The Black Hole of Knitting.

Followup re: Bottom Line Books, I'm pretty mean when I'm mad enough, and even though the call center person was just doing her job (and I told her that) I rarely have time for bullshit. And I don't suffer fools gladly. When she indignantly said "This isn't a scam!" She pushed me over the edge. I said she couldn't possibly know since she was sitting in a cubicle somewhere reading from a script. Sheesh. As for my MIL, they only reason she called me is because she thought it had something to do with the "web". Her children were a little peeved at first because they assumed that she had ordered these books without realizing it, but a little research told me that she wasn't alone and probably hadn't made this error.

The books themselves are a "Yearbook of Medical Snakeoil, 2008", which means there is a new one every year. We will need to keep an eye out next year. I don't trust this company.




Ah, yes, the "black hole" of knitting. You've been there, I know you have. The Lace Ribbon scarf is 80 inches in the pattern. I already told the story of ordering and re-ordering more yarn so it would be long enough. I am a long scarf kinda gal. I was shooting for between 72 and 80 inches, unblocked. I began measuring about each repeat or two beginning at 60 inches. I'd lay it out on the floor, and get it as flat as possible. It seemed to stay 60 inches for days. And I was about knitted out on this pattern, let me tell you. (This is my lunch time/coffee shop knitting.) When I hit 68 inches, after I broke out the champagne, I figured I'd go about 2 more repeats which would take me to between 72 and 74 inches. (I started his piece back in October, by the way. It was on hiatus for Christmas knitting.) I've been really busy this April and didn't get a lot of lunchtime knitting in. I was coordinating a big program in the Northeast part of the state in early April and spent a night with my mom instead of at a hotel. I took the scarf, and when she saw it, she kept saying, "Isn't that looooong?" "Are you sure you want it that long?", until I wanted to strangle her. So maybe this is payback for my black thoughts.

Anyway, I finished it up on Friday night, and measured on Saturday morning and GADS! it had not gained 4+ inches, it had gained about 12+ inches. Without blocking the blasted thing was 85 inches!! I honestly wondered if the scarf had been kidnapped and knitted by aliens. I forged ahead, and soaked (spun in net bag in washer), and laid it out flat to dry. I measured and now it was 89 inches!! Sigh. I was pretty sure this would be unwieldy, even for me. I waited until it was dryish and tried it on. By Saturday evening I had convinced myself to wear it awhile to see how I felt.


Sunday morning, I just decided nothing doing, why worry myself silly over such a small thing. (I like to look at the big picture most of the time.) This was the advantage to knitting. There are always do-overs. (Except in wire knitting, ask me how I know this.) So I snipped the end, and unraveled about 6 - 8 inches, reknit the border, and voila.




Lace Ribbon Scarf

Size #4 Harmony circular needles

3+ skeins Koigu KPM in pretty apricot, about 80+ inches


Mods: I knitted a three row seed stitch border on both ends.



I didn't need the fourth skein I bought. The first skein only knitted up to 20 inches, but the 2nd and 3rd went further. I think the third skein took me to about 78 inches. I would have stopped there if my measurements had been accurate. The yarn pile in the photo above is almost all I used of skein 4. Now I need to figure out what to do with a partial skein of Koigu.


I actually enjoyed knitting this pattern. I didn't memorize it until late in the process or I think I would have liked it even better. But as with most things that drag on, there came a time when pattern fatigue set in. This was my first time knitting with Koigu. I really loved it.