New Top Down Sweater

I recently started a new sweater, from a Mary Maxim kit I purchased a few years ago...

Not sure why it's taken me so long to get to it!

I hesitated in buying it - because the illustration doesn't give a lot of information about what the sweater really looks like or how long it is.

In the end, I purchased the kit because someone commented that this was her favorite sweater and she was planning to make another for her daughter.

It's knit from the top down, which is unusual for sweaters. The pattern calls for placing markers at certain intervals (dividing the back, sleeves and the two fronts). After using markers for half a dozen rows, I took them out. I find counting stitches works best for me...

Every 2 rows, the sweater grows by 8 stitches.

I hope that, in the end, it will be a favorite sweater for me, too - and that it will fit! I'm such a loose knitter that I end up making sweaters that are larger than expected. To correct that, I've started knitting a size smaller than I want the final garment to be, hoping that it will end up the right size.