Not the Problem I Expected

The other project I'm currently working on now-a-days is a cardigan for my mother, which will be her Hanukkah present.  The good thing is I've had this planned since around Mother's Day and, knowing this was a little more ambiguous than socks, started back in September. (Funny story with that.  I bought the yarn in front of my mom, on a special trip to WEBS, and explicitly told her I would use it for a sweater for her Hanukkah present. Fast forward to September, where I went to measure her for it.  She asks: why are you measuring me?  I go: for your sweater.  She goes: oh, you're making me a sweater?  I go: ...).

Anyway, fast foward to now and I've got the body done:

If you're interested, the pattern is Raindrop Cardigan from Twisted Stitches by Connie Chang Chinchio

So, after you finish the body, the instructions tell you to block it.  I debated about this for a bit.  After all, the yarn I'm using is mostly alpaca; why should I block it and then try to pick up for the sleeves?  What will that do?  In the end, since I was in the middle of hand washing stuff anyway, I decided to give it a wash. 

It bled like nobody's business.  But that wasn't the main issue; after all, it will get another bath and I'll set it then.  The main issue is this happend:

That is part of the bind off sequence for the armhole. Broken. With four stitches dropped down and saved with split stitch markers (by the way, always have split or locking stitch markers.  They suck for normal use but they're a godsend when you drop a stitch or four come loose in a wash).  I have no clue how that happened.  I didn't agitate it much.  I wove in all ends.  I didn't do anything wrong, did I?

Now, this isn't that crazy to fix.  I need to ladder up the four stitches back to the bind off, then re-bind them off with another piece of yarn.  At least that's what I think will work.  Unfortunately, it's still drying, and I can't try to fix it until it dries.

Now, hopefully this is the last issue....it would really suck if, say, the armholes are too big after I join the shoulders together.

Misadventures in Shawls, Part 4: For Better or Worse, It's the End of the Road

Hey, I had a productive time void for once:

I am done.

I have to say, the last chart and half the chart before were pretty fast and simple.  Actually, they were so easy I went on autopilot and missed the fact that the second to last row had a double decrease.  On both charts.  The first I really had to hack the fix, so bad I did some weird 5 stitch increase, then had to pick up a bar from a couple rows below it on the next right side row to attempt to fill up the gap the crazy decrease had made.  I was partially successful:

Unfortunately, at that point the life line was so far down I didn't want to rip it out to do it right.

Then, I missed it again with the last chart, but at least all that took was an extra row of knitting added to decrease down to where I needed to be.  That did cause a gap in the beads in the top band:

Oh well.

Of course, blocking it wasn't very simple either.  I'm not talking about the multitude of pins; that's to be expected.  I mean that I forgot what Madelinetosh yarn loves to do:

Bleed.  Two vinegar baths later, it's still bleeding but no where near as badly:

That's when I ran out of vinegar and therefore gave up.  I gave it one more soap bath and took it out.  Good enough.

That first picture, by the way, doesn't do it justice as to how shiny those beads can be.  They gleam blue and other colors depending on the light:

That picture still doesn't do it justice, but whatever.

Part of me feels I should still do a proper debrief but...meh.  I covered most of what I would put into a debrief into this post series.  The only thing I can think of that I didn't mention was row 67.

Row 67 was the only row where I did it, checked my work, checked my work again, and still couldn't figure out why it was wonky because as far as I can tell, I followed the pattern right.  You see, row 67 did something weird.  It shifted the pattern over by a couple of stitches.  It also seemed to want 8 stitches for the end of the row section, yet there were only 6 before that and 6 after.  It made what I thought were small leaves look a bit more like spirals, or at least leafy blobs with something trailing off the left side.  It jagged the lines of yarn-overs and stockinette sections.  It looks better after blocking, but still.  I don't get what happened there or if I screwed up somewhere, or the pattern was the wonky one.  No one else on Ravelry who has done the pattern has mentioned it.

