The next week on Monday, I balanced the check book dating back to November (Himself installed MS Money and went back to Nov. , but entered a starting balance of zero, this took 6 hours to complete) and the next day I decided it would be great to shampoo the carpet in the house. Yep. Nothing like a day of hauling furniture around. I decided that I'd had enough after completing the two main family/guest rooms in the house (about 3 1/2 hours), and really, they were the worst ones for stains (from the girls). I can't believe what a difference that makes in the rooms! Wednesday I rested and knit up the Pirate washrag.
Isn't it cute? This was my first ever Intarsia. Now, let me say that in spite of what I'm about to tell you, I will try this again. In fact, I will knit this pattern again, just to see if I've fixed it (my youngest wants one in pink - of course!). This pattern had so many typos I don't even know where to begin. If I were experienced with Intarsia, this might not have mattered too much, but I was nervous to start with, having to guess what the heck the instructions were supposed to say DID NOT HELP. Then, in my opinion, things were left out. Example: you cast on 46 stitches, do some garter rows then knit the first and last 5 stitches of every row. The chart is for 24 stitches. So 24 + 5+5= 34. Where the heck are the other 12 stitches? I decided there were an additional 6 on each side of the pattern in stockinette, but it was never addressed in the pattern at all. For a newbie, I did not appreciate having to work this out on my own just 5 rows into the project. Then, the HUGE number of typos, just plain typos, on a very, very short pattern. Seriously, the written instructions are probably shorter than this paragraph and fully 1/4 of the words are/have typos. The chart is fine. Tackling a new thing was dodgy enough, I didn't appreciate having to deal with the typos too. Still, I like my Jolly Roger washrag, mistakes and all, and I will probably attempt another one in the near future. If for no other reason than to see if I can have an easier time of it now that I've worked out the written bit and had a go and the process. I'd love a class, but I don't see any listed anytime soon.
I also plan to contact the shop and let them know that they might want to tidy up those written instructions quite a bit before handing them out to anyone else. sheesh.
Thursday was yardwork, mowing, etc. Friday was another day of rest and of spinning! Yippee! I finally got my Northern Lights roving plied and got started on the ruby merino.
I'm not sure the colors worked out so good in the photo, even after adjusting them. The darker roving is the Northern Lights and has lots of turquoise sprinkles (amongst other colors) in it. The ruby yarn is actually a very deep blue-red color - it's georgous! I plied up three hanks of the Northern Lights and I have to say, I am really delighted at how balanced the yarn turned out. I was not expecting that, and I got good results on all three hanks of yarn. Go me! I only got one bobbin of the Ruby spun and plied. I decided I was too excited to see how the ruby was going to look, so I just spun up the one bobbin and plied it from a center pull ball. That worked really well and I was glad not to have to worry about two bobbins of different length singles and left-overs. Now I just want more time to spin the rest of the fiber. It was so nice to be spinning all day.
All in all, a very busy but satisfying week one of vacation. Tomorrow I'll tell you about week 2.
1 comment:
I like the pirate hat! My son was looking over my shoulder as I was reading your blog and immediately commented that hat was "Way cool, Mom" followed immediately by "Can you make me one?" High praise indeed from a kid who thinks knitting is "Kinda goofy". Loved the comment about hauling furniture around to shampoo. I did that last week. What a load of work.
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