Today’s good news is that the dpn’s arrived, despite having been ordered only yesterday from Meadow Yarn, my go-to source for needles. They are KnitPro Royale. They are beautiful.
But the bad news is that when I began to employ them, I discovered that the circular needle with wooden tips which I had been using, was grotesquely too small, 2mm instead of 3.5. Tamar, your comment on yesterday's post was prophetic. I don’t see how this could have happened. The grey metal needle I started off with was the right size. Why didn’t I notice the difference when I changed to the wooden one? Why didn’t I test the wooden needle? I usually do.
I went ahead and knit another scallop. The difference in gauge was conspicuous. That had to be added to the fact that the first three or four inches of the inside edge were distinctly messy – until I solved the YO problem, as detailed yesterday. When in doubt, take it out. I don’t think EZ said that, but it’s a useful maxim just the same. I started again.
C. and I have had a preliminary communication from our cruise company (early May, upper left-hand corner of the Scottish mainland) asking for contact numbers for our next-of-kin and anything they need to know about our food preferences. Meals are delicious, but we all eat together and there’s no choice.
It occurred to me, reflecting happily on this prospect, that lacey scallops might make good cruise knitting, being small and easily portable. Even if I have finished the first two sides by then, and picked up stitches for the first two borders, I could go on knitting the second scallop-strip. There will be excursions I don’t go ashore for, where there is the prospect of a healthy walk and no chance to sit down until the tender comes back three hours later. Just the afternoon for some bird-watching and scallop-knitting.
I’m going to London next month for a great-granddaughter’s christening. For that, however, I’ll take socks. Scallop-knitting isn’t very conversational.
Here’s the promised picture of Alexander and Ketki, dressed for Calcutta Cup day. I forgot to take today’s avocado picture, however, until it was too late.
I feel for you on the ripping back issue. I'm just knitting Houlland for the second time. The first one worked out well in the end but took a while to get going and the same is true of this iteration. I knit the edging strip and then discovered that I had inadvertently knitted four rows instead of two at some points, so at least half of it had to come out. Experience somehow does not stop one doing these things, but there is no rush and it is only knitting.
ReplyDeleteMust be rip-it-out week. I just ripped out two mitts, one which was completely finished and one half-done. Oh well. Shandy is right.
ReplyDeleteI'm better at ripping out since I learned to just breathe deeply and get on with it instead of being furious!
ReplyDeleteIt is the week for unknitting. I was unhappy with the yoke on a top down raglan, but the body was nearly finished. I snipped a row, separated the yoke and body, and started the yoke again, then joined with kitchener, the miracle stitch. Whew. A knit buddy of mine says if you go back and look at a mistake 3 times, to wonder if it needs to come out, take it out. I also think that sometimes the difference in feel between wood and metal needles can camoflage a small difference in needle size. I have done that, as well.
ReplyDeleteI picked up a lacy shawl that had been ‘resting’ for a number of years. I followed the pattern and 24 rows later I stopped to admire my work when...apparently I had changed some stitches in the pattern to make it easier and my newest knitting didn’t match. I ripped back those rows, knit them wrong again, ripped them back, then, literally, the dog chewed up the pattern and my husband tossed the shreds into the woodstove. That made me look for the pattern online but I needed the name. I found more pattern sheets with the yarn and, low and behold, there was my marked up sheet with my changes. It seems to have been a do-over week all ‘round.
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