But oh well.  I guess it worked out well enough in the end.  As more than one person has said to me (and I've said to others, not that it stops me from doing the same thing), no one else notices all the mistakes you do.  So while I'm beating myself up about how it's not my best effort and it's got so many mistakes in it, and it's a wedding shawl and it should be my best effort and so forth, the two people I've sent the picture to have both complemented it.  One of these was the recipient.  So I did something right.

The Tale of a Broken Needle, Part 2, Or Why You Shouldn't Switch Needles in the Middle of a Project

The good news is that I finished my Mom's Hanukkah socks with time to spare:

The bad news is that, contrary to every other sock set I've knitted so far, the second one came out a bit bigger than the first:

 
Which sucks because the first was the perfect length.

Now,  I know I did the exact same thing for both of them.  Thing's like these types of cable, lace, motif, whatever patterns make it easy to write 'stop at row x' and to do so, since you're keeping track of rows and can see where you are via the pattern.  No, I'm pretty sure the difference in size is due to the fact that I had to switch needles to knit the second sock.

If you go back to this post, you'll see why that was unavoidable.  However, you'll also note that I mentioned that my gauge shouldn't be that different with another pair of nickel-plated needles.  So, I got all excited and ordered new sock needles for that size:

And just cast-ed on and went, conveniently forgetting that my analysis was based on the fact that the Knitter's Pride Nova needles and the KnitPicks Options are very similar (I wouldn't be surprised if the same manufacture makes them).  What isn't that similar are those Addi's I decided to buy because ooh, needles made for Magic Looping socks!  Must have!

So I failed, and now have two slightly different sized socks: one with a gauge of  11.25 rows per inch and another with a gauge of about 11.75 rows per inch.  And it's not like I can just rip back and adjust it so they're the same length because of the pattern; it'll be very obvious if I did that.  So...it is what it is and hopefully my Mom doesn't mind.

Of course, what I should have done, had I not been blinded by nice, new needles, was go buy the same needle brand.  But what's done is done, and it's not that far off that they're unwearable (and it's better to be bigger than smaller).

Since one of the reasons for this blog is learning from my mistakes, the moral of this story is that you should never switch needles in the middle of a project if you can help it, unless you're able to adjust for it.  And if you do have to, use the same exact needle brand and type (I shouldn't have to mention they need to be the same size too, right?).  Because your gauge really does differ between each needle, no matter if they're made of the same material, no matter how slightly, and that can be the difference between a perfect fit and slightly too big or tight.

On the other hand, the Addi Sock Rockets are really nice needles, and I loved working with them.  May have been worth it.

Stupid Human Brain

Pictured below is a perfectly cromulent hat, right?  It looks fine (other than that the needle was taken out already).  It's nine cables, and now has the right number of stitches picked up:

Well, it's not.  I miss-crossed every single cable, and didn't realize it until I started reading the directions for the decreases.  I was too busy trying to knit it on the subway and at lunch to bother really reading the chart.  Oh, don't get me wrong, I looked at it.  I looked at it long enough to memorize what rows to cross on and to see that it was a 5 x 5 braided cable.  But for some reason, I completely mis-read the cable symbols.  For this I have no excuse, as they're not unclear (and there's a symbol key right next to the chart in case they are).  I remember looking at it and thinking I comprehended it, though, so I never took a second good look.

'What else is new?', is all I can say now.  I make this error more times than I care to admit.  I do my quick-read and think I got it, it's easy, I can't possible screw it up...just to see later that I was wrong, and it was in front of me all along.  It's not always that I don't bother reading ahead and assume (which I sometimes do too, but that's another issue), it's more like my brain's putting what I was seeing together differently than what was actually there.  Or maybe I'm not looking with enough attention, and my brain is filling in the gaps so I think I read it. 

It's a funny thing, actually, the way the brain does this.   Most people don't notice, especially when, you know,  it works as intended (that is, we fill in the gaps from what we see and are right).  Humans are really good at seeing patterns and connecting the dots, so good, we'll see them when they aren't there. And this is only one way we can be tricked by our brain (if you're interested about this topic, a good book is Don't Believe Everything You Think by Thomas E. Kida). 

