Just Shoot Me Now - A Masters Hand Knit Post

You would think that answering a series of questions regarding your knitting of the swatches would be pretty easy.  Basically Question #4  asks you to look at a couple of swatches and tell them whether you like the bumpy or the smooth side better in the cast-on and what you might want to do about those differences in a personal project.  Pffttt.....except the cast-on edge of the two swatches I'm looking at aren't looking different because I didn't do them as instructed!   As I said, just shoot me now - I get to do this swatch over (again) because I don't think they are going to buy into "let's pretend I really did it right".  I'm pretty sure they are going to want to see it done correctly.

And the question about bumpy and smooth, well heck the more I dug into the nature of this cast-on the more complex the answer.  Two hours later I know a whole lot more about this particular cast on and what options I have for manipulating bumpy and smooth cast-on edges.  Amazing what you can learn.

Now if I could just get the magic knitting fairy to show up and leave a whole new swatch under my pillow tonight that would be wonderful - hey, it could happen.

The Master's Level 1 Swatch #4

I'm coming to the conclusion that I will never pass Level 1 in the Master's.  Oh, I'll keep going since I will learn a lot, but I have certainly given up any hope of passing.  I find that when I am trying to knit the swatches I get all focused and tense and all I can think of is all the places that I could make this horrible, very bad, never be able to fix it right mistake and then I will have to do the swatch all over again and it will be some weird Ground Hog Day nightmare over and over and over again.  About this time I'm binding off  Swatch #4 and have some kind of "out of body" experience because I suddenly have this weird extra bar thing on the back and I have no idea where that came from so there I am frogging the bind off and back knitting to where I some how dropped a damn stitch. You would think I might notice dropping a stitch, but noooooo.   Temporarily abducted by aliens can be the only explanation.

Over thinking gets me in trouble in the saddle as well.  My trainer has been giving me and ole nimble toes an exercise where we have to back up in a "U" shape.  Don't think about it, just do it.  Yea...right!   This sounds a whole lot easier than it is and being the slightly dyslexic and spatially challenged person I am this is tough.  It is also tough for ole nimble toes because backing requires the horse to back up using his feet diagonally.  You would think it is like walking, only backwards, but it isn't.  It is the same foot placement as the trot going forward.  So, you are sort of trotting backwards at a walk pace and doing a U in reverse. The horse has to figure out what to do with his feet, not ole nimble toes strongest suit.  Standing around hoping someone will give him a peppermint is more his style. 

So asking ole nimble toes to go backward when he can manage to fall over his own feet just trying to walk forward is a tough one.  We managed to get only two correct steps in all the attempts.  Lesley, the trainer, thinks this is good for me because I can't over think it, I just have to do it.  Gets me out of my head.

What does this have to do with knitting?  I just finished my second go at Swatch #4 and blocked it - Blech.  I start over thinking all this stuff and the next thing I know I am so focused on my knitting and my shoulders are up under my ears.  Sigh...oh for the happy ignorance of "just knitting". 

I even bought the signature needles and I am probably the only one on the planet that thinks they are ugly.  I don't like their loud, carnival colors, they compete with the yarn and I don't like it.  I like black, with occasional wild and crazy forays into beige.  My horse is black, my cat is black and my dog is actually sort of grey except for her four buff (think beige) legs.  I realize I am not the norm. So I don't like the colors of the signature needles, but agree they do knit nicely and others probably love the colors.  Lol...I just noticed the yarn I picked out is beige, yep I was just thinking it was light colored and I couldn't use black. 

I did this sweater several years ago, happily knitting on some size 8 ebony needles from Lantern Moon.  The whole thing was a 2x2 rib.

 I don't think it's all that terrible tension wise, but I what do I know, I wasn't over thinking the whole thing - as I have said before: ignorance is bliss.

Ignorance is Bliss or the Perils of Tension

I could have probably continued knitting for the rest of my life without ever having heard of The Knitting Guild Association or their Masters Hand Knit program, but noooooo.........I had to decide that I wanted to improve my skills. I wanted my knitting to get better.  I'm reminded of being in graduate school and a woman I knew who "suffered" from Multiple Personality Disorder.  She once told me her life had been so much easier before she decided to "get better" and told this great story over lunch of how a tree had come down in her front yard and she called the tree cutters to come and clear the debris - then the next day called her boyfriend who had been with her the prior day and wanted to know who the hell cut down and stole the tree in her front yard.  One personality came forward to handle the problem, then retreated while another personality came forward who had no idea where the tree had gone.  Life might have been pretty interesting for the people around her, but her ignorance of self was bliss. 

