I did loads of research on the tinter, planning and calculating - checking out places like Ravelry and actually doing a grown up thing called -a swatch...yes, a swatch, I did one of those things and finally I decided on a very pretty (but VASTLY too complicated for me) shawl - oh I did fall for this one, I could just see me knitting up this gorgeous little number and seeing I had three and a half weeks up to her birthday - I was sorted!
Did my head swell at the thought of the cleverness of it all!! *oh yes*
Any hoo, I started. I unwound the hank carefully and re-wound it (with a few inevitable knots and the equally inevitable cuss words) I cast on the required 4 stitches, did three rows of garter, then turned it one quarter and knit on the other side, then reading the pattern turned it one quarter again and did the same.... and ended up with a sort of square lump - hmm..... so I frogged it, started again and did three rows of garter, then turned it one quarter and knit on the other side and found I was soon heading for that same mashup I had had at my previous attempt. Hum. So I frogged it and put it away coz I still had three weeks to go and I was still buoyed by the audacity of it all.
That weekend, I started again, I cast on, I carefully read the instructions several times, wondering whether to contacted my beloved knit-perfect sister-in-law for help when suddenly it dawned on me and I understood the gobbledygook written on the paper. I started again, and despite a wonky start, I was getting some way and I actually felt that yes, I would get this done in the remaining two and half weeks.
The first half of the shawl grew off my circular needles as I got closer to the impending lacy pattern. I managed to only frog the odd bit as I launched myself into........ the lace.
I could actual feel my heart beating as I tried to translate the pattern. You could have heard a pin drop - I sat with my mouth open and my brain empty...huh? I have to do what? I read it again. And again and still you could hear the tumbleweed rolling through my head as I tried to comprehend the pattern instructions. I put it aside - I needed to think about this part....never mind I still had two weeks to go.
A few days later I sat myself down and had a serious heart to knitting needle discussion with my shawl and managed to finally (after a practise run and frogging session) understand the pattern - but wow was it mind blowingly hard to concentrate - I marked, in pencil, each stitch I did as I went along. I would get so far and would reach for the pencil eraser and frog my knitting and frog my pencil marks....for several days. I put it aside - Himself could see I was struggling and made typical husbandy type soothing sounds of - 'just go and buy her something' and 'just unpick the ****** thing and give the wool and the pattern'. I hid it from him (and me) and went away for the weekend....never mind I still had about 10 days and I was over half way.
Back from our weekend I felt refreshed and ready to tackle the lace pattern again, I knew I could do it, it was just I was incredibly painstakingly slow. Then. Then I noticed the pattern was not working... I frogged it back, re-knitted and it was the same. I looked at the pattern and looked at my knitting and the lacy pattern was not lining up. I tried again.
And re-frogged.
I had a sinking feeling as I knew I would have to frog back about 10 rows of lace to start again when I spotted where the error was.... I carefully threaded another needle through and frogged back down to it. I also decided that now was the time to change from a circular needle to needles as I was struggling to see what I was doing.
Despair.
Right. Fed up to the back teeth I put it aside and composed myself by having a small controlled temper tantrum in the kitchen which entailed gorging myself on everything and anything fattening I could lay my hands on and washing it down with copious amounts of tea. Grrrrr.
Then feeling fortified (read that as feeling really sick) I tried again, and by the evening I had managed to get myself almost back up to where I was before when........ sitting on the settee next to Himself, there was an almighty thud upstairs which made me jump out of my skin...... and pulled out the knitting needle - scattering nearly all my stitches at high speed. Himself sat there and looked at me. I shut my eyes momentarily, then frogged back the entire shawl. I put it in a bag. I put it away.
I went back on to the tinter to a pattern I had looked at initially but had been enticed away by the gloriousness of my now poor choice. My inexperience was an excellent lesson of over achievement. I cast on for the Boneyard Shawl by Stephen West. I had found it on his blog and followed it over to Ravelry to get the pattern. I had only about 5 days left.
Humbled I knit a simple stockinette stitch and purl 'bones' with a garter stitch border and it slowly grew. At every opportunity I knitted. As it got larger I only managed a row or two after work as I was just too tired to do any more without making mistakes.
My mom's birthday came and went.
The rest of May came and went -I knitted. June came, my birthday - I knitted. Every time I was a passenger in the car - I knitted. We went on holiday. I knitted. I sat on the beach and I knitted, I was eaten alive my midges and still I knitted. Then on our return home, I knit the whole way home. And we got back - all I had left to do was the border.
Two weeks of double shifts at work certainly didn't help but finally finally last night I gave my mom her birthday shawl - a mere five weeks late for her birthday but I got there in the end :)
I was given a lot of support by my dear knit and natter friends as well as bloggy friends - Jane (hook and yarn) - who also made a boneyard shawl - thank you too for your encouragement.
PS - because someone will ask - Pattern - Stephen West's Boneyard Shawl. The yarn is The Natural Dye Studio - Nymph 4ply in Wisteria, I used two x 100gm skeins (800 metres) and had a small amount left over.
