I picked this one back up with dread because I had dropped it thinking I didn't have enough yarn and because I couldn't figure out the pattern. Well, I had just enough yarn so that I didn't have to use the new skein of a slightly different pink that I bought last time I had tried to finish it. The plan was to have one pink & one blue handle if necessary. I was also pleasantly surprised to find that I was almost done, and figured out immediately what I was doing wrong the second time I got stuck. The top is finished with I-Cord and I was reading SSK as slip a stitch, slip a stitch, knit the next stitch. Yeah, that gets you nowhere as far as binding off.
Anyhow, I finished, took a before photo, and washed it. Wow! How cool! It shrank right down, and I washed it again to make it tighter. A-Maze-Ing. All my errors? Gone. Holes? Sealed. Big crappy stitches on the handle and the bottom? Invisible. Felting is so cool. My mother and husband were amazed at the transformation. And I got a needed lift. Both a project quickly finished, and realizing that my knitting is improving.
The before photos? Yeah, well, the baby knocked my camera to the floor and it doesn't work at the moment. But I took a photo onto the card in my video camera. Uh, no I didn't.
And um, yeah, I noticed it doesn't look like the photo with the pattern. I don't know for sure but I think I knit way to loosely. I am a notoriously loose knitter (ha, ha), so I probably didn't have to strive to knit with a loose gauge, could have just knit normally. Or maybe I didn't need the extra yarn because I decided to make it smaller? Just bad pattern reading? Or perhaps if I felted it many more times, as the pattern says it to? But I like the shape and the texture as is. It won't hold papers well, but it will be great for knitting.
Now I have to decided what to make with the Quatro.
