To keep it tighter, I kept all the stitches I either knitted or purled on the tip of the right hand needle until I did the next one. It seems to be working as good as the examples of other peoples' work I looked at.
On the other hand, I was helping my mom block a shawl she crocheted today (yay corporate holidays). I ended up doing most of the work because the yarn she used, Madelinetosh's Tosh Light, bleeds oh so very much, and I dealt with the same problem with my Tosh Light shawl. Now, for my shawl, I stopped the bleeding with two vinegar washes. Hers...well, it was still bleeding after soaking it in three vinegar baths. I just gave up and told her to tell the giftee that if they wash it, not to wash it with anything else. It at least wasn't as bad as it had been.
Now, from my research, I know that vinegar is supposed to be the best way to stop bleeding yarn. So I don't get what I'm doing wrong. Am I diluting the vinegar too much? Does it not work for some yarn dyes? Was I not using enough vinegar (the shawl was a whole lot bigger than mine, but I can't say I measured the vinegar out any of the times I used it)? I'm confused.
At least I wasn't as confused as my stepfather, who was questioning my use of the vinegar, saying that he used vinegar as a caustic agent to clean out the coffee pot (that had recently decided to clog up and overflow coffee every time someone made it. I claim no fault. It worked fine for me last Friday). I stupidly replied: 'Well, don't you know that that's how Easter eggs are set?,' completely forgetting that my stepfather has never dyed Easter eggs (explaining this would unfortunately require a whole paragraph, so I'm not). My mom and I had to explain that vinegar is used in Easter egg dye to set the dye on the egg (for any other folks out there who've never dyed Easter eggs for one reason or another).
Tomorrow, it's back to my actual paying job, and not knitting the crazy cable blanket. That I just found a mis-crossed cable on. Ug.
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