The Knitting Nemesis

This is the coat that never ends, it just goes on and on my friend…

Every now and then you come across a project that shrinks, not in the wash, but on the needles. No matter how much you knit it just seems to get shorter and shorter, even though you checked it with the tape measure only an hour ago.

This was mine. I knitted the exact same pattern a few months ago and that too seemed to be the same, but not to the same extent. I’m starting to swear the Knitting Pixies are coming in and frogging it in the night. Hmm maybe they should get their work ethic from the Shoemaker’s Elves instead.

Baby items usually only take me 2-3 days and I’d cry if I worked out how long this has taken. I was delayed even further, I had to out this morning to get some new bodkin needles to sew it together. The Knitting Pixies appear to be taking them on their frequent visits. It still needs buttons but they will have to wait for my craft warehouse expedition next week. I’m probably going to go for wooden toggles again, but I might chose a slightly darker stain.

Since I couldn’t finish it last night I cast on for a Branching Out from Knitty and did a few pattern repeats. You know what they say about idle hands so I thought I’d better occupy them. It’s for a friend’s birthday. It’s another mystery yarn job from my stash. I was planning on going out to get something exciting for it, but this is pretty similar to what I would have chosen anyway. It’s two shades of green with a slight sheen.

It took me ages to get going as I always have to translate the American terms into English ones and I fiddled around with a few different decreases as I didn’t like the one given, but once I got going it grew pretty quickly. I’m not sure how long I’m going to make it, either as far as the yarn will go or before it gets ridiculous. I hate making nice stuff, I never want to part with it.

I’ve finished my muffler too, but it doesn’t look that much different to the last photo and needs buttons, so it didn’t warrant a photo. It will come in really useful under my skiing jackets, they’re the pull over the head type and a pain to wear a long scarf with and too drafty without.