Kids, Don't Try This at Home

If stitches could talk:  "HANG ON EVERYBODY!!"

What you see here is probably going to get the knitting police called on me, and rightly so.  This is what happens when your itsy-bitsy circular needle is too small for the sleeve, your DPNs piss you off by snagging every single float and laddering every single color change, and you just decide to go for it and switch to the 16" circular.  These poor little stitches are stretched so tight that I am doubting the structural integrity of the sleeve.  Anybody know the tensile strength of superwash wool fibers?

Trained professional on a closed course; do not attempt these maneuvers.

In my defense (feeble though it is), this sleeve is getting bigger around by 2 stitches every 5 rounds.  So while my cruelty is real, it is also going to be short-lived.  Good thing, too:  this booger does NOT want to move around the needle! 

All of which has me asking "Is this really the best I can do?"  Surely there is an easier way.  Yeah, right.  If it were easy, everybody would be doing it.  I'm thinking this one falls under the categories of omelet-making and egg-breaking.  Stay tuned to find out if I'm right...