I Wish I Could Knit For A Living

My sweet cat, Macy, is sleeping on the floor in front of me, on her back with her legs in the air.   Macy's been with us for almost a year now, and she has started exhibiting a need to be our line of sight.  Macy always relaxes or sleeps directly in front of the couch and tv if we are in the room with us.  For regular longer sleeping or napping, she's still much more comfortable and safe in her cat condo.  In fact, as I type this, she just climbed on the couch next to me and made herself comfortable on my knitting.

The flash woke her up

I am in the middle of a big project at work and it has completely screwed up my routine.  I've been going into work earlier and leaving late.  I feel very stressed all the time. I basically get a few hours each night to try to relax.  The only thing that helps is knitting.  And I started an afghan project a few weeks ago but I messed up the pattern two separate times and had to frog the entire project both times.  Knitting was not helping me out at all.

However, on the third try, the pattern suddenly clicked with me and I couldn't put the pattern down.  This is exactly what I needed to start taking my mind off the mounds of work ahead of me.  I hate the colors I've picked for this afghan (they don't work together as well as I thought they did) but I love the pattern so much that I don't care that it is ugly.  I'm already planning my next afghan.

Ripple Stitch Afghan in progress

Reverse Knitting

I really want to knit an afghan I found on Bernat's website.  I can't link it directly because you have to be a member to view it, but it's called Ripple Stitch Afghan.  While I bought yarn to start the project, it is clear to me now that it will not be enough.  And, while I will not have enough yarn of the same dye lot, this is not enough to discourage me from this project.

Color palette (the orange is the contract color for border use)

The pattern seems simple enough.  I've learned my lesson from other projects that I will read through the entire project and make sure I understand the stitches.  This easy pattern passed the test.  My contrast color (orange) started the project as the border, and then I had to increase the number of stitches by 30.  At this point, I started with my first color (pink) in the ripple pattern.  The pattern involves increasing and decreasing in the row, but I thought I knew what I was doing.  Wrong.  I managed eight rows of the pattern before I realized I was leaving out several stitches at the end of the rows.  I frogged the entire thing back to the beginning (i.e., all stitches off the needle) and started over with my border color.

My second attempt was started yesterday and I made quick work of the border.  I was confident going into the first row of the pattern.   Everything is looking good unless I get to what is supposed to be the last seven stitches.  Only problem is that I only have six stitches remaining to work.  Argh.

I was tempted to rip out the whole thing again, but I'm trying to keep my frustration in check and I'm reversing (unknitting) the last row.  This is very slow because I have to unwork 207 stitches, some of which are stitches knitted together and slipped.  I'm wondering if I will ever get the project off the ground.  I'm hoping that once I establish the correct pattern repeat, I will be able to pick up mistakes long before I get to the end.  Otherwise, I may start looking for a new pattern to use up this yarn.

I've neglected this blog and, believe me, it's not the only thing in my life getting the neglect edit at this point in my life.

We are halfway through May and we have no idea what is happening with our short sale home purchase.  Mr. Grumpbump and I want to own this home and we are willing to wait for it.  If we just had an idea of where the Sellers were in their short sale process.  I would never recommend buying a short sale to anyone, especially if the house is to be your primary residence.  We've heard horror stories about short sales taking seven months to a year to close.  We love this house but are really afraid of waiting that long.  I'm not sure we can remain sane that long.

I've asked Mr. Grumpbump if I can have a kitten.  He was not very open to the idea but mumbled something about getting our house first.  He's right, of course, and I have not completely considered how adding a kitten  to our household would affect Miss Macy or Delilah Cat.  I want to believe that their maternal instincts would kick in, but I've been known to be wrong before.

Delilah is ALWAYS cleaning.

We believe Macy's background to be part cat, part owl.