Powerless in the Hands of Fate

Did I not say that fate would slap me down? It would seem that the Stag Bag has played its next card in our little showdown. If you look at the picture to the left (you don't even have to look carefully, it's that bad) you'll see that I am incapable of making my chevrons do what they are supposed to. The killer is that of the four chevron areas, I'm consistently screwing up the same one. As the knitters out there know, I now have four choices: Unknit the last five rows one stitch at a time; take it off the needles and rip back; leave it in as a symbol of my imperfection; or get out the crochet hook and drop each of the twelve stitches down, then pick them up using the right color. I must confess that I seriously considered option three, but I'm giving this to someone as a gift and I don't think I could live with the shame of it, so crochet hook here I come.

In other news, the broken girl has been decasted and is now free to immerse her arm in as much water as she wants to. The break is healing nicely and as long as she stays away from monkey bars and cartwheels for the next couple of weeks she should be fine. I find it interesting that it is now quite easy to spot the break on the x-ray now that the arm is healing. On the original it was just a squiggly grey line, but on the new ones it's pretty obvious where it fractured.

Back From Vacation

We're back from our mini-vacation to Marquette (that's in Michigan, not Wisconsin for those who are thinking basketball-ly.) A lovely time was had by all, even the girl in the cast who couldn't get her arm wet. This was unfortunate as Marquette is on Lake Superior and we made several beach excursions. On the plus side, no one really swims in Lake Superior anyway, it's just too cold.

I accomplished almost no knitting while there. If I had been thinking I would have brought along a sock to put in my photos, which I understand is a very knit-bloggy thing to do, but I didn't think about it till I got home. I did do a bit of work on the Stag Bag, and this time it looks like the bag and I will be able to live harmoniously. I even broke out the calculator and figured out how to get the chevrons to work nicely in their new alignment BEFORE I got to the center panel. I would give myself a pat on the back, but fate doesn't like arrogance and slaps it down when given the chance. I will just say that I shall attempt to integrate the whole "forward thinking" thing into my knitting arsenal. I predict that it will last till approximately the end of this project.

Read Purl Rows From the Left Stupid

With the baby cardigan safely stowed away, it's time to start something new. I really like a lot of the patterns from Knitting Daily and I decided to start the Intricate Stag Bag as a gift for someone. The way the pattern is written you first knit the center motif, then add side panels, then the top panel, then the bottom panel and back of the bag. This means that the stranded knitting is done back and forth. I didn't really stop to think about this much, but it turns out that ALL of the stranded knitting I've ever done was done in the round, and my chart reading habits are a little hard to break.

The first time I started (you do see what this means, right?) I got through about 20 rows when I really took a look at how things were going. It turns out I should have done this a little sooner. When you're reading a chart and going back and forth you need to remember that you read the purl side rows from the left, not the right. If you choose not to, you end up with exhibit A, to the right. At this point it should look like legs, not some strange dot-to-dot Rorschach test. Ripping ensued. The second time around I managed to follow the chart correctly, but I couldn't get my tension right on the purl side rows. (I'm not good at catching the floats on the wrong side.) Ripping ensued. The third try was a pretty good imitation of the second, the only difference being that the brown stitches were pulling instead of the off white ones. Ripping ensued. I finally decided that back and forth stranded knitting is not for me and modified the pattern so that I could knit the sucker in the round. I made it about 3 inches on that go-round until I decided that I really did need to have a purl stitch on each side to keep the bag flat when I was done.

At this point, I have two re-balled skeins of yarn that are ready to go back on the needles. I'm gonna make this thing even if it kills me or, more likely, drives me insane. It's now a matter of pride. I shall not be bested by the Intricate Stag Bag!

The Hole Thing

When I do charity knitting I especially like making baby things. They don't take a lot of time (unless you're going the blanket route) and they're not usually very complicated. When I was learning how to knit the second sweater that I made was a baby sweater. I liked it so much that I made several of them for people who were expecting. It's been several years since I made this particular one and now that some time has gone by I feel like I'm actually getting it right. I feel this because I can now see all of the less than stellar instructions in the pattern. Take, for instance, the button band. I worked it as specified and ended up with what you see on the left. It's OK, but I'd really rather have the button holes not be quite so obvious. These were made by making a yarn over then purling stitches together on the wrong side. I decided that I couldn't live with them this way and frogged the button band back and did it again, this time making my holes by making a yarn over then knitting two together. This worked, but now my holes are off center. If I were smart I'd make a note that the ribbing on that side should start with a purl, not a knit so the ribs would be offset by one stitch. Anyway, I finished it off and now all it needs is the buttons and a nice home.

Son of Frankenstein

Looking back over the last month I discovered that I've been fairly self centered. All my knitting has been for me, so I decided it was time to put down the sleeve and do some charity knitting. My first thought was, "I'll whip off a couple of pair of booties." Seems simple enough; go through the files of patterns I've downloaded and purchased, find some easy booties and go. I looked back through the booklet that I taught myself out of because I seemed to remember some booties in there. Sure enough, there they were, with some cute infant feet modeling them.. I picked up my needles, found some leftover yarn that would make cute booties and knit. The booties were quick, the booties were easy. The booties...would not fit on any kind of human being I've ever seen. These booties were the right size for the Frankenstein baby.
I checked my needles, yep right size. I checked my gauge, yup right gauge. Then I looked more closely at the photo. If they made those out of worsted weight yarn, then I'm the Queen of Sheba. Needless to say, bootie number 2 did not make it onto the needles. I switched gears and decided to do my favorite baby cardigan instead. Tune in tomorrow for how that turned out.

On Cats

Right off the bat I must say 2 things: If you have a weak stomach, please don't look at the picture below. Even if you have a strong stomach, you might want to avert your eyes. Second, if you are Fiona Ellis, I apologize. I would have kept it from happening, but I didn't get any advanced notice.

I am a dog person. I enjoy the way they play, the way that they can always be counted on to be there for you, the unconditional love. Cats, I have a harder time with. They are aloof, they only want to be petted when it is most inconvenient, they are not fun. They also have a habit of creating hairballs. Since this is a known cat fact, I don't get too annoyed when it happens in my home. What I object to is the cat (hereafter known as Furry Flying Projectile #1) walking into my newly furbished craft room, standing over the pattern book I just put on the floor, and projectile vomiting on it. If you have a cat you know that the hairball ejection process involves some ...warning sounds. I was given no warning. He walked in, found a likely looking place, and regurgitated all over the Celtic Icon pattern.



While tempted to kick FFP#1 into next week, I restrained myself. I calmly did what anyone else of my temperament would do, I called the dog in to clean up.

Let the Decreasing Begin

So perhaps I was a little hasty when I said that I might lose interest in the sleeve. It has held my interest long enough so that I have gotten past the myriad increases, and am now set to begin the decreases. Of course this was accomplished by the wonderful parental tactic of placing the small intruder in front of the television for way too long.

On the subject of decreases, I have added a question to my list of "Things to Ask God About When I Get to Heaven." Why are our arms shaped like this? Why must a knitter cast on what seems like a good amount of stitches then add more every few rows? Why can't we have nice straight arms that don't grow and shrink, causing us knitterly types to have to do math and geometry and other unwholesome activities?