Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Tangly Mess

 
Picked up this little bad boy and started on the sleeves.  Man is this a tangly mess. 

I was alternating the whole way with the two skeins.  And I always work pairs of anything two at a time.  So when it comes to sleeves, I usually divide up the remainder so that I have 4 little balls.  Two from one skein, two from the other.  That way I can still use one from each skein, on each sleeve.  Still alternating skeins, is the point.  I don't end up with one darker sleeve, or pooling, or any of that jazz. 

I know 4 balls of yarn on two sleeves, knit at the same time, can sound a little crazy all on it's own.  Honestly though, it's really not bad at all.  Each of the little sets gets a little twisted around, but that's super easy to fix. 

Here's where everything goes a little coo-coo-ca-choo.  I still have enough of the oatmeal that I don't want to break it up.  I might be able to get another project out of it, and I avoid a break in the yarn like I avoid hot pokers in the eye if at all possible.  I'm pulling from the center for one sleeve, and from the outside for the other.  Starting to get the picture here?  CRAZY MESS....just....crazy.  S'ok, they're tiny sleeves, they'll go by quick right?...no.

No...they don't go by quick when the tangle is so bad that you can only knit a few rows before spending 5 minutes untangling.  Five minutes every few rows, adds up fast.  I'm thinking....I'm going to weigh the oatmeal ball before and after the next stripe.  Then I'll divide that by two, unwind that amount from the outside of the ball for however many stripes are left, add a little just in case, and cut. 

Honestly, that JUST NOW ocurred to me.  As I sit here and type, I'm thinking man, the rest of these stripes is really going to suck until I get to the point where I'm only knitting with the ballpoint again.  And then lightbulb...genius.  Well, not genius, cause I fought that tangled crap for three sets of stripes last night.  I'd like to sit here and act like I'm so awesome I thought of that before fighting the yarn last night, but no....lying is no bueno.

xoxo,
Liz