Yes!

I didn't end up having much time for knitting last night because the woman who my real estate agent hired to come help get my house ready for the market took over an hour to go through the house and yard. She just went NUTS over the back garden. Just absolutely LOVED it and said that it was going to be a huge selling point for the house. It is pretty cool but ... I don't use it. And I hate to garden. She gave me all sorts of directions on how to move things around, where to put mirrors, etc. And truly - this is not going to be an easy house to live in if it looks like a magazine! Which is the whole point. "We're selling the dream", she says. I can really tell the difference between how houses are presented for sale now as opposed to when I bought mine which was 15+ years ago! Then you had to have some imagination and people just made sure the house was clean and tidy. Now though you have to remove over half ... yes, over HALF of your stuff. She says people have to look at the place and say "I want to live like this!". I told her about a house that S and I looked at a few weeks ago, how lovely it was but .... "Who lives like this?". "Nobody", she says. And now I see - people bring portable storage units up to their homes, store everything but the bare essentials and live in a magazine advertisement until the house sells. Which sometimes is pretty darned long. I am SO SO lucky that I bought in this neighborhood because it's about the only one in Seattle that is moving inventory.

All of the things she wants me to do are do-able but holy cow -- it would be very very difficult to maintain, especially with Tinkerbell. She said if she were me she'd move to S's house rather than try to live there. This is a possibility, especially (well, ONLY) since his kids are going to be moved out by May 1. The problem with it is that S's house is way out in Bothell. On the other hand it is just a block or so from the Burke-Gilman Trail and while it would be a long ride, the trail is flat and I think I could do it, especially since the weather is turning. Much to think about. And here's another thing on the side of moving in with S - when she went into my office/yarn room she said, "You're not going to like this. Take everything out except the roll-top desk, chair and wall unit." Store my stash???!?? Arghghgh!!! If I went to S's, I could have it with me. That's a biggie.