I Knew Things Were Going Too Well

I started working on a lace shawl just over a week ago. It was started because I needed a break from knitting socks which had been taking up all my knitting time for some weeks. The first hundred or so rows were completed pretty quickly but as the shawl grew it took longer and longer to knit each row until it got to the stage yesterday where each row was taking something like 20 minutes to complete. But even though the rows were taking longer to complete, the actual pattern over these stitches was very easy to follow and soon became imprinted on my mind so that minimal viewing of the pattern charts was necessary.

Things were going smoothly until about 5.30 this evening when I discovered that there were some mistakes in the shawl. I started to unpick it stitch by stitch but with almost 500 stitches to the row, trying to find out where the errors occurred was going to take forever. So I did the unthinkable. I pulled the needle (I'm using a circular one because they are the best thing to use for shawls) from the shawl and started to unravel the whole shawl.

It may seem a somewhat extreme to do this but I really don't have the ability to concentrate on the shawl for the length of time necessary to unpick it a stitch at a time to find the errors. I often resort to this when knitting lace because it can be so easy to make a mistake which can take forever to find. Admittedly I have never managed to get so far with a shawl before making one of these catastrophic mistakes, but I know that the shawl will probably be better second time around and I am now more aware of the likely problem areas of the pattern.

I have already started knitting again and already have completed 13 rows of the first chart. It is likely that I may finish the first chart this evening and possibly even start the second one. Hopefully, this time I will be able to work on the shawl without having to resort to pulling the needle out.

Frustration

My mood, while not exactly brilliant, has been reasonably stable over the last few days, but sleep has been something else. I sleep well when I use medication to help, probably too well, but sleep badly when I don't.

I had a very successful day giving a presentation to GPs and Practice Managers for one of our Strategic Health Authorities last Wednesday, and then got roped in to talk to some high ranking people from most of the Strategic Health Authorities in England that evening. It made for a very long day, having left home at about 5.50am and not arriving back home again until 10.20pm, but I think it was worth it because they were all very interested in what I had to say about patients having access to their GP medical records online. I am due to give another presentation in a couple of weeks, this time to my local Primary Care Trust, and in September I will be making a presentation and taking part in a discussion at the Department of Health.

I am always very nervous and anxious for a couple of days before each of these events, but a bit like an old trouper on the stage, once the spotlight is on me I seem to be able to hold my own in front of the audience and I always get super feedback from those who attend the presentations. It seems that hearing things from a patient makes a big difference to their appreciation of the subject. After these events I then suffer a real adrenalin high that lasts for 24-48 hours, almost like a manic period, before crashing back down into depression. Fortunately, the collapse into depression has not been so severe this time, but neither has it been a bed of roses.

My knitting has been causing me some problems over the last week or so. After having had some problems that resulted in me having to unpick a few rows, I managed to get back on track and was progressing well. Then, on Sunday, I discovered an error which required me to have to unpick some rows again. Only one and a half rows this time but it was annoying all the same. I had only six more rows to knit until I got to the end of the main part of the shawl and could start on the edging (the pattern for which I still have to create). I decided to take a break from the knitting yesterday, but started work on the unpicking today, corrected the mistake and then was progressing well until I found that I had one stitch too many in a particular part of the pattern which was obvious and would require me to start unpicking again. This time it needs about five rows to be unpicked so this is going to be a long job.

Hence the frustration. It seems that this shawl is determined to cause me as many problems as it possibly can before I finish it. I'll see how I am feeling tomorrow before deciding to do any work on it. At times I feel like pulling the needle out and unravelling the lot but I know that this is silly and I would regret it the moment that I started doing it.

I may be feeling frustrated by it, even despairing a little, but I am not that desperate yet.

Panic Over

It took me a while, but I managed to unpick my knitting stitch by stitch, row by row, until I got back to a spot where I had the right number of stitches on the needle and then knit a few rows to get me to the point where I had noticed the error. So I can carry on with the knitting and still hopefully finish the centre panel over the weekend.

I have mentioned before that I started knitting lace shawls about 18 months ago and while most patterns have not caused me any significant problems, one took a number of attempts before I managed to complete the shawl. Since that time I have knitted two other shawls to that pattern without too much of a problem. However, when I was knitting it for the first time I would become depressed for days each time I had to unpick the shawl and start again. At one point I thought that I would never be able to master the pattern.

It is yet another indicator of how much better I am becoming, that even though I have had significant problems with this Shetland lace shawl, I have not got to the stage that I thought I would have to give it up and admit defeat. Through all the problems that I have had with this pattern, I have kept telling myself that knitting consists of just two basic stitches with slight variations to how those two stitches are arranged that creates the pattern. As the centre section is knitted backwards and forwards on the needles (or one needle in my case as I am using a circular needle throughout) I have only been using one of those stitches, and variations of it, so far.

I won't be getting very much knitting done today as I have a busy schedule of other activities and will be out of the house much of the day. But as I complete each pattern repeat I seem to be gaining confidence that I can knit this shawl. It is the kind of item, that in this increasingly throwaway world, can become a family heirloom, and I hope that Kelly and her family can use it for many years to come. Some Shetland lace shawls have survived for more than one hundred years, and the thought that something I have made may still be around and being used long after I am gone means that perhaps I can leave something for future generations.

Just In Case You Wondered

Yes, I have been a bit quiet about the Shetland lace shawl for the last few days, and there is a very good reason for that.  I have started it, and had to unpick it again, seven times so far.  The best that I have managed so far is to cast on the required stitches, complete the four rows of garter stitch and then complete 14 rows of the 20-row repeat that forms the 'rosebud' pattern at the centre of the shawl.  My best attempt came to grief about half way through row 15 of the pattern when I made a mistake and then while attempting to correct it managed to drop some stitches that were impossible to pick up again.

It's not that I am a bad knitter; I rarely, if ever, drop stitches normally.  The problem that I am having here is caused by the fineness of the wool that I am using.  I know that they say that a bad workman blames his tools, but in this case it really is the yarn at fault.  I am starting to get used to it now, and I am working on my eighth attempt at the moment.  I have just completed row 14 of the 'rosebud' pattern and will shortly be entering new territory. I am determined that this time I will not make a mistake and I will be a little more careful if I have to unpick anything to try to ensure that I don't drop stitches.

The fact that I had so many problems with the shawl meant that my other knitting, instead of being a stand-by, became the main thing that I was working on.  The result of this is that I now have a new jumper and a cardigan, both in the same yarn.  The cardigan is the garment that I got for free because the yarn was so economical.

So, I will sit down with the pattern, I shall take up the knitting, and I will start row 15 in the hopes that this will be the last time that I have to start on the shawl and that I can get to work on it every evening so that it grows at a good rate.  If I'm having this much trouble with the centre of the shawl, I hate to think what will happen when I get to the lacy borders.  It might just turn out to be my biggest nightmare ever.  We'll have to wait and see what happens.