However, knowing about it doesn't mean one stops doing it, especially when one is being sloppy and self-confident.  I'm not self-confident about many things, but at this point, I consider myself a decent knitter.  I don't know everything by far, but the things I know I can do pretty well.  But this sometime leads me to skimming patterns in the interest of time or laziness, and thinking I know what's going on. Or thinking I know something and I really only have a hazy idea (or remembered wrong).  Being a fast sight-reader doesn't help this matter; I can read fast, but if I'm being less than attentive I will think I just read it fast when I didn't really capture everything on the page (and again, the brain connects the dots).  Which is how I get the wrong instructions stuck in my head, follow them, only to find out later that if I had just looked more carefully at the paper, I wouldn't be wasting the time in which I could be knitting my main project ripping out and restarting my travel one.

Learn to X Instruction Review: The Contents of a Good Instructional Guide

Before I start my commencement of posting reviews of knitting and crochet instructional guides, I first want to establish what I look for in such a guide.  After all, it wouldn't be fair to rag on a site I found, or a book used, without stating why I find it so bad.

So, without further ado, I present what a good knitting and/or crochet instructional guide should be.  A good guide:

1) Is clearly written and well organized.

Obviously, one person's opinion of 'clearly written' and 'well organized' will be different than someone else's.  However, truly horrible organization, out-of-order presentation, and incomprehensible  instructions should be pretty obvious as things you don't want your guide to be. A good guide doesn't take the learner forever to find basic information,  gives instructions in simple and concise language (and/or pictures when necessary), and is presented in an order that let's the student build on previous knowledge.

2)  Will at least name the style they are teaching, if not actually presenting the learner with more than one way of doing something.  

I get it, guide writers don't want to confuse people and have a writing deadline.  But I say by just telling people 'this is how you cast on, this is how you knit, this is how you crochet', guide writers are actually doing the learners a disservice.  First off, maybe the person reading the guide will hate the way you're teaching them, but would be more suited for an alternate method.  For example, maybe they're current crocheters learning how to knit, and would be more comfortable knitting Continental style instead of the English style.  If you start by reading some of these guides, you won't have a clue what I just meant by that last sentence, and that's bad. Learners like this, when attempting to use a guide that only presents one way, are more likely to get frustrated and give up.  They can't learn! they'll say, not realizing that there's more than one way to do it.

The other downside with this format is that while the learners may be fine with the one presented method in the beginning, they then may run into issues when they decide to branch out past the stockinette or garter stitch square. What if you need a different cast-on, or another way to start a crochet circle? Someone who was taught 'this is how you do x' is going to be confused when they run into a problem better served by a different method. Someone who at least was informed, if not shown, a different way will be more likely to look for and use the better way.

All in all, I think it's better for a guide to show at least two methods of doing something.  It gives the learner a choice and lets them feel out what is best for them.  If the guide doesn't show more than one method, at least it should tell the learner they're learning, say,  the knitted cast-on, and that this is only one of many ways of doing it.

3) Will present all the basic techniques needed to knit or crochet almost anything

Yes, us more experienced knitters know the beginner's going to be knitting a scarf, and gauge isn't crucial.  This doesn't excuse the guide writer of skipping any mention of gauge, even if it's after teaching the student how to knit a square.  A good guide will teach concepts like gauge from the start, as it'll save heartache when the beginner decides to move on.

4) All the information is correct.

This should be a given. No sympathy for incorrect statements.

Also related: If you teach to a pattern or provide beginner's patterns, make sure they don't have any mistakes in them. A intermediate crocheter like me will realize quickly that there's a mistake.  The beginner's just going to keep following your instructions blindly and will most likely blame the bad result on their inexperience. Mistakes in patterns is another topic, but just make double sure that a teaching pattern is correct.


