A day late and a dollar short

This is what I've been working on for the last week and a half. I realized the Saturday before last that if I wanted to complete this for Valentine's Day, I would have to start it. So, I went to JoAnn's and picked up some Jiffy Thick 'N' Quick, which is as near the same gauge (and in a Valentiney color) as the yarn called for in the pattern.

This project nearly got the better of me (or maybe it did... you decide after you finish reading). There has been much ripping involved with this project.

One of the first problems I encountered was that I didn't want half a heart at the bottom of each end of the scarf. If you follow the pattern as written, that's exactly what you get, so I figured out how to modify it to eliminate the extra yarnovers on the first 2 RS rows. It took me a couple of tries to get it, but I finally did. If you want to make the same modification, here it is:

1st Row 1: K8, yo, k1, yo, k8.
1st Row 3: K5, k3tog, yo, k3, yo, k3tog, k5

I also did the first and last two stitches in garter stitch, and made a nice slip stitch edge by slipping the first stitch of each row purlwise with the yarn in front. If you need more information on that because I'm not being clear, let me know.

So, anyways... I got sick last Tuesday, and have been dealing with that, and then the after-sick-symptoms for the last week. That did not help my knitting at all.

I finished the first side by Wednesday, and took the second side with me to a meeting with the ladies group at my church on Thursday. I knit, and knit, and knit, and made a lot of progress (probably 5 or 6 repeats). I picked it up again Friday, and noticed that in the 1st repeat I'd knit on Thursday, I'd put a yo in the wrong place. There was no way I would be able to fix it without at least ripping it back to that point (I know of no way to drop a stitch down when there's lace bits on that column). I tried it, but since every RS row had lace on it, I was not able to pick up the stitches right, so I ended up just ripping back to the start. And then in my haste, I forgot to do the modifications I mentioned for the first couple of rows, so I had to rip it out again. I finally got going and actually knit a lot... I was nearly back to where I'd been before I had to go to bed.

Saturday, I just could NOT bring myself to work on it, even while I was watching TV. I was really disappointed, because I had wanted to get it done for Sunday, because I see a lot more people on Sunday than I do during the week. Sunday also ended up seeing very little knitting.

Monday was rather busy, and I didn't end up getting to it until late afternoon. I worked as fast as I could, but I still didn't get it done before the last errands of the day, so I never even got to wear it out. I did finish the knitting last night, and did a 3 needle bind-off to finish it up. But having missed the day, I just cut the yarn and called it a day.

I'm surprised I could get any desire together today to work on the finishing, but I wanted to steam block it, and since I've never done it before, I think the novelty helped spur me on. Steam blocking made a HUGE difference, though. Before blocking, it wanted to fold backwards along the center line and at the change between stockinette stitching and garter stitching. It pretty much wanted to be a tube. Here's a before and after comparison:



Now all I have left is weaving in ends. I'm not quite sure if my regular needle will be big enough to do it... this is HUMONGOUS yarn. And, it's almost like, what's the point now, since Valentine's Day is over.

Oh, and you should know, k4tog is a bear of a stitch. I dreaded it every time, and it was HARD every time. Since the Jiffy T'n'Q left me with so much left over, I may try it out with 2 k2tog's, the first slipped over the second, to see if that gives a descent alternative that would be infinitely easier.

Also, I don't love the tip of the bottom-most heart quite so close to the edge... if I were to do this again, I would add a couple of rows before starting the pattern (maybe in garter stitch or seed stitch, to help with the curling).

Oh, and one last note... the color of the scarf is off in both pictures (although I tried to correct it in the first one). The color is really a nice burgundy/wine color.