Bonehead

I've got no knits that are news-worthy to share.  I did finish the second foot on Jim's Clessidra knee-highs which is nice.   And I made a stupendous error in judgment with regards to gauge that has temporarily halted progress on my Lizard Ridge blanket.

See, I was having difficulty finding the right needles to work the strips of the pattern.  I tried circulars, but the cable was getting in my way. So I bought a pair of pink plastic needles at the Zellars in Waterloo because they are short.  I knit most of the stripes on them, but after a while they made my hands ache because the yarn doesn't slide around on them well.  I got really fed up with them.  Yet I was eager to work on the project because I could see the end nearing, so I switched needles at home for a pair of DPNs, putting point protectors on the ends so the yarn wouldn't slide off.  Now I could go to town on the project and did, finishing the last strip this week in Waterloo.

Except...

As I was about ready to bind off, I was congratulating myself on having so much more yarn leftover than usual....

And then it hit me.  I'll bet my gauge was off between the pink plastic needles and the DPNs.  Why the heck didn't I check?  Did I think I was immune to the laws of gauge?   What a bone head!  I made myself step away from the knitting and stuffed the offending fabric into it's ziploc baggie for the trip back to London.

Then I pondered my choices and I've come to my conclusion. I'm not going to rip, or re-knit or let this project die a slow death at the back of the closet.  I have a plan and this is it. I'm going to knit this smaller gauged strip to match the length of the other strips.  Yes, the lizard's ridges won't match up and I've decided that this is going to be the creative, innovative, wonderful feature of my blanket.  I'm also considering buying a few more balls of Noro to make another small-gauge strip, just to emphasize this special feature of my blanket. 

Except I have to get over my annoyance with the project to actually knit it.   I won't deny that I started a plain stockinette sock this weekend.  I'm thinking of it as a confidence booster.  Also, there were distractions. We had a fun Saturday night out.  The whole family went to visit old friends who also have teen aged kids and the eight of us all went downtown to the Home County Folk Festival to listen to Bruce Cockburn.  It was a beautiful evening and just the way you want a summer's day to end, by forgetting all your troubles.