Friday, April 18, 2008

This Knitter’s Miracle

On Wednesday, Iain had his 9 month doctor’s check up in Wolfville. I cannot believe that he is nine months old already. I have to plan a first birthday party in only three months – eek! Iain is now 21 lbs, 29.5" long and is sporting five teeth! He is growing so quickly. While DH was away this week – Monday to Thursday – Iain cut two teeth. You’ve got to be with him every moment to catch these quick changes! He has two more coming in while I type and I sure wish they’d hurry up. Even the most contented baby would be fussy with odds like that.

Wednesday was a gorgeous, sunny day - capri and sandal weather. Not that that was what I was wearing. No, that would require foresight, planning and the ability to use finite personal time to search the Internet for weather information versus knitting information (not to mention a trip down into the depths of my storage area where I’m a little scared to go).

After his appointment, Iain and I headed off to Gaspereau Valley Fibres, my LYS, for a wee shopping trip. This time, Iain and I also visited the chickens, llama and sheep that are located close to the building that houses the shop. Iain was particularly taken with the chickens - probably because they were smaller than the other animals, some were black and white and they were conveniently located close to the fence. The sheep and friendly llama were a bit further away so they didn’t catch his eye. Do not despair, he’ll be a knitter yet. He had to be safely ensconced in a sling during my whole yarn store visit so as not to tear the yarn apart. He has a huge attraction to fibre; I just do not have a huge pocketbook with which to feed both of our addictions and, lets face it, I’m still bigger than him so I won.

I specifically went to the yarn store to pick up an extra skein of organic cotton for my nursing sweater. I already have plenty, according to the pattern, but I do not want to tempt the Knitting Goddess further and wanted to make very, very sure. Additionally, as I usually add at least 2" to the sleeves for a sweater for me or any member of my family, an extra skein in that particular dye lot is probably not going to go astray.

I was also on the hunt for something else very special. Something hand-painted special. Something ‘one of a kind’ that was on sale last summer special. Yes, I was tempting the powers that be to see if I could find something that would mean I could complete the sleeves on Iain’s chevron sweater without having to rip out the project and start a vest.

How do you think I did?

The only real fibre difference with the new skein is that the fibre blend includes 10% nylon (it’s Hand Maiden’s Casbah 80% Merino, 10% Cashmere, 10% nylon sock yarn) instead of just a cashmere and merino blend. I figure the nylon could help if Iain, you know, starts wearing the sweater out in the elbows. That is if he gets to wear it before he grows out of it.

Either way you look at it, I figure this find has got to be a knitting miracle! Now, if somebody can tell me how to evenly split a skein into two equal balls, I would be eternally grateful. I’m serious, how would I go about doing that?

3 comments:

JustApril said...

Well, before I got my little scale (some call it a drug dealer's scale b/c it measures the tiniest increments of stuff) I used to roll the skein into a ball, then roll it back into another ball until they felt about the same weight and were close to the same size. I did pretty dern well, too, actually. =)

Kudos on finding your miracle yarn! It's always great when you can find such a good match. (well, nearly impossible - thus the miracle status! lol)

Elizabeth said...

Lovely colour and I think you have pulled off a miracle there. And a little added nylon is always good for soaking up the perma-drool these little ones have (hee hee).

Teething is never fun but since it's going to hurt anyways it seems very effective to sprout a few teeth at a time. Worked for my daughter when she was little and we're waiting to see if her brother will be the same. He is still working on his first tooth which is lurking just below the surface. One of the earliest experiences that we are happy to forget.

Yarnhog said...

That is a miracle!

If you have a postal scale or something similar, just start winding and weighing until you hit the halfway point. If you don't, you can wind it into a ball and knit the sleeves at the same time, one from each end of the ball.

My baby looked just like that what seems like last week. He'll be 11 in June.