WIP Wednesday - Or What I Do for Fun?

After a serious knitting jag of knitting, writing, rewriting, charting, charting again, editing and sending for testing of my own patterns it really was time to knit someone elses for a while. *

Another person's entry into the Colourmart Spring Contest was ready for test knitters, so I volunteered to do that, even though I really should be working on the Dragon for TDQ's friend's birthday.  Reading through the pattern instantly had me back in my "testers" frame of mind and I happily swatched and then cast on.

Wanna see?

I know it doesn't look like it yet, but that is the starts of a top down collared cardigan.  A little bit of lace, a little bit of cables...you know,

all the things I love!

But.....

I have had a "bee in my bonnet" for some time and it was an itch that had to be scratched, so I am not being monogamous on the test knit at all.

Over the years, as people, namely young women, have learned to sew and embroider, to hone their skills and perhaps even to show them off, they have worked on samplers.  Some are pretty amazing, with delicate pictures, symbols and most importantly alphabets and dates on them. The older ones are crafted on homespun warp and weft, from home woven even count fabrics, and over the years have faded and muted in color.

Go into any craft store and you can buy kits or charts to make your own, with catchy phrases in them..or not.. which ever you prefer.  And I will admit, that hanging in the stairwell to our basement is one that I cross-stitched in 1986, I think from a Better Homes and Garden pattern.  It is the Floral Alphabet, for anyone who cares.

So think of this, a thirty year old project, nicely protected behind glass and framed for all to see...but what do we as knitters have to show after thirty years?  At least in my house the socks, sweaters, scarves and mitts will have all have long since worn away.  I have  a couple of the pieces I knit as a teen**, mostly cotton blend tops, that still fit and get worn on occasion, but nothing that will last centuries like those old samplers did.

I have been determined that I will knit a sampler and mount and frame it as carefully as I have those cross-stitch patterns that still are on my walls.  But I could never quite pull it together.

But, now I might have....



Just to prove I am out of my freaking mind, that is knit on size 000 needles out of a 2/60 yarn that has been sitting in my stash for far too long.  On good days I can almost feel the yarn in my fingers, but to be honest it is something I have to look at to knit. (Yeah there is a reason I have been working mainly in fingering weight yarn, that I can still feel!)

I still need to work out a border and I did not create the lace letters charts.....but imagine if you will a blanket or a shawl with all your favorite quotes on it.

So putting on the tester hat, where you have to look at everything in a way that leads to the most misunderstanding and idiocy***, and/or working in a thread that probably is designed to be carried along with another thread to make something approaching a normal weight of yarn is what I do for "fun".

~M
*It won't last long, I already swatched another concept piece, but it really is restful to knit something I am not charting or doing the math on!

**Oh my, that means those pieces are over 30 years old..when did I get that old?

***Not that knitters are idiots, but, well sometimes there is clear and there is clear!