Whoa!!!!

I'm pulling on the reins, but it's not because I'm Santa telling Rudolph and the reindeer to take off with the Sleigh full of gifts. Not hardly, rather it's me yelling whoa! Time is going by too fast, faster than my fingers can finish knitting the stole I'm concocting for Mother's present. I have accepted the reality that I cannot complete socks for my sister, nor any other major knitted gifts for other family members. This is not so terrible as I wasn't certain my sister would wear the socks, and everyone else wouldn't really appreciate how much work such things take. Simplify, simplify, simplify, quoting Ann Morrow Lindberg, has become my motto.

I thought I'd share the last photo I took of the Mystic Waters Shawl (MWS). I haven't knit any more rows in about 1.5 weeks, but I think I'll go back to it so I can switch between Mom's shawl and the MWS. Working on 2 shawls really helps with the tedious aspect of repetition. The last clue of MWS was posted last week and Anna posted a picture of her finished shawl on her blog just the other day. She used a finer yarn than I am using, and her finished wingspan was over 90" with a depth of 50+". I suddenly realized that if I knit the whole thing, my shawl would be 100+ inches by 60+ inches-- way, way too big. I'm afraid I'll have no other choice but to knit the "small" version and hope that it isn't too small. My guts tell me I really wanted a finished size somewhere between the two but I don't want an afghan. Stay tuned to see what happens!

I had a difficult time deciding what pattern to use for mother stole. Finding a balance between easy-to-knit and interesting-to-knit with the limit of no knit-on edgings made the pickings a bit slim. But I was delighted to discover that Sandy at The Yarn Haven is carrying patterns from HeartStrings FiberArts, including the hot pattern of the summer, the Scotch Thistle Lace Stole. Problem solved! Well, sort of. The pattern calls for fingering wt. yarn and I planned on using a cone of laceweight cashmere (thanks ColourMart!). OK, so I doubled the yarn and kept the recommended needle size. I read through the pattern after I brought it home, but when I cast-on I just started knitting from the chart. It looks nice, but it doesn't look like the one in the picture. Why? In the written directions you are instructed to repeat specific rows multiple times before proceeding to the next part of the chart. Whoops! I briefly considered frogging back, but decided to go on, unventing the pattern as I went. The unventing is a bit interesting but it has called for a few tinking sessions when I hated the choice I made. You didn't think I was wise enough to throw in a lifeline before forging on did you??? Ha! not a chance (OK, I regretted not having a lifeline last night after tinking about 5 rows, ugh!)

I'm taking notes to share when I'm done with my version of the stole (with apologies to Jackie E_S). I'll post pictures next time. Until then, HO HO HO!!!

Happy International Tatting Day

Some of you may have been led to believe that April 1st is a rather infamous "holiday" known as April Fool's Day, but it's actually International Tatting Day. Celebrations, small and not so small happen among tatters across the globe. To honor the occasion I am posting a picture of my favorite "beadntat original" tatting design-- a heart I created in the aftermath of the 9-11 bombing of the World Trade Center in NYC. I also pulled out my favorite shuttles and petted them a little, but I didn't add any stitches to the project as I didn't want to unpick them later if I made a mistake. Tinking or frogging knitting is a piece of cake compared to undoing mistakes in tatting! Since I didn't go anywhere today I couldn't "tat in public" but I did adhere to the other celebratory ritual of eating chocolate--a Harry & David raspberry truffle, Yum!

The first of April marks another important time in East Tennessee. In this part of the world there are only 2 "important" times of the year. The first, of course, happens in the fall when it's "It's Football Time in Tennessee!" This is to be yelled loudly and proudly in support of the University of TN Volunteer football team, our favorite local obsession (I use that term knowing it is an enormous understatement of the situation). But that is the fall and this is spring so the cheer changes to "It's Dogwood time in Tennessee!" This time one can speak in a more dignified tone as the focus is on flowers, flowering trees, and local arts and fine crafts. The festival officially starts next weekend and lasts about 2 weeks and it's lots of fun. But the dogwoods bloomed very early this year-- I can't ever remember them blooming in March before.

I'm continuing to work on my Shh! It's a Secret Shawl. I finished the first section of lace and was quite pleased with how it looks in the highly variegated yarn. Unfortunately the second section of lace didn't end up looking as nice knitted up as it did on paper. I knit about 10 rows into the 2nd section before calling it quits. This morning I frogged back to the lifeline and worked on designing something else. I'm a bit more optimistic about my current plan, but I need to knit a few more rows to know for sure. Designing for highly patterned yarn is a much greater challenge than knitting with a solid color yarn. Fortunately the Kaalund yarn is both durable and delicate so it's holding up nicely to all the tinking and frogging. There's nothing like a good yarn! I should be working on the rewrites on my big D, but I'm feeling pretty icky tonight so I may just do some knitting while I cheer on the Lady Vols who are playing in the NCAA Final Four semi-final basketball game tonight. Go Vols!!!

