domingo, 4 de septiembre de 2011

Me & My Scarf… A.k.a “Please just stop stinking so bad!!!!!”



 It all started earlier this year in March, when a friend asked me to knit a scarf for his mom, the only condition was that it had to be navy blue and white ... I started thinking about several options that would look good in those colors, maybe Vertigo? I've never done mosaic knitting (In those days I haven’t tried many things…) but didn't seem so difficult. While searching the Ravelry database for ideas I found Concordia. It was love at first sight, it looked so incredibly complex, so elegant, so exquisite that I knew I had to knit it no matter how complicated it were, I was going to knit that scarf even if I died in the process.




A glimpse at the instructions and cable charts and I knew I would probably die halfway, I was not used to reading charts and this one looked particularly difficult ... I got scared, I felt stupid for even thinking I could do something like that with virtually no experience, so I started to procratinate, until I felt embarrassed for taking so long with the scarf ... Even though I didn’t feel prepared for the epic magnificence that Concordia was, I had made ​​a promise and fulfill was the most appropriate thing to do. So I bought the yarn, the needles and printed the pattern ... After a few rows, I felt much more confident, and I could actually visualize the little bastard done ... Everything was beautiful, from the incredible braided cast on


 that oftroy explains here,










to the exquisite dark blue yarn ...

Everything was going well until it was time to change color, it was then that I realized the following:
  • The white yarn was the personification of everything that anyone could hate on a yarn: it was rough, nothing soft or elastic and it squealed
  • I had less white yarn than blue, and supposedly the white part would be the longest
  • The white gets dirty very very easily ...
Due to the epic hate I proffesed to the white yarn my progress stopped, I didnt felt motivated to continue at all, even though I knew that the faster I got done the white section the scarf would be finished faster ... I started other projects , and only got 5 or 6 rows done per day ... at that pace it would be december and it wouldn’ be done yet ... But then, something amazing happened: I started this blog and I witnessed and what object of what I’ll call from now on "The Power of the Blog" ... My other entry related to Concordia was made on August 19, on August 24 the bitch was finished (with matching edges by the way), I just needed to give it a light wash and ironing to stretch the edges (I had given up trying to stretch it over 20 cm) and make a fringe ... This is what happened:

1-wash the scarf a first time, only with water, just in case that the soap would do something horrible to the scarf
2 - I do all the goddamn process of putting on a clean dry towel, roll up and step on it 3 times
3-I put the scarf on my ironing board and then go looking for a clean cloth to put over the scarf while ironing the edges
4 - Return with the cloth to discover that the ironing board has inexplicably stained the white part of Concordia with a nasty looking brown color.
5- I panic and I go back to washing the blasted scarf… the stains disappear ...
6 - I go looking for another dry towel to place between the ironing board and the scarf ... As I go lookin the towel I put the freshly washed scarf ON the ironing board.
7 - I curse miself with intensity
8- I managed to wash again the thing, put it on the clean towel and under the wet cloth and start ironing (it was like a sandwhich)
9-Once I’m done ironing the scarf is still slightly damp so I decide to put it out all night to dry.
10 - The next day I pick up the scarf, only to find that smells like rancid shit and that nothing would make me happier than burning it.
11-I go back to washing, this time with some disinfectant, and dry it with towels, leave outside, this time hanging it in a rather creative way and sit to knit for a while
Thats my balcony, and all of my clothes hanging thingies




12 - It's raining, raining as if the whole damn water of the Orinoco had decided to fall on my house

How could I not think it was going to rain... Look at the fucking sky!!
Its almost purple and its only 2:00pm



13 - Concordia gets wet (duh)
14 - repeat points 10 & 11 again, this time using detergent, bleach, hot water and drying it in the washer while I curse loudly
15 - The scarf dries successfully. I dance a little.
16 - I put the fringes and keep it in a bag so that nothing bad happens until the day that the delivery (September 12)




The End :P

Despite the disgusting amount of problems this project had, I'm really happy with the results ... and even happier to have dared to make this scarf ... Now I feel that all the other cables in the world are my bitches...


Ohh by the way in this pic, do you see those little red hairs in the lower edge? thats were I cast of with red yarn and hen grafted it together to have matching edges... I tried to do a two color sewn cast on... but it didn't look the way I wanted...











Again Dude??


Blogger keeps screwing with me ... I used the days between the times blogger let me in to think about the entries I had prepared ... I decided that several of them weren’t really relevant to the world, that is, who (if anyone reads this, which I doubt) might be interested in my personal story about the immense shit that Irene has been / was , although my country is in the opposite direction Irene were Irene is/was headed? Who is going to care that I’m running out of fucking vacations and that I have to start suffering again with classes, thus reducing the time I spend knitting? Most likely no one, so I decided to delete those entries, leaving only the entry that describes my unhealthy relationship with Concordia aka Messenger of Doom....