KnitMe

Parallel parking

You know how when you parallel park, you go back, and forward, and back, and forward, and when you're done you're sitting still? That's what this weekend was like in knitting.

I knitted and knitted and knitted every night on my Spinners Shawl while listening to back episodes of Cast On, and realized about 1/3 of the way through the border pattern that I would NEVER have enough yarn. I briefly considered spinning more, then I decided I should just rip back. So I ripped out 10 rows of border, and two 10-row repeats of the main pattern, then started going forward again. I have now knitted 16 rows of the border, but this one is going to look the same as it did last week until it's actually being worn.

I turned the heel on my feather-and-fan sock #2 and knitted the gusset. While I was working on it during the week I suddenly thought - oops I've done too many gusset decreases - there are 16 stitches on each needle on the leg and I had gone past 16 on the sole needles. So I ripped back the extra decrease rows. Then on Saturday while knitting during Emily's swimming class, I realized that I was supposed to decrease down to 14 on each of those needles so I'd have 60 foot stitches. So when I got home I ripped out the one inch of foot I'd knitted and went back to add two more decrease rows on the gusset.

I forgot to take my photos until after dark, so they are not the pretty natural-light shots I've been getting since last month.

I kept spinning my brown bluefaced leicester. I knitted a swatch with it too:

This is moss stitch, on size 7 needles. It made a nice fabric, but I was shooting for 22 stitches and 28 rows over 4 inches and I got 21 stitches and 26 rows. Too big for what I was hoping to make with it. I had a brainstorm last night as to what pattern might work - we will swatch again this week and see if my guess is right.

I also got some 100% cashmere yarn in a light DK weight from the eBay seller 'colourmart', enabled by Jan... Because it came oiled on the cone, I hanked and washed it before knitting so I would actually get some enjoyment out of the process. It still needs more washing, but after 2 or 3 soaks in Dawn about 60% of the oil seems to be out of it.

I wanted to knit something special - something light, not cabled or ribbed, and with a little lace, but not a LACE item necessarily... I ended up starting the Trellis scarf, by Evelyn Clark from a back issue of Interweave Knits.

I think this will be just right - I won't block it hard or fight its tendency to fuzz, so it won't be the perfect lace, but I think it will be quite pretty.

That's all I have today. Here is a cuteness shot of a little old kitty having her nap.

Posted by Prudence at January 8, 2007 08:32 AM