Monday, July 30, 2007

will the knitting disasters never end?

Let me tell you, I really know how to pick a pattern. I've been working on the All Season Shell for a few days now, and finished up the back this morning. I use the term "finished" loosely because I may or may not be frogging most or all of it. But here it is anyway. It looks pretty good from far away:

I thought I picked a simple pattern for my first (sleeveless) sweater. But the pattern I chose was, in fact, too simple--some parts of it were very vague, which left me guessing how to work the stitches, and not always coming up with the correct answer. The row count was also amiss, complicating things further. I know what you're thinking--if I've been having so many problems with patterns recently, maybe the problem is me, right? I was beginning to suspect the same, but then came across another blog with complaints about the A.S.S. (hah!) pattern. So, the problem is not me. At least, not this time.
Here's my first "iffy" area: the armholes.


Armhole on the left side looks ok, but on the right, the decreases are a bit wonky. Worth frogging for? Maybe. This is a gift, but I'm sure my mother doesn't expect perfection. And unless you're looking for it, you might miss it.
Problem number 2, also with the decreases, this time, at the top of the shoulders:
Again, some wonky stitches with the decreases, likely because I had to unravel a row to redo the neck bind off (more on that later!) and ended up with some twisted stitches--I tried to fix them all, but, you know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions . . . The bound off edges are also a little messy, but they'll be hidden in the seams, so I'm not as worried about them.
And the biggest dilemma--the neck. My old enemy, the bind off, has risen up to torment me again. I bound off the neck stitches once, and they were way too tight. I undid them and tried again with a larger needle, and still very tight. Will my mother even be able to fit her head through the neck hole? It's impossible to know without having the front done, but I'm worried.
So, should I frog it? Ideally I'd like to be able to unravel up to the armholes and try that whole mess again, but, as I think I bemoaned before, unraveling isn't my strong suit. I usually end up dropping stitches and making a mess of things, especially with ribbing, where the stitches aren't all in a row. I could just rip out the entire thing, but doing the initial 14 inches of K2P2 rib was a little mind-numbing, and I already have to do it again for the front; I don't know if I could do it twice more while maintaining my sanity--although it may be just the kind of thoughtless knitting that I could do on the Metro.

1 comment :

crookedknits said...

IF you do frog (big if), use the stretchy bind off. On my first sweater (also a sleeveless to avoid sleeves hassel...but still many hassels) the pattern called for a stretchy bind off. I only used it on the front half of the sweater because I wasn't paying attention during the back. I don't know it offhand but I'm sure you can find it on the internet. If not, it's in the original SnB book under the Little Black Top pattern. Might help the tightness because I definately noticed a difference between the necks on my front and back (but I'm too lazy to frog).