I think this is the basis of a good learning guide for beginners.  For learning guides for more intermediate skills, I'll say that 1, 2, and 4 are all still relevant, though 2 a little less so (after all, for some of the more advanced techniques there is only one way to do it.  Also, at this point, if you're looking up more advanced techniques, you're going to know to search for another method if you don't like the one you found).  Intermediate guides tend to focus on one technique, and that's fine.  It doesn't excuse unclear explanations, bad websites, not naming the technique (unless you made it up, then say that), and in-factual information.  Now, onto the reviews!

PS: I apologize for the previous post that was here; I click the wrong button and accidentally published my draft.

Deadlines and Stupid Mistakes

Bad things happen when you actually start to think about deadlines.  Sure, we've all had them, for knitting or otherwise.  Sure, they're sometimes a good thing.  But it's nice when you can take your time with a project as well.

The latter was my first approch to Crazy Cable Blanket.  You know, this one:

This was mostly to preserve my sanity.  Imagine setting a deadline on that sucker...at best, it would have been so far into the future it'd been useless.  Anyway, a week or so ago, I sat down and calculated around how much I needed to knit if I wanted to get it done by next Hanukkah (which is in the middle of December this year).  A rough estimate concluded that if I knit 4 rows a day, I can get it done by November (which would maybe give me time to smack a border on it.  Because all this time-sink of a blanket needs is more work done to it).

Four rows a day?  How hard is that?

Well, pretty hard, actually.  For starters, there are some days I'm just not really home until late, and I have to go to work the next morning, so forget about staying up to work on it.  Despite what I did yesterday, it's not really a good project to bring to a bar, nor to travel with in general.  Some days, I just have other crap to do, or I just don't want to sit down for an hour and a half and knit, or I get distracted by other things (like now).  Despite this, I'm sticking to my goal of four rows a day, even if in reality it's more like 14 to 16 rows a week (about 2.29 rows a day)  This is because this is the most I've worked on it, and even if I don't quite make my deadline of Hanukkah, I'm at least making visible progress.  Also, I really don't want to be talking about it a year from now. 

Of course, attempting to speed things up a bit has it drawbacks.  Like noticing almost 75 rows later that you did this:

...and, even worse, this:

It figures.  Not only did I mis-cross the easiest cable in the blanket, I noticed it way after I did it.  Not like I'm going to frog half the blanket to fix it, so I'm pretty much stuck with this visible emblem of my stupidity.  Well...I did search for a way to fix it, and there happens to be another way.  However, I'm not so sure I want to try cutting just the right piece of yarn to re-cross the cables. Knowing me, I'll cut the wrong piece and ruin a year's worth of work.  A pre-teen won't care about a stupid mis-crossed cable and I'm just being anal, right?

P.S.: By the way, there should be no more interruptions in my life of the unplanned, life-taking-over, variety...at least for now.  That doesn't exclude laziness in posting, so I'll ask you to forgive me now for infrequent updates.

Magic Looping is a Good Hack

I hate DPNs (Double Pointed Needles, for the uninitiated).

Yeah, I said it.  I have never liked working on DPNs.  It's not knitting in the round that I hate; I love doing that.  As long as it's on a long circular needle, that is.  But I dread the point in my sweaters and hats where I have to pull out those crazy pointed things that stick out everywhere, catch on everything, and are a pain in the ass to knit on since you're constantly stopping to adjust the needles, move stitches, and on and on.

They also don't stop anyone from choosing to sit next to me on the bus, even when there's an empty row right in front of me.  But I digress.

This isn't to say I don't use them.  Not to say I haven't used them successfully either. But I don't like them, and more times than not, something ends up looking screwy.

Anyway, what brought it to a head this week was this:

Now, we already know I suck at 1x1 ribbing, but this is a new low.  Everywhere the needles meet, there's a big open gap between the purl and knit stitches.  If you look closely, you can see where I tried the rotating trick (rotating where the joins are is supposed to help hide the ladders, as they aren't lined up in a column.  Maybe for someone else it does, oye.).  To put salt in the wound, this is all I got done in three days of bus trips (though part of that is due to bus crowding and falling asleep on the bus...lets say this is all I got done in 4 bus trips).  3 inches of ribbing.  That's it.

