Sad but true, I am ashamed to admit that I fell out of love with my Rams and Yowes project. This is the first time I've knit with Shetland wool, and if I were smart enough (which obviously, I'm not), I would have made a swatch and blocked it before launching into this project. But I'm not interested in getting gauge - it's a blanket, after all - but what swatching would have done was still the nagging thoughts in the back of my mind that my knitting wasn't even enough.
When I looked at photos of blankets-in-progress on-line, I decided I must have been doing something wrong. This blanket surely wouldn't block out perfectly, and with every passing row, my doubts and fears grew thanks to my very active imagination.
As projects are sometimes wont to do, it got put in its dedicated clear zippered bag, and placed on top of the dryer, not quite out of sight, but there as a mocking reminder of my knitterly short-comings. Every time I went into the laundry room and did a load of laundry, there it sat, unrequited and unfulfilled. It was the "nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah" of the wooly world. And it was in the laundry room that my stroke of genius (I'm being kind, it was more of a lucid moment) came to me. I'd just purchased a new state-of-the-art pressure steam iron. A real steam iron - let me tell you - this thing ain't messing around. And using said steam iron, I steamed my uneven stitches, and watched in joy and disbelief as each stitch relaxed under the steam's spell. Suddenly, the knitting evened out, and I did a little jig. If this were a relationship, well, we're back on again, as the saying goes.
So I'm giving the Rams and Yowes full attention these days, now that it's back on the front burner and the heat's turned up to high. Since the above photo was taken, I've managed to finish the Rams in the middle section, and start in on the Yowes which mirror the opposite end. I'm starting my third section of Yowes, so the end is in sight. With a few more days of love, we'll be ready to steek and start the border, which involves picking up 700 plus stitches along all four sides. I'll be sure to let you know how that goes.
2 comments:
knitting seems complicated..what ( I am sure ) I lack in patience I also lack in dexterity! hehe..A* knits but she is working her way up to something other and a scarf..I was always amazed at my grandmother who could knit and do practically everything else at the same time without ever missing a beat.
Hey Beav, nah, it's easy, it's just 2 different stitches, knit and purl. With the internet, anything's possible, so you don't need Grammy nearby LOL.
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