From one extreme to another

So, after doing all that weaving in (all that endless weaving in) and then buggering up the finishing of the cardigan I decided that I would a) do something simple (with minimal weaving in) and b) follow a pattern for once!

I found a pattern in a book I had lying about for a cowl neck, garter stitch tunic. Garter stitch! And all in one colour! I had some nice variegated wool in a box and off I went.

Boy, garter stitch palls after a few rows. And even though this is for my four year old, it was still 33 cm of garter stitch before anything at all was due to happen. And that was only a little minor armhole shaping before continuing for another 16 cm.

So I figured I'd do a more complicated one simultaneously so that when I got bored with the garter stitch I could switch to something tricky, and if it became too tricky I could switch back.

The garter stitch has seriously addled my brain because I have decided to have a go at my first ever cable sweater. And it's a doozy. You've got to love a pattern that says these 32 rows form cable pattern don't you! Thirty two rows??? Oh boy!

But, trumpet fanfare please, I have completed the back of the garter stitch tunic and the front of the cable sweater.

So now I have one front and one back and my lovely partner is wandering around the house singing, 'put 'em together and what do you get? Bibbidy bobbidy boo' incessantly. I'm loving the cable I have to say - it's a lot of fun, and the garter grows so quickly that I keep having a warm glow of achievement. I'm working on the cable back now, and I can see problems ahead... not with the back, which is straightforward, but when I get to the sleeves... there's this nasty little phrase: keeping continuity of pattern as you shape the sleeve. Shaping the neck nearly killed me so we may yet wind up with stocking stitch sleeves. I'll keep you posted. The other bit that's going to be interesting is the collar, which involves strange stitches I'd never heard of, and diagrams I can't follow. Thank goodness for KnittingHelp.com, which has video instructions for something that seems to be the same. Let's hope it is...

Nine months between posts! Well, it's a good job nobody much reads this!

There are reasons for my absence... a couple of weeks after my last post my mother had a totally unexpected stroke and nearly died. She is now, thank god, almost back to her old self and doesn't seem to have sustained any major lasting damage. But it was a horrible time - especially the first few months. Because she is such an amazing woman, she has friends (and family) all over the world - all of whom were wanting constant updates on her health and progress. So we discovered yet another use for a blog! I don't know what we all did without the internet. I set up a blog and my sisters and I constantly updated it so that everyone could keep up with Annie's progress. It was fantastic, and something I 'd really recommend to anyone in similar circumstances. So this blog slid while we worked on that one...

By the time Annie was well enough for me to think about knitting or blogging, Jessie had learnt to climb onto the sofa - which put paid to knitting for a good few months - very hard to concentrate on knitting when an eighteen-month old has firm hold of one end of a needle, or is seeing how many rooms she can stretch a ball of yarn through. And then of course it was summer and who wants to knit when it's 30 degrees.

But by February, although it was still hot, Jessie had learnt that No means No (to an extent, my she's a stroppy little thing!) and I managed to finish off the rainbow striped cardigan I was knitting back in June. All those loose ends! There were fourteen stripes on the back, two fronts and two sleeves, and they all had two ends to weave in. Never again!

There are no photos. Maybe once I've ripped out and reknitted the collar and button bands... and first I should probably learn how a collar should work...

Anyway, it may all have gone horribly wrong but it got me knitting again! :-)