Wednesday, January 09, 2008

Intarsia Central

There's only 6 days left of the Contest. If you haven't left your resolution yet, better hurry!


Being the complete idiot with crafty projects that I am, last night I decided to take on another project that I had no idea how to do. Intarsia. You'd think that I would be happy with the few things that I know how to do with knitting and would combine them and make something wonderful and quick. Well. I don't do things the easy way and let's just leave it at that.

Usually when I tackle something new, I become the master researcher. I learn all sorts of things that I never wanted to know about each project that I do. I learn to ad nauseum. But! I didn't do that this time. I had a pattern, I had yarn, I could do this.

Heh. Heh.

I just about pulled my hair out last night. Truly. I was wading in the deep end without a paddle. I read and re-read the pattern and then re-read it again. It didn't take long, it's a short pattern.

I got up and went to the computer to verify what I thought they were asking me to do. I was right. Yeah! So, I began. and stopped. verified at the computer. began again. Every row that I did was done in this fashion. It was incredibly tedious. I gave up and went to bed.

This morning, I logged into Knitty and did more research and then googled some more. By mid-afternoon I was ready to tackle it again. And this time the project started to really move.

It's not all completely intarsia. I did a little bit of stranding in the middle of the intarsia pattern. I just didn't feel like that part of the pattern warranted me started yet another freakin' strand of color there. Other than that, I think I've figured it out.

I can honestly say that I don't hate intarsia. It's okay, but I probably won't be doing tons of these projects in the future.

I am proud of myself somewhat. One of my knitting plans (I refuse to say resolutions) was to work with more than one color of yarn this year. I've tackled all sorts of things in the past year: lace, people sweaters, dog sweaters, socks, stoles, shawls, etc. But it's all been with one color/colorway of yarn. I can now say I've done it.

The project will take another couple of days, but here's the current state of the knit (from the back) all laid out on the table next to my cup of mint tea next to my big comfy chair where I like to sit while I knit:
Lot's of pink and black!

I'll see you tomorrow. I'm gonna go dive back in now.
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