The ignorance of the quality of my knitting has been bliss as well, sigh.........

Now I look at every aspect of my knitting through a magnifying lens;  selvages, tension, gauge, blocking, etc.   I am also lazy, I cringed at the tale of a Master's student redoing a swatch 31 times until she felt she had gotten it right.  I'm beginning to understand why she might do that.

I have blocked and woven little strips in my swatches so I can measure the row and stitches. I relied heavily on the wonderful blog by Arenda Holladay  http://www.arendaholladay.com/ for guidance.

So, I have knitted, blocked, woven little threads and counted stitch and row.  Which after looking carefully at my work is obviously just a practice run. 

Swatch #1

I can't help but notice that in the 2X2 ribbing the second knit stitch is larger than the first knit stitch in the rib.  I'm not to unhappy with the actual garter stitch portion ( let me keep a little bliss of ignorance).

Swatch #2

While the knit stitches are larger in the rib than in the Stockinette Stitch this is to be somewhat expected; however, my rows look like a drunk who failed a field sobriety test.

Swatch #3 Seed Stitch

I was feeling pretty smug about this swatch, even gloating in a small polite sort of way that my swatch did not seem to have the stitch error the picture in the calendar seemed to have, it was about this time I once again noticed how much my rows wandered all over the place.  Hmmmm...... according to Montse Stanley in her book Knitter's Handbook this is a tension problem. 

Well, I don't knit like any of the examples in her book.  Tension problems can include points that are too long, how one holds the needles, inconsistent position on the needles of the yarn from stitch to stitch, etc.  Correcting this fault won't be easy.   I was at a Fiber Guild event yesterday and had an opportunity to talk with a member who had completed Level 1 and was currently working on Level 2 she's a thrower and passed Level 1, so there is hope.  I then wandered over to my friend BSue who was working on her current knit project, this woman is a knitting fiend.  Of course I immediately began looking at the stitches and tension - If the fiber world has a version of a "Shock and Awe" this was it.  Total perfection.  Then she showed me a sock she had completed - I was speechless with admiration - trust me words rarely fail, I once won a lunch if I could keep my mouth shut through a business meeting.  Damn she's good. 

Well....as I remind myself - it is a process.  But I will definitely be heading to TKGA held in Reno this fall for a little education and feedback.  In the mean time I'm going to just keep calm and carry on.

The Masters: Blocking and the first 3 Swatches

I have just completed the first three swatches which to me seem to all fit in a group.  They are about even tension in rib and flat knitted fabric, weaving in ends so that they are invisible and maintain the elasticity of the fabric and correct blocking - or so it seems to me. 

Along with correctly blocking the swatches, the Masters requires a report on blocking and in my mind this is the logical time to start to research and write this requirement.  It is also the logical time to put what I learn into practice.  My plan is to block the first 3 swatches and get them all prepared for the binder with labels, Swatch sheet, etc.  I will polish the report and put that in the binder as well. 
Of course any good report requires reference materials and with a gleam in my eye - that means BOOKS!!  So I quickly rationalized the need to buy three new books and a blocking kit.  Okay, I know that I could have probably done the whole thing without a blocking kit.  The report could have been written with a library card and the Internet - but this just gave me the excuse to buy what had been on my list of "I wants" for some time.  Besides, one can never have to many wonderful, glorious reference books about knitting   I chose to buy the following:

The Principles of Knitting
The Knitter's Handbook: A Comprehensive guild to the Principles and Techniques of Handknitting
The Knitter's Book of Finishing Techniques

I have my eye on the Vogue Knitting Book, but that will have to wait.  I hadn't counted on the US Post Office choosing not to deliver the books and declaring my address undeliverable.  Considering I have been here for 3 years and they just delivered an Amazon package last week this was bizarre.  Maybe they think I have too many knitting books and are staging an intervention.  In the meantime, I found this great video specifically targeted to the MHK program and blocking.  We don't know what we don't know and yes I bought the above picture of the blocking kit, when a couple of towels, some rust proof pins and a mat from Lowes or Home Depot would have been good enough.  I don't have a reputation as an equipment junkie in my guild for nothing. 

References:  Blocking Swatches for the MHK Program, LippizanKnitter  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id0ti5-c1ds&feature=endscreen&NR=1