Cursed

Have you ever noticed that certain projects are cursed? I mean, you do your best to run with them and yet, they continue to not work out. I've got two such projects kicking around my knitting bag at the moment. The first, and most obvious, is the dreaded husband sweater. Last night I frogged all 9 lovely, carefully crafted inches of his sweater. Why you ask? The curse of course! If it's not one thing it's another with this sweater. I vow it will be done by fall, but I'm just not sure how many ways it will try and thwart me before bending to my will.

This time around it was color banding. The yarn for this sweater is Lorna's Laces, and it's hand dyed, so even within a dye lot there is some variation. The first ball of black was a bit varigated, with ever so slightly lighter and darker shades of black. It looked really good (as this is tranisitioning into a varigated black/orange/green color later) and I was happy. But then, the second ball came in to play. I was moving along just fine, I'd made about 3" of progress or so, when I noticed the difference. It was sitting in my lap in the car and I looked down and noticed there was a distinct line running across the sweater and it looked different on each side of the line. Sure enough, when I looked inside, it was where I'd switched balls. The new ball is a much more solid and consistent shade of black.

Armed with my husband's helping hands and a good glass of barbera the sweater was fed to the hungry ball winder. It's just as well. I had Grant try it on again, and despite fitting when it was a much shorter length, it was now a bit snug. I guess the little thin strip was stretchier than a larger tube of fabric, which makes sense. So I'll be casting on a few more stitches tonight and starting over alternating between yarn balls on each row. This will blend in the darker yarn quite nicely.

My other cursed project is my attempt at a Mimi Verylong. I really like this pattern, and the stitch repeat is super simple. I tried making it with my left over Lion and Lamb, that failed because I ran out of yarn (and makes me sad, it was beautiful). I tried making it out of my Tilli Thomas Disco Lights, that failed because I decided I wanted the yarn to be something else. While winding the stunning Valentina Devine silk/wool I received as a Christmas gift from the Craft Kitten it spoke to me and told me that it should be my next attempt at a Mimi Verylong. So I have cast on a narrower version (I don't like my scarves very wide) and am chugging away. We'll see if it survives. The yarn is a dream to work with and I'm madly in love with the colorway.

Here's hoping to an end to both these curses!