Extreme Blocking
Oy. So my beach shawl is finally done and blocking. It only took forever to get it that way. See? Here it is:
(Pardon the crummy photo. It's dark out and I had to use the flash. The colours are WAY better in real life.)
As I wrote in my post earlier this month, I started it in June 2010 and finished it in July of that year but I wasn't happy with it because it was too short. So I frogged it and started again. And it wasn't as exciting the second time around (the same phenomenon that causes second sock syndrome) so it went into deep hibernation. When the new year started, I brought it out of the deep recesses of my knitting basket determined to continue with the progress I had made in lowering my number of WIPs. I made good progress on it until some point last week. I was almost done. I had a row and a half to go before the bind off. But...
The second to last short row section is on the top center of the shawl. Mine was knit in a section of the yarn that was dyed, for lack of a better term, "funny." While Mini Mochi proclaims to be a single ply, this looked like a barbershop pole of the peachy colour and the light sea blue colour. And the section looked awful. It was muddy. And it was right there in the top center.
I know what kind of knitter I am. I am the kind of knitter who will take scissors to a sleeve because of two stitches that were purled where they ought to have been knit. And I know that I'm the kind of knitter who won't wear something if I don't absolutely love it. So I couldn't leave that section alone. I pulled it back, cut out several yards of muddy looking yarn, and began to re-knit again.
And then I caught that blasted noro virus that's been going around. And then my toddler caught the noro virus. And so no knitting got done.
But today I finally finished. And I was faced with a new problem.
How to block it.
Not how as in the steps to blocking, but where the heck I was supposed to put it. You see, there is no spare floor space in this house. None. Zero. I thought about blocking it at my parent's house, but I was really hoping to block it and have it dry in time for me to wear tomorrow. So I had to make do.
I put my blocking mats on the floor and stretched out my shawl, hissing at the cat and scolding the dog for trying to walk and lay on it. Then I cleared off the piano. And put some file boxes on the key cover. And stacked some boxes on top of the music next to the piano. And pulled out the bench and stacked some more file boxes on it. Then we moved the mats to the top of the piano. And there it is!
I give you extreme blocking.
(Pardon the crummy photo. It's dark out and I had to use the flash. The colours are WAY better in real life.)
As I wrote in my post earlier this month, I started it in June 2010 and finished it in July of that year but I wasn't happy with it because it was too short. So I frogged it and started again. And it wasn't as exciting the second time around (the same phenomenon that causes second sock syndrome) so it went into deep hibernation. When the new year started, I brought it out of the deep recesses of my knitting basket determined to continue with the progress I had made in lowering my number of WIPs. I made good progress on it until some point last week. I was almost done. I had a row and a half to go before the bind off. But...
The second to last short row section is on the top center of the shawl. Mine was knit in a section of the yarn that was dyed, for lack of a better term, "funny." While Mini Mochi proclaims to be a single ply, this looked like a barbershop pole of the peachy colour and the light sea blue colour. And the section looked awful. It was muddy. And it was right there in the top center.
I know what kind of knitter I am. I am the kind of knitter who will take scissors to a sleeve because of two stitches that were purled where they ought to have been knit. And I know that I'm the kind of knitter who won't wear something if I don't absolutely love it. So I couldn't leave that section alone. I pulled it back, cut out several yards of muddy looking yarn, and began to re-knit again.
And then I caught that blasted noro virus that's been going around. And then my toddler caught the noro virus. And so no knitting got done.
But today I finally finished. And I was faced with a new problem.
How to block it.
Not how as in the steps to blocking, but where the heck I was supposed to put it. You see, there is no spare floor space in this house. None. Zero. I thought about blocking it at my parent's house, but I was really hoping to block it and have it dry in time for me to wear tomorrow. So I had to make do.
I put my blocking mats on the floor and stretched out my shawl, hissing at the cat and scolding the dog for trying to walk and lay on it. Then I cleared off the piano. And put some file boxes on the key cover. And stacked some boxes on top of the music next to the piano. And pulled out the bench and stacked some more file boxes on it. Then we moved the mats to the top of the piano. And there it is!
I give you extreme blocking.
Impressive :)
ReplyDeleteI'm about to finish my first shawl since my daughter got mobile and have quite worked out how I'm going to do it. Buying blocking mats is probably the first step now that I don't have a spare bed to use any more.