In the Pink

I've started knitting again since my recent sprain. It hurts, but in a good way. Okay, it hurts to knit, but not badly enough for me not to do it.

And what I've started to knit! Last December, I was visiting Ptown, and my friend Adrienne lives in Provincetown, and somehow it happened and I asked and she offered, and I have a place to stay for a week in July. For free. On Commercial Street, right in the centre of everything. For free. So of course I offered to knit her something as a thank-you and a way of repaying her. We decided on a heavy shawl, but she didn't particularly care for the one I usually make, with the ruffle on the ends. Okay, I can live with that. So I've been casting about for a pattern that struck me, and I settled on a modified Irish Hiking Scarf, by Adrian Bizilia (it's a free download on Ravelry). I added some stitches and a couple more cables, bringing the number up to five, and cast on using size US 13 needles, which is what I normaly use on my big ruffled shawl.

Quelle disastre. 

That's French. 

I think. 

I don't really speak French.

A bit of background. The ruffled shawl pattern asks for size US 11 needles. When I make it, I don't get anything like gauge, and in order for it to be big enough, I need to use size US 13 needles. So I reconfigured the Irish Hiking Scarf pattern to include four rather than three cables, and cast on my brand new Knitter's Pride needles. (I love these needles, and should write about them sometime. They're wicked pissah.) I knit five rows on these 13s, and it looked awful. Wretched. Vomitrocious. In short, it sucked.

Let's face it: God don't like ugly. I don't like ugly, either.

So I grabbed another skein of the yarn (I've got six of them!) and cast on using size US 11 needles, and began knitting away. It looks better. I think it would look even better on size US 10½ needles, but I don't have them in the right circular length, so to hell with it, we're using the 11s. Sometimes you just have to deal with it. Reconfiguring some more, I added another cable to the pattern, so there're five. Math is not my strong suit, and counting is hard! I figured it out, eventually, but whoever invented numbers and counting had better stay the hell out of my way. If they ever cross my path, I'm gonna kick them til they're dead.

So, after twelve rows, and one cable twisting, this is what it looks like. I think it looks pretty good, and once it's finished and blocked, it will be a proper shawl. I will, however, send a photo to Adrienne, to make sure she likes it. I don't think I want to knit through six skeins, 600 metres, 648 yards of shawl, only to have her say, “Yeah, I hate it.”

Now that would really suck.