The Twilight Hours

I joke that I have all the spare time I need: between 9pm and 5 am.  But you see the flaw in my plan: that is when I do laundry.

There are days when I grab my knitting bag, set it down next to me,  but never take it out. Too tired to knit.

These days, I do the same with my work bag.  After I put the kids to sleep, I pull out my work bag, with the laptop and files that I didn't get to today. Or yesterday. I look at the bag.  I know what is in there. I know it is work I should have done a few days ago.  But I am just too tired. Too tired to knit.  Too tired to work. Too tired to think.

This does not bode well.  It makes me cranky.

The most I did knitting-related tonight was to cruise on Ravelry. I am looking for alternative patterns for the tank top. There is no way there is going to be enough yarn. I need a top-down knit 'till you run out of yarn kind of pattern. I have a few ideas, and some front runners,  but no conclusions.

Today, it is all about the neglected work/knitting bags.

Contingency Plan

I am very concerned about the yarn for the tank top. I have four balls of  Grass.  I received those balls in a yarn exchange, so there is no hope of finding more.  I mean, really, the emergency yarn from Poland was a once in a lifetime fluke.

So I have started knitting the Shapely Tank, but even as I cast on, I don't think that I will have enough yarn. At least, I won't have to knit all of it, only to come up short with only a few inches to go. Again. Four balls, two sides. If I haven't completed the front with two balls, all hope is lost.

I am so pessimistic, I already have a contingency plan. 2 and 1/2 inches, and I have a back-up plan. Still a tank top, just a little skimpier. And knit the bra portion first, then the body top down, in the round. I can knit until I run out of yarn.

Today, it is all about Plan B.

One Problem Created, One Problem Solved

So I am about ten rows into Celtic Sage.  A decent start, except that the lace just doesn't look right.  I mean, it looks fine, but the decreases jsut aren't where I would expect them to me.  My assumption is that the probelm was user error.  I got one row off where I should be, and was continuing the problem.  So i knit the border in some scrap worsted, and it ended up the same way. 

Ok, so now I have the choice of knitting as written, assuming that the real problem is user expectation, and that there is nothing inherently wrong with the pattern.  Or I could do some work, and adjust the pattern so the decreases are where I think they should be.  Later, just thinking about that makes my head hurt.

 

Meanwhile, I solved the issue I was having with my mittens.  I wasn't sure what to do with the thumb.  Stiches held on waste yarn to be knit into thumb later.  Problem solved, and continuing on. 

The colorwork isn't difficult, but does take a high level of concentration.  Two purple, two white, one purple, and so on, all the way around the row.  I think I will like the end product, but I have a feeling these mittens will be a long time in progress. 

 The pattern is starting to take shape, which is encouraging.  Hopefully, enough to keep me interested. 

Meanwhile, I have been tempted to start something else.  I uncovered four cotton linen balls, and started picture a cute, clingy tank.  An unfortunately skimpy tank, since I only have the four balls, and no hope of finding more.  (They were received as part of the Christmas Yankee Yarn Swap.)  

I am barely passed the experimentation stage, so there isn't much to see yet.  I have cast on, but since I didn't have the yarn to spare on a swatch, I may be ripping and re-starting.  

And I just realized that I am working on a cotton tank in the same week as wool mittens.  

Today, it is all about the contradictions.   

Delusions and Design

I have started the knitting on my frankenstein-designed Celtic Lace Shawl. At some point, I had to stop working and re-working the math, and cast on.

That was scary enough, so much so that I found myself in a strange delusional state. I knit a few rows, then found myself wondering what was taking so long to find out if my design worked. Apparently, in my zeal for my first pseudo-design, I forgot how long knitting takes.

Sometimes, I am amazed at how dense I can be about knitting. I have been knitting for almost twenty years. I really have no excuse.

I am going to this loud and clear, so everyone in the cheap seats can hear, even those as apparently dense as I.

YOU CANNOT KNIT A FINGERING LACE SHAWL IN TWO EVENINGS, EVEN IF THAT IT HOW LONG IT TOOK TO DESIGN IT.

I will learn one of these days, I swear.

Today, it is all about the learning curve.

Back to the Math

I should apologize to my faithful readers.  Both of them.  I have been a very neglectful blogger.  Busy, work, kids, blah, blah, blah.

But my needles and knitting juices have not been idle.  Quite the contrary.  I found myself all alone at Knittervention.  I had arranged a sitter, and was determined to enjoy myself.  I ended up finished and binding off my Mother's scarf.  A Christmas present finally finished in June.  Now there is something to be proud of, right?

