to steek or not to steek....

I am still pondering how i will knit the rest of this sweater. one approach is to pick up stitches around one edge of the bottom panel and knit up, with decreases for a square neckline, then cut steeks for the armholes. I like to pick up stitches for the sleeves and knit down to the cuff. Lynne's question, tho, was could i pick up stitches from a steeked edge. i wonder
if i did 2 rows of machine stitching at the cutting place, would that be stable enough for picking up stitches? on the other
hand, would it be any less strain on the fabric to attach sleeves to those armholes after they are knitted? Lynne is helping me
ponder this question and here's what she emailed me:

+++ for your armhole steeks...you can carry a pattern around the entire top of your sweater uninterrupted. This is a great advantage with handspun variegateds because when you knit back and forth the color goes back and forth and the colors that end up on the front two halves and the back half of the bodice are never the same. With your steek idea the colors would flow. In fact, it would look very flowy if you did steeks for the armholes AND the front...in other words did the whole thing in the round. The colors will still shift around as they always do, but there would be a natural flow.
Now I'm looking at your yarns again and they are more solid than usual because they are from carded blends, not variegated rovings...so the above is not totally necessary.

===the disadvantage...you will have an end to deal with for every single row. Some people just put tape over them...like gross grain. This works for the front of a cardi, but would be bulky for an armhole seam. you can have all the ends just waving around in there...after all,who's going to look? If you wash the sweater to block it the yarns will barely felt and stay put a bit better...but if it's superwash , there they be. I think that needle felting would be a great way to get them to stay put...you would have to poke each thread a couple of times...not too much as that would show on the front. I would do a test swatch...sound like a lot of trouble?

So, still pondering. what i think i want to do is use the Jo Sharp "Berry" as a background color and do something in fairisle and/or intarsia in 2 or 3 of the other colors. i have a LOT of the "Berry", so it could be the predominant color in the sleeves,
too. i have a few designs that i've graphed... a spiral, some flowers, a stylized hand, etc, and i love the spindle that Sarah
Swett did for the Spin-Off sweater a while back. (it's legal to use that, isnt it?)

i'd love to have any comments or ponderings that anyone has...... meanwhile, i have about 1 inch left to do on the bottom,
and will get that done tonight.