Marinating

I was taking a brief "break in the action" this morning to do a little reading in my private suite. You know the one I'm talking about--it has 4 walls and a door that really closes and locks, there's a sink and a shower/tub and a.... Well I was parked on the throne so I grabbed the latest magazine to thumb through which happened to be the April issue of Harper's Bazaar. In it was an article called What's Age got to Do With It? by Gail Sheey (p.122). I haven't read any of her previous books (Passages, etc.) but one line in the article caught my attention. She was talking about women over 50 (I'm not quite there yet, but close enough) who are now "feeling free to reinvent themselves, to find and follow their passions, and to celebrate being seasoned women."

Interesting idea, I thought, and to some extent I sort of fit although not necessarily in the same way that she is thinking. My changes in course have been out of necessity as much as personal choice. But I loved her definition of the seasoned woman as "someone who has been marinated in life experience." Sheehy goes on to expand on this notion, but it struck a chord with me. I am at one of those turning points in life where you look back at where you were, assess how far you've come to arrive at the current place, and look forward with an openness to the possibilities that lie ahead. And while I think I have always followed my passions I have been quite conscious of the effect that being seasoned with life's experiences has had on me and those with whom I interact. Marinating really is a good thing!

I picked up some knitting in the last day or so, mostly because I was too fried to do anything constructive with the Dissertation. When I am that exhausted, lace knitting usually isn't a wise thing either. Late last night I discovered that I had made a mistake in my Shhh, it's a Secret Shawl that I'm designing. I tried to ladder down and fix the mistake, but I couldn't really decipher what I done wrong and I couldn't fix it either. The complex color variegations of the yarn both helped and hindered the process. I might have fudged it and gone on, trusting that the colors in the yarn would hide my error but I was on the last row before a planned pattern change and I was afraid the error might really mess up my stitch counts. So.... I patiently tinked oh, maybe 500 stitches? I don't really know. I am proud of myself for fixing the mistake. I just finished putting in a lifeline so I can frog back if I don't like the design I have planned next. I don't use lifelines much, but this time I know I need one. Who knows what will happen next? LOL

S+F/K=T

For those of you not well-versed in knitting statistics, let me interpret the data for you (wink, wink): When you add Stress and Fatigue and then divide your limited attention by knitting, the end result is tinking. Tink, tink, tink! I was knitting row 21 and was more than halfway across the row when my stitches just weren't lining up the way I thought they were supposed to. I tinked and reknit the same 20-25 sts several times but still just couldn't seem to see where the problem was. But there was one thing I was certain of and that was that something wasn't right.

Let's face it, when knitting a very distinct lace pattern such as the basketweave section of the Hanami Stole, if you make a mistake it will be screamingly obvious down the road. So I applied the lesson I learned well as a neonatal nurse--when in doubt, yank it out. Of course in nursing the rule applied to IV's and endotracheal tubes which, when improperly placed or dislodged, can result in harm to the patient--something no nurse would ever want to inflict on a tiny newborn. It's a good rule and I applied it to my knitting as I painstakingly tinked back 2.5 rows and reknit them. I didn't really find the error in my previous knitting, but I know it's right this time and that's what matters most. I'm now 86 rows into the stole. My new KnitPicks Options circular needle was tremendously handy in picking out all those central double decreases--a nightmare to tink. I must admit those sharp tips are mighty handy and are allowing me to knit faster than I could with my rounder tipped Addi-turbos. Yup, I'm sold on these babies!

Delirious

It's late Tuesday night after a couple of intense days working away on the dissertation. At times I'm so tired I'm delirious. That's a problem when I decided I need a break from it all so I pick up my knitting! If I work with any speed I make mistakes and end up tinking, so mostly I just knit slowly. And I look at the charts more often than usual. Not often enough mind you as I just finished knitting a few repeats on Hidcote where I reversed my k2tog & ssk sts. Fortunately it was in a place where the change really didn't adversely affect the lace so I didn't tink. I dislike tinking ssk sts, but I *despise* tinking sssk with a fervent hatred reserved only for the vilest of things. Yup, it's that awful. The good news is I'm on the last row of Chart 8. Only 2 more charts left to go and this cow has the barn in sight--both for the shawl and for the dissertation. YeeHaw!