Instead of going bottom up, I’m going top down. And I used Judy’s magic cast on, because I wanted to avoid a seam, or grafting. So now I have a seamless start!
I hate how in Kitchener, the yarn always almost felts by the end of the graft as all of it is going through the stitches that’s a lot of friction.
This way I will also be able to finish with a very stretchy cast off.

I will work in the reflexive thread in the white band on the bottom.

Since I couldn’t meet the gauge on my biggest needles, I opted to add several stitches. Hood is 60 stitches wide, and the cowl will end up 80 stitches wide.