Thursday, May 11, 2006

Smooch Restored!


I'm back to where I was before I had to frog most of my work. I think it looks much better with the proper shaping!

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Blame it on the rain and the pain

Last week was full of ups and downs. Sunday our flight home from Chicago was delayed 6 hours but I got to meet the famous chef Cat Cora! Monday I had my wisdom teeth removed and everything was going fine until the last tooth. The root broke off and they couldn't get it out. I had to see an oral surgeon on Tuesday to finish the job. Thankfully Wade was with me at the dentist. Originally someone else was going to pick me up but Wade took the day off since we got home so late from the airport. Tuesday the oral surgeon said he might not be able to get the root out and I might have partial numbness in my tongue, but he got it out and I don't have any numbness. I was behind on my schoolwork due to the flight delay and emergency oral surgery. I couldn't concentrate because of the pain medicine so I was going to watch all the things I had on TiVo and knit.

I'm making Smooch from the Rowan All Seasons Cotton Collection for my sister-in-law's birthday at the end of May. It is my first garment and my first project with lace. I'm very excited about it. I was getting so much done last week. This is where I have to blame it on the pain... Thursday night I got to a part in the pattern that said work until piece measure 16cm. My piece was already a little longer than that. I kept going anyway because the next line said work until piece measures 33cm. These instructions seemed odd to me but like I said, I wasn't thinking straight. On Friday I showed off my work to a bunch of my friends. I worked until 33cm and when I read the next instructions I was supposed to cast off for the armholes and end up with 64 stitches. I only had 64 stitches! This is what had happened: I had misread the instructions for decreasing and was only decreasing on one side of the work instead of at each end, so it took me twice as many rows and this is why my piece was longer than 16cm. Then I hadn't done the necessary increases because I made a copy of the pattern to take with me to Chicago and it cut off those 2 lines of the instructions. It didn't seem right to only be shaping on one side of the garment but I was on pain medication so I didn't think about it too hard. Friday night I was so confused about not having the right number of stitches that I took out the pattern book and realized what had happened. I had to frog an entire ball of yarn and then some!

I'm not as far as I would have been but I have made a lot of progress. The piece looks a lot better with the proper shaping. I glad that I realized my mistake before I finished the back. The instructions for the front are the same until half way up the piece. If I had realized the mistake while making the front I would have had to frog a lot more. Knitting this is really fun and I am thinking about knitting a different tank top for myself soon.