posted by Lily on knitting

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I could say “.. well almost” but that wouldn’t really be true.  There has indeed been some full blown foot stamping and screaming today.  I finished my razor lace cardie … blocked it … tried it on … and all my worst fears were confirmed.

This cardie has been SUCH a pain to knit.  Sort of.  I love the construction method.  There have been long, peaceful hours when I’ve really enjoyed the knitting.  But razor lace?  AAAAAAAAARGHHHHH!

In the early days I frogged this cardie 6 times.  Man oh man!  Truly I’m not exaggerating when I say I’ve probably knitted it three times over!  One occasion even involved ripping it off the needles and hurling it onto my chair – by this stage I was leaping up and down like a demented ballerina (without any grace), wringing my hands and squealing to my Mum.

Of course, she sensibly said, “Stop it right not.  Choose another pattern.”  I squealed “No!  I paid for this pattern.  I LIKE this pattern.  I cannot believe I am so stupid I cannot DO this pattern.”

But in the end, I decided to just embrace any mistakes in the wretched, lovely razor lace and keep knitting.  THAT was a dumb idea.  As I knitted closer and closer to the castoff I said to everyone nearby at that moment – “Can you notice that big bump there?  Yeah, the one that will sit right on my boob!”  ”Can you see the holes in the sleeve really clearly where I dropped a gazillion stitches and picked them up badly?”  ”Can you see down here on the band where god-knows-what-I-did?”

Mum said, “Just wear it around the house.” (not comforting)

Abby said, “Put a brooch on the bump.” (yeah right – “look folks! here’s my right boob!)

Julian said, “Didn’t you only pay $3 a ball for that wool (I did, Paton’s Bluebell old stock) – put it away and do something else.”

I kept saying “When I block it and put it on it will be probably be fine.”

Sweet little babysitting girlie said “Yes you can notice the bump.  And there and there and there and there.  I think you should pull it out and do it again because the rest of it looks really nice and you’ll never like wearing it with those bumps.  You like knitting so that’s okay.  You’ll like knitting it again.”

Out of the mouth of babes.

So, I’m here to tell you that stamping and screaming doesn’t make you feel any better.  Indeed, it only increases your fretfulness over the disaster.  Being honest and clear eyed about what you’ve done is so much more liberating.  You would never have guessed that would you :-)  You needed me to tell you that! :-0

I undid the castoff, attached the cardie to the wool winder and bam!  Hundreds of hours of knitting were neatly re-wound in just 15 minutes.

I kept the cast-on.  Do you think I’m truly demented for doing it again?  I do really like the pattern and when I had it on, I loved it and could imagine wearing it with lots of my clothes.  And I hate the thought of being defeated by it.

But given I couldn’t keep that wretched razor lace right no matter how hard I tried and after hundreds and hundreds of rows … am I just going to have the same problems again?

I mean, I know this pattern OFF BY HEART … knit, wrap, knit, slip as if knitting, slip two stitches as if knitting, put them back on left needle, knit, pass slip stitched over, knit, wrap, knit, wrap, knit … and so on.

Maybe I just have to be really vigilant and count my little head off.  The minute I notice a mistake – unpick.

… very … deep … sigh ……