Kimono Sweater, Post #3

As you already know, it was a VERY productive long Columbus Day weekend in NC, at least in terms of my sweater. (By the way, when the gallery where you work part-time is owned by the city, and your husband works for the federal government/military, you get all the holidays off.) I can't really explain it, but for whatever reason I was just absolutely unable to put my knitting down. In my sickness, I even worked on it in the car on the 4 hour drive back home. In this last instance, I attempted to resist pulling the project out of the bag, but Brendon could see me getting fidgety and said, "You're wanting to knit, aren't you?" He managed to convince me that actually knitting in the car was possibly less obsessive and crazy than sitting there thinking about knitting, working the pattern in my head without working it in my hands. So I caved.

Anyway, I'm back in Virginia, which means I once again have my camera and can take some pictures of my progress! Want to see??

You can see that I did finally finish that long and painful cable pattern. Alright, alright, it truly wasn't all that painful after the first of the 3 repeats, once I got comfortable with the pattern and was able to anticipate the next step, plus having fixed that one major mistake of a row, etc - but it remained very 'involved' anyway. After switching over to stockinette, though, it's going marvelously quickly. In one day's work in SS, I already have just about half the length of the back panel done, compared with what, a bit under 2 weeks to do the cables?? By the way, this is the first time I've used my rosewood needles, and I LOVE THEM. Period.

I would also like to mention that I remain very pleased with the Elegance yarn from Knitpicks. Working it in stockinette, it turns out so soft that the word "luscious" comes to mind. The silk really gives it a nice sort of subtle sheen, especially in the sunlight. I have no trouble at all keeping the stockinette stitches even. The color really looks quite different depending on the light it's in, from a red-grape type color in high wattage or natural light, to a more blue shade under softer light. It's really unusual. Since it's 70% alpaca, it does have a slight halo, but so far, pre-washing, it doesn't seem to shed at all. (Though it does attract the dog hair that covers my apartment quite well.)

Here is an up-close shot of the cables, since I'm so proud of them. I know I was just talking about the complexity of colors that this yarn takes on, but the red you see here is to be blamed on the camera. I don't know what happened there. It is definitely not that red, really.

I am feeling very positive about the amount of work and the quality of work I was able to turn out over the last few days, and I'm very optimistic about finishing the Kimono sweater in time for the opening on the 27th. It might not be done on the 20th like I wanted, because there are still other cabled sections yet to go, but we'll see. So far I'm not the least bit sick of it, particularly since that first part is over, so that's a good sign.

I would like to clarify that the trip to NC did involve other activities besides those of the yarn-ish variety. There was furniture moving, shopping, catching up with old friends, eating out at some of our old favorite places, and even a trip over to Raleigh for a concert: a small-club, multi-band benefit for Alzheimers. We went there specifically to see Parklife, whose lead singer is a friend of Brendon's from back when Brendon and his mom went to all the Cravin Melon shows they could. Parklife even played at our wedding reception, at least until the noise brought the police out to the scene.

In spite of all this, I won't deny that the majority of my time in Greensboro was spent with needles in hand. My friend Bethany, who knitted with me on Sunday, told me that knitting can truly be a physical addiction; that the repetitive motion releases pleasure chemicals in the brain - much like chocolate does. Or sex. I'm not sure where she picked up that little tidbit, but I tend to believe it. It's kind of nice to think that I can't actually control the obsession.