Hil-arr-i-ous

I've been motoring along with my edging on the baby shawl. I had 35 repeats to do by Friday, so I divided it into 7/10/9/9 and today I was starting on my first lot of 9 when I paused to look at the sewing up instructions and that's when it caught my eye.

The shawl is a square, knitted diagonally, with four side borders picked up and knitted on each side, then an edging added where you pick up a stitch from the border as a stitch at the end of each second row of edging (you work sideways is what I mean). Anyway, I'd knitted my border and was 18 repeats into my edging when I finally read the instructions.

See that? "Work as for First Border from ** to **"? Yes. I did that, not a problem.

Row 60, however...

This is how you work Row 60 in the first edging you do. So I did that. For the Second Border as well.

I didn't knit the stitches left at the end of the First Border, instead I cast on another 17.

That sound you heard around 2:45 this afternoon? That was my heart breaking. It was pretty loud.

Epilogue: I posted a description of how I'd stuffed up my knitting on Facebook. My friend Chantal read it and went "Wait, how did Andrea stuff up? That's exactly what... I... did......eep".

That's right. We both stuffed up the edging completely. I've pulled back 3420 stitches, and now I'm going to sit down and knit like a freakin' demon to get it done.

The B-Side

This week I'm starting the edging on the second side of the baby shawl I'm entering in the Show next month. Yes, I truly am the rightful ruler of the kingdom of Procrastination.

Now, I have 175 stitches on the needle and I decrease 5 every ten rows. So.... 350 rows of 17 stitches for the edging, and I want to have it done by Friday.

Pffffft. Piece o'cake.

With my sanity intact?

Pffffft. No.

Bliss

No doubt many people might object to their significant other being home sick. I read posts on Facebook about "man flu" and how husbands become all whiny and turn into sooky three year olds. I obviously married a good 'un because Felix is home for the week with a chest infection (requiring antibiotics disguised as horse pills) and I couldn't be happier.

Spending time with Felix (and no kids) is the best part of my day. When the kids are finally asleep we sit back and watch some episodes of "Archer" while finally having dinner (9:00pm is normal for dinner, yeah?) or else he heads off to play something on his PS4 while I sit behind him on the bed watching Netflix and knitting, either my own or customers'. Last night I came into our room to discover that Felix had started up Minecraft and I proceeded to sit and watch for almost three hours while he built a house and various adventures, and took in my suggestions (An all glass second floor? Why not?) and worked on a neckline for a child's jumper at the same time.

Sheer bliss.

Andrea and the terrible horrible no good very bad day

Today was just awful. It was a very bad day, the kind I haven't had in a very long time. I keep myself extra busy so I don't think too much, but sometimes all of the blah creeps in a brain crack and wham: Bad Day.

I eventually ended up at home around 11:30am with Dot in tow and a veneer of civility and kindness. I can fake it, I'm really good at that. I took one look at the dishes and thought "Nope."

Instead I sewed up a little teeny baby jumper for a customer.

Instead I cut up a brand new t-shirt and added three bands of amazing fabric Judith bought home from Germany to make Dot a dress.

I took my rubbish mood and made things with it and now I'm feeling better.

I think I'll finish the night by adding a crochet border to a knitted coat. Thank goodness for my customers.

Doctor Who knits.

Why aren't you?