It is now gone.  I got sick of all the gaps and curving ribbing. I ripped it out Wednesday night.  I then sat down and looked up a video on how to magic loop.

I now have this:

Look at it!  3 and a half inches of nice, neat, ribbing; the best 1x1 ribbing I've done so far.  And it was done in two bus trips.  No ladders.  No pointy needles clacking everywhere.  Why didn't I learn how to magic loop before?  Why did I buy every DPN from size 0 to 11 from KnitPicks when I had perfectly good needles and a long cable to knit small rounds?

I can tell you why, actually.  I bought most of the DPNs before I knew there were other ways of knitting small rounds.  And when I did learn of magic looping, most of what I was reading was along the lines of 'Why would you do that?  DPNs are superior.'  I got the idea that magic looping was a Bad Idea, a bad hack.  So I didn't go any further, and I bought more DPNs.

Well, magic looping may be a hack (after all, you are using a circular needle for something it really wasn't meant to be used for), but it's a very good one, at least for me.  I can knit faster, it works up neater, and I'm dealing with less needles.

It serves me right for ignoring the solution and wasting my time.  I shouldn't have cared.  When have I not liked a good hack?  It's like finding out that adding two lines to a stored procedure will make Microsoft Report Viewer generate columns using a stored procedure with a temporary table in it.  No, not my hack, but finding it did save my ass from having to completely destroy someone else's sproc to get rid of the temporary tables that shouldn't have been an issue in the first place (and, for the record, Microsoft Report Viewer is something else I hate.  But that's not knitting related, so I'll drop it).

Oh, and before I go, I guess I should clarify how I usually use the term hack.  A hack is a solution to a problem that doesn't actually fix the problem.  Instead, it works around the problem, and is often not pretty, efficient, or smart, but it works.  If I say I hacked something in my knitting, I usually mean I fixed my knitting mistake by doing something else instead of frogging it back and doing it right.  For example, fixing too many stitches increased by knitting two together on the next row.  That's a hack. Sometimes this is a good thing (who's going to notice an extra increase and decrease in the area under your armpits?).  Sometimes, it isn't, because the problem still exists and leaving it there or even the hack itself can cause other issues (that area where you had extra increase may now be too big, and will sag, making it noticeable anyway).

And by googling the word hack, I just found out the other word for it is kludge.  Anyone else ever hear that word used?  Kludge? Maybe it's because I'm a programmer, but I've always heard it called a hack.  Link here if you're interested.

Ribbing Woes

I have realized that I suck at 1x1 ribbing. I should have noticed this when I did it at the bottom of the sweater:

I should have thought, hey, this isn't good, I need to learn to fix this.  But no, I conveniently forgot that the bust area of the Milk Maiden sweater is 1x1 ribbing as well.  And when I actually got to that part of the pattern, I forgot that my 1x1 ribbing sucks. So I began ribbing, only to find out that, yeah, having gaping stitches is not conducive to the bust area of a sweater.

So I pulled out 6 rows, and tried again.  I tried twisting the rib, but that just creates huge gaping holes in between the stitches.  I tried twisting the knit stitches only, but that leaves gaping purl stitches.  I tried loosing my tension (this seems counter-intuitive, but according to what I read, trying to pull your stitches tighter makes gaping ribbing worse), but it didn't work either.  I've pulled this part of the sweater out three times already, and I've made no progress since Tuesday (though crowded buses and the idiot that sat next to me with a huge duffel bag in his lap that took up half my seat space didn't help either).

Now I just don't know what to do, other than change it to a 2x2 rib, since I magically don't have this issue when I do any other multiple of ribbing. It'll also mean the bottom won't match, which I'm fine with.  As long as I do the sleeves the same way, I think it'll work.  But I rather do it right.  How the hell do I do 1x1 ribbing without gaping holes?