Saturday, September 27, 2008

Frog!

I don't even have a picture for you, I'm not taking one. I've been working diligently on Harold sweater. I had just started to really see progress, when I realized that the mistake early on that I thought I could live with would bother me forever. I realized this as I was thinking about "the next time I make one of these sweaters I'll do that hem properly, and it will look nice" and "I hope I do the sleeves better" Oh man! I knew I had to rip it, or I just wouldn't be happy with the final product, or the rest of the knitting.

I should have done it before, but it took me so darned long to get through doing that part in the first place that I avoided it. MISTAKE! Now I'm not only redoing it, but I've ripped out hours of work, and I have to try to undo knitting the inside and outside of the them together, and then tink back a row, and then do it all over again. I have 240 stitches a row.

Ok, backup, here's the problem, I knit one of those hems where you do a provisional cast on and then knit 2 inches or whatever, then a purl row, then the front side for 2 inches then unzip the cast on and knit a stitch from the cast on together with a stitch from the outside part. Here's a old picture...before I messed it up:

Anyways, I was right to begin with, I had the two sides even, but then I started knitting the sides together and it seemed like the outside was shorter, and I was afraid that would make the bottom sort of swoop out. So I undid that and knit another row before doing the knitting together part. Well, now that it's a big longer, there is a big pucker on the outside, it's like you can tell there is a seem there, but the inside is beautiful and flat! Grrrrrr. It's the outside that should be beautiful and flat! So, last night I was happily (but not completely happily obviously) knitting along and in one split second I decided I must rip. I yanked the needle out and started pulling.... ugg, you wouldn't believe how long it took me to pull it out....it was just a mean reminder of how long I'd blindly knit refusing to admit the truth because I knew how much work it would be. Oh well, it's not even fully undone yet. I'm so dreading it. I hope I get it done today, but I doubt it. I still have all those k2tog to undo while separating it back onto the 2 separate needles so that I can undo the one side by one row. Did I mention that it's 240 stitches around....

Remind me why I decided I must knit a very large sweater for a man who doesn't wear knits.

5 comments:

Jennifer said...

Your sweater knitting is an act of love. And didn't he ask for one? Oh, oh...idea. It could be your prayer sweater. You know like the prayer socks Leah has been working on. You could pray for Harold the whole time your knitting it. And it would help you from cursing or thinking bad thoughts. Now, I've never tried this either but I think it is a cool idea. Can you pray and count at the same time? Maybe you should just pray your way through the hem.

You know what, I've never knitted a hem yet so you carry on and I'll watch from the sidelines. :0

Anonymous said...

I hate frogging. So much so that I have been known to throw things in the garbage, rather than frog back a large ammount. Heh. I bet your perserverance will pay off though. Can't wait to see the FO!

Tracy Purtscher said...

Ouch....I feel your pain. Chin up Sweetie!

It is now time to look at all this in a different light....

1) You like to knit
2) You now have more opportunity to knit even more. :o)
3) Forget about what once was and enjoy what you are doing.

Or...

Go ahead and torch the damn thing! LOL

cinnamongirl93 said...

I am right with you. Frogging back gets easier. I can't believe I just typed that. It does! Your eye will always go to the mistake if you leave it. Look at this as a teaching tool. Is that any better?
Just keep going, you can do it!!!!!!

Tracy Batchelder said...

It might be faster to rip it all the way out and start over. It's a pain to have to do this, but you'll be much happier when the hem is right.