And so it begins.......

Tam A in hand spun alpaca (my own) and Noro Kureyon

Bright and early on weekdays, one of our schedulers posts report from the day or weekend before. This allows everyone who reads it to gain knowledge of what happened while they were off. Some read it, and very obviously (as previously posted here), many do not. It's not that they can't read, it's more like they don't want to take the time when a phone call to awaken the night shift nurse is easier, but I digress. The scheduler always starts her post with a quick nod to what day of the week it may be--as if my Blackberry didn't already let me in on that. Monday report typically begins with, "and so it begins.........." There are always a plethora of ellipses to denote that, yes, it's the start of the week, and my friends, it's gonna suck.

It's only Sunday, and I'm already dreading the week ahead, what with the hunting, gathering and cooking for a feast all by myself, entertaining Mr. Larger Than Life, watching Stinkerbell McBookeater like a hawk and oh, yeah, working 12 hours Thursday night into Friday morning, sleeping fast and getting up to work again by Friday at 4 PM. It's my holiday to work, but don't feel sorry for me, it's one of the two I selected. Sometimes, I'm not too bright.

So far this weekend, I've worked a bit on the shawl and knocked out another tam. I selected tam A from the free Three Tams pattern and used a combination of hand spun alpaca for the main color and Noro Kureyon for the contrast. Being a primarily self taught knitter, I tried and tried to do the corrugated ribbing on the brim of the hat, but couldn't figure out how to make the contrasting color pop. As a result, the contrasting color on the brim only shows on the inside. Now I know what I did wrong, but it's too late for the hat, and the brim will stay. I'm not ripping out all of that fragile hand spun and the single ply Noro.


I will however promise not to advance in a pattern without figuring out what's going on with my technique when it isn't right. What I did wrong was bring both the working and non working yarns forward to make the purl stitch and both to the back of the work to make the knit stitch. I should have moved only the contrast yarn forward for purling and back again for knitting and let the non working yarn dangle in the back. I inadvertently created a double knit brim that could be reversible if not for the rest of the hat.

Live and learn.

I'm ready for Tam B with a corrugated rib and I'm also cruising Amazon for a more definitive text on color knitting. I think I may buy Alice Starmore's book and perhaps the one on color by Sally Melville.

I'd better hurry...........before I know it, it'll be time to begin that work week.