Knitting Bulletin

We interrupt this project to bring you breaking news… literally. Turns out those polished wood needles I love so much are really easy for a 4 year old to snap, especially in the lace-knitting sizes. So I had to put my lace shawl on hold temporarily. The good news is that a dear lady is having her first baby, and her baby shower was a week after the day my needles broke, so I had another fun thing to focus on: a Rainbow Baby Sweater!

Everyone needs a little more rainbow in
their life, right?

This project partly owes its existence to the incisive mind of my friend Dom, one of the most artistic people I know, who rightly perceived the heart of my quandary: I had a vision, and realizing it required extra fiddly work that might not turn out. In typical me fashion, I was paralyzed by my options and wasted a lot of time asking people who were not me what I would do if I were them. Turns out that information is not relevant to anything. Ever. But Dom saw right through my question. It was not really “what should I do?” but rather “what do I want to do?” Why spend more money and waaaaaay more time making something when I could just buy something adorable? Because I wanted to make something unique, something I was inspired to make. There would be no point if I didn’t make the thing I wanted to make.

It didn't line up perfectly - turns out that
an increase in width of a single stitch can
make a difference in the end.

The thing I wanted to make is a newborn-sized cardigan made from a beautiful self-striping merino sock yarn I’ve had for a while. I say self-striping, but the “stripe” is actually a gradual color-wash gradient fading through the whole rainbow. This is a problem because the back, being twice as wide as either side of the front, would go through the color changes twice as fast, and throw off the balance of the thing. And while I wasn’t going to worry about matching the front to the back, I wanted a consistent texture. Also, the front needed symmetry for sure, so it seemed like the best thing was to work each side from a different ball (same dye lot, of course), matching the spot in the color change on each so that it was the same on both sides. As for the back, I decided to work the back in two halves the same way, and seam it down the middle.

It doesn't look like a half-finished
sweater, it looks like a huge mess.

Look at all those stringy-things!

Look at those gaping holes! (That's
what God made loose ends for.)

Somewhere my moss-stitch border got
mixed up - so I just cut my losses and
 cast off early

This sweater had so many lessons to teach me. I couldn’t decide what to title this post, because I had so many good thoughts to put down. It was about fudging and faking (adapting the pattern, knitting on after miscounting rows, etc), but also about doing things the Right Way (christening my sweater blocking kit – that was fun!). It was about the process of making something, in particular the way that mistakes have a way of blending in, and the way loose ends have of tying together more issues than just themselves when you finish them off. And it was about color and fun.

I’m posting a catalogue of the mistakes I made on this sweater, because sometimes it’s important to acknowledge the imperfections of a thing before you can put those imperfections in perspective. And after you’ve looked at all the errors, check out the final picture: They Don’t Show At All.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled Lace Stole (I bought new needles).