Having spent more time than usual riding the bus lately, I have been doing a lot of bus-knitting. I finished off the legwarmers, and they have been put away for when Ironic Winter returns and we wear all of our knitwear and winter gear like models in a fashion shoot. There is plenty of yarn left, and I need to figure out what to make out of it. Perhaps some sort of coordinating accessory? We shall see.

Next I was going to start some sort of scarf-wrap thing done in a stitch pattern that I found in my knit-a-day calendar on January 24, 2005 and have saved since then, waiting for the right time to arrive.

Perhaps it is not yet time? Sorry, no photos. Everything has been either rewound into balls or tossed in the trash.

The knit-a-day pattern is for a lace sampler. The project in the photo has two panels at the ends that are lacy-with-holes, two closer to the middle that are somewhat floral, and one in the very center that I can totally recognize as leaves. Is the photo right side up or upside down? Is the stitch near the top of the photo “ring stitch” or is it “bird’s eye stitch” (both of which are in the written pattern)? A cursory Google search will make it clear that both patterns go by both names, so I guess we just start knitting and see what we get.

First attempt: I did not realize that row 7 could not possibly be right until I had knit it.

R.7: k2tog, yo, k3, yo, (k3tog, yo, k3tog, yo), repeat () five more times, k2tog.

All of the other rows maintain the same stitch count. None of the rows have more increases than decreases. This is supposed to knit up roughly rectangular, so it can not possibly be right. Rip out, re-wind, try again.

I’ve tried this pattern with the good lace-weight yarn and then with the scrap lace-weight yarn and then just to get a sense of things in general with some really awful worsted weight yarn and size 11 needles (to simulate lace).

After that I tried to see if I could make any progress by using the knitting machine. That was a disaster and a half, but it did reinforce my belief that half of the k2tog in this pattern should be ssk and that the k3tog should probably be s1, k2tog, psso.

I’m trying to decide if I should fix the pattern, chart it out, and start knitting it again or if I should give up on knitting for today and do something else.