I'm still plugging away at the Multnomah shawl, but I'm not yet done with the garter stitch section (i.e. the easy part). I guess I'm just a slowpoke knitter.
Things I've learned during this project, so far:
I've mostly gotten over my fear that pooling will ruin the looks of the shawl. Now I've moved on to worrying whether the garter section will be big enough following the pattern as written, or if I ought to extend the garter portion before beginning the feathers and fans section. (I just don't know...)
Meanwhile, I'm feeling some serious urges to start a new (larger-scale) secret project. I've been thinking about this one since January, really, but recently the thoughts have gone past the nebulous "we'll see; there's plenty of time for that later" phase and into that phase where I go into my yarn stash and start pulling out skeins to get a combination of colors I like.
In fact, I have pulled out several skeins and balls and tidbits of yarn, and I think I like what I've selected. I'm sorely tempted to set aside Multnomah and begin work on this other pattern. It's crochet, and it might not be such a bad idea to have a crochet project actively going at the same time as a knitting project... (Of course, there are other crochet and knitting projects in hibernation, and technically, I could just pull out one of those, but that's not what I want to do.) I just don't want to get out of the groove of Multnomah-- possibly forget something important and mess up when I return to it... And of course, if I set it aside even "temporarily", I'm just extending the time-frame for completing it... But it's a shawl(ette), and I'm not likely to be able to wear it until October or November, anyway... What's the rush to finish it?
I don't know if I'll have the willpower to withstand the crochet pattern's allure. ;o)
Why is it that whatever I'm working on-- even if I'm enjoying it-- I feel this odd compulsion to be working on something else (or at least to start lining up the next project...)?
Things I've learned during this project, so far:
- Knitting garter stitch (knitting only-- no purling on either side of your work) may be super easy, but it's still possible to make small mistakes while doing it, and those mistakes can still be irritating to mend.
- Fixing a dropped stitch (or three) in garter stitch is much messier than fixing a dropped stitch in stockinette. And once, I found what must have been a dropped stitch, several rows down, but there was no laddering up near the needles! (Very mysterious...) I still don't know what went wrong there, to be honest, but by purposely dropping what I figured should be an adjacent stitch, I was able to see where the first dropped stitch should go and build them both back up to needle-level. (Whew!)
- I knit for longer periods of time when I'm simultaneously listening to an audio book (or to a DVD of a TV program / miniseries / movie that I know so well I needn't look at the screen to enjoy it). Music is good, too, but an audio book holds my attention better-- and with music, I tend to push the "next" button fairly often, providing more opportunities to stop knitting altogether. (That frequent song-skipping is probably a sign that I need to remove some of the less-favored music from the mp3-player... Or build more playlists...)
I've mostly gotten over my fear that pooling will ruin the looks of the shawl. Now I've moved on to worrying whether the garter section will be big enough following the pattern as written, or if I ought to extend the garter portion before beginning the feathers and fans section. (I just don't know...)
Meanwhile, I'm feeling some serious urges to start a new (larger-scale) secret project. I've been thinking about this one since January, really, but recently the thoughts have gone past the nebulous "we'll see; there's plenty of time for that later" phase and into that phase where I go into my yarn stash and start pulling out skeins to get a combination of colors I like.
In fact, I have pulled out several skeins and balls and tidbits of yarn, and I think I like what I've selected. I'm sorely tempted to set aside Multnomah and begin work on this other pattern. It's crochet, and it might not be such a bad idea to have a crochet project actively going at the same time as a knitting project... (Of course, there are other crochet and knitting projects in hibernation, and technically, I could just pull out one of those, but that's not what I want to do.) I just don't want to get out of the groove of Multnomah-- possibly forget something important and mess up when I return to it... And of course, if I set it aside even "temporarily", I'm just extending the time-frame for completing it... But it's a shawl(ette), and I'm not likely to be able to wear it until October or November, anyway... What's the rush to finish it?
I don't know if I'll have the willpower to withstand the crochet pattern's allure. ;o)
Why is it that whatever I'm working on-- even if I'm enjoying it-- I feel this odd compulsion to be working on something else (or at least to start lining up the next project...)?