 My Annis Shawlette is blocked, and I have learned to charmingly drape it around my neck.  Just in time for the 80 degree weather.  May was more like July in Indiana, certainly not shawl weather, not even a small one.  I stubbornly wore it a couple times, then carefully folded it away until autumn.  Or a freak cold snap in July right after I finish a cotton/linen tank top.  Such is my luck.

    I have been knitting quite a bit on the place-mat.  The pattern is nice.  Easy, but just enough to keep me interested.  I am looking forward to having these place-mats in my kitchen.  Then I realize that I currently have eight place-mats.  There are only four diners in my family, but two of them are still dodgy about their fork abilities, so the place-mats are constantly in the laundry rotation.

That is a lot of place-mats to knit.  What have I gotten myself into?




Lastly, since realizing that the Jane Eyre Shawl won't work with my pretty sage mohair, I have returned to my original concept: a wrap with Celtic-inspired design.  Of course, I searched Ravelry endlessly, and couldn't find EXACTLY what I was thinking anywhere.  Making up my own pattern seemed incredibly ambitious.  I mean, I am not an inexperienced knitter, but following a lace pattern with minimal screw ups is a far cry from creating one.  

This weekend, I started cutting and pasting, almost literally.  I took the central motif from one pattern, the border from another, then started cutting out the portions, leaving something close to what I had in mind.

Then started the math.  How many stitches wide?  How many rows tall?  I had to balance the border repeat  with the central motif and desired overall size.  Each time I thought I had the math cornered, I reviewed it one last time, and found one more thing I had missed.  Over and over, until I started coming up with the same numbers, repeatedly.  The planning was infuriating, but every time I caught another omission, I reminded myself that it was far better to catch it now, rather than with my tears staining the mohair.

I just hope that I haven't forgotten anything.

Today, it is all about planning the math.  

Size Does Matter

I finished casting off my Annis Shawlette.  I have quite a bit of yarn left, relatively speaking.  A ball of yarn about the size of my fist.

On a not-completely-unrelated issue, the shawlette seems smaller than I was picturing.  I am pretty sure it is the size that the pattern specified, so any inaccurate picturing on my part is entirely my fault.

 I haven't blocked it yet, so it may grow a little yet.  I am reserving judgment.

In the meantime, what does one do with a fist of lace weight alpaca?  Too much to throw away; too little to make anything useful.  Maybe a bookmark, but that sounds like a lot of work for something that will be mostly squished between pages, and probably lost in the bottom of my work bag.  I will have to keep thinking.

I could always save it in a box, waiting ten years for someone on the other side of the globe begging for me to give it to them so they can finish the edge of a massive shawl.  I don't know from where that idea came.

Today, it is all about the fistful of useless yarn.

  

I always overpack

 Planning vacation knitting is always a balance between restraint and panic.  I always start with two strategic projects.  Carefully selected for their level of difficulty (one simple, one complex) and small size.  I know this will be more than enough for the trip, and vow not to overpack my knitting, like I always do.

Then I start start to re-evaluate.  I have hours and hours of plane, train, bus and car rides ahead of me.

Then I start to panic.  What if there is a problem with one of the projects?  What if I lose the yarn?  What if I lose the needles?  What if I get bored and can't bear to look at it?  What if I get stranded in an elevator for twelve hours without children and finish both?  What if my body decides it no longer needs sleep?

Then I overpack, as always.  These are the four projects I brought with me for our vacation to Poland.

This is the ONLY one that I actually worked on during those two weeks.

Ironically, it is the one that I had wanted to finish before the trip.  The one I was hoping to wear on the trip.

All those hours of public transportation, and I never strayed.  Maybe a small part of me hoped that I would finish it before the end, and still be able to wear it.  (Though that small part of me had not figured out how to block lace on the road.)

On the plane ride home, I did start casting off, too late to even hope that I could sashay the streets of Torun with a shawlette casually draped around my shoulders in defense of the spring chill.  The streets of Lafayette will have to suffice.

Perhaps it is for the best.  My brother already spend quite a bit of time teasing me about my shawl fetish.  He says that like it is a bad thing.  Besides, I only brought one shawl with me, Aurora.  And we will forget that I chose by dresses to match the shawl, not the other way around.

Our travel adventures were enjoyable, but it is nice to be home again.  Back to my own bed, my own kitchen, and a giant mountain of laundry.

Today, it is all about feeling homey.