Knitting Rules! (3 page)

“Yes, and I'm considering making one in blue. Would
you like to see the reverse side?”

“Do you like it? I changed the gauge from 20 to 18 stitches to 4 inches and I think it really paid off.

“Thank you, I'm glad it's the right size. The last one I knit blocked out so big that it ended up as big as a car cozy.”

“Thanks. I got it at Wal-mart.”

Scenario 3

There's a sale at your favorite neighborhood yarn shop.
You:

Tell all your friends, knitting and non-knitting, then arrange a car pool and knitting lessons for afterward.

Tell no one (you don't want the competition), but go quietly to the shop first thing in the morning and score that 850 yards of mohair you've been coveting.

Go to the sale, but use your stash spreadsheet to make sure you're getting only the 500 pounds of yarn you really need.

Go enthusiastically but buy very little, as the big box you bought at the last sale is still at the front door. Besides, you're really into spinning your own yarn right now.

Go, buy lots of yarn, have a wonderful time, then put it in your closet.

Scenario 4

Seduced by a good-looking sweater pattern and a yummy yarn, you've begun a new project that's not really working out (by “not working out,” I mean the sweater resembles a sweater the way a nun resembles yak fur).
You:

Take the sweater to your wide circle of knitting friends or have one of the more experienced club members help sort things out.

Pour a glass of your choice of liquid concentration, then sit down with needles and yarn and experiment with
the various decreases and stitch patterns you know until you've worked it out.

Go online and check for correction to the pattern, then when you find none, pull out some graph paper and a pencil and work up a chart, using a calculator to rejig the stitch counts.

Keep knitting, wondering what it's going to turn out to be.