Who Invented the Phrase: Ripping is a Part of Knitting?

Because I'd like to give them a big kick in the ass, thankyouverymuch.

I haven't been blogging so much, but I have been knitting. And ripping. Lots of ripping.

I started a new seemless sweater because I fell for some beautiful orange Nashua Creative Focus Worsted 75% wool/25% alpaca yarn.

Self, I thought. I've made two of these seemless numbers so far: a crew neck sweater and a cardigan. Who's counting that I really don't wear either becasue the crew neck just looks dorky and the cardigan needs to be reblocked or reknitted or who knows -- sold on Ebay.

But I saw this orange wool and thought: Maybe three's a charm?

So I bought the wool and start making my third seemless sweater -- this time with a v-neck. I followed the pattern but altered it slightly because I wanted a deeper V than the pattern called for. How cool was I altering a pattern to adjust the V? I'm such an advanced knitter!

Not so fast hot shot.

About a third of the way through the sweater I looked at it and thought -- "WTF? Am I making this for Barbie? Because it sure looks teeny." No way this sweater is going to fit across my bust. This is an alpaca/wool blend. Not expando-elastic.

I made an emergeny trip to Urban Knitting, where I bought the yarn, and showed Helen my work-of-art-soon-to-be-disaster sweater.

Helen: "Oh yeah. This is way too small. Your gauge is supposed to be five stitches to the inch and you have five and a half."

Me: "Well, um. yeah, mumble, mumble. I know that, mumble, mumble. I just figured I would make it slightly bigger than the pattern says."

And this is when I was reminded: I am Math Challenged.

More stitches to the inch on your gauge and your project will be SMALLER, not BIGGER.

Doofus.

And so I ripped. 350 yards of beautiful orange yarn. Now nicely wound up waiting to be started again using bigger needles that give me a gauge of 5 stitches to the inch.

It was a painful lesson.