I am getting very frustrated with the knitting machine. I can do small pieces on it just fine, but I am not toddler sized, so making a sweater for me requires making big pieces…and that ends up in a lot of dropped stitches and sticking needles and swearing. Last night I slogged my way through most of one sleeve, but it was a tense and frustrating experience the wider the sleeve became, and I am beginning to wonder if I am missing some crucial part of my brain that would let me figure this darn thing out. Grr.
That aside, I have ordered the yarn for the FLAK (Plymouth Encore Worsted, in Blue Ivy) from Webs. I wasn’t entirely sure how much yarn to order, but with the Webs discount it was going to be less if I ordered more than I thought I might need, so I decided I might as well take advantage of that and order a little extra, just in case. I’m looking forward to the yarn arriving, but in the meantime I am still dutifully swatching out my cables so I am completely prepared.
Tonight was First Friday craft night at my knitting mom’s house, and there was quite a crowd of us there. Lots of us are knitters, so we are all making plans to take the Stitch and Ride train to Stitches West in two weeks. Plus there was a kitten running around in little cat heaven – all that yarn to bat at and needles to attack and an entire house full of women who were perfectly willing to stop what they were doing and play with her. I admit that I am starting to get a little tired of swatching out my cables, and I didn’t feel much like dragging out Richard’s sock to work on, so instead I took advantage of the kitten’s need to find someone to fall asleep on, and let her settle in the crook of my arm for about half an hour.
I think that, regarding the sweater and the knitting machine, I need to back up and start small again. My coworker has a baby due in May so I am going to try to use the machine to crank out pieces for a little blanket or sweater, or perhaps both (I will make it on the large size, since babies in the Sacramento Valley are not exactly in need of sweaters during the summer). And as for the sweater I was hoping to make, well, I can knit stockinette by hand just as well as by machine, plus I suspect it will be a nice, mindless thing to work on while waiting for the Olympics to start, and when I might occasionally need a break from Olympic knitting.