Remember the Knox?

Here’s a Photoshop image that I created a couple of years ago. It might give an idea of why the Knox appealed to me…

I named this image “The Summer of ‘68″ because it reminded me of a mini skirt I had then. It was a bright orange, with striped checks of hot pink and lime. I loved it. In more recent years, I had an MTB in “Interference Pink” - these hot pinks and oranges again. So… the fact that I couldn’t have “Vibrant” was compensated for by the fact that Knox meets my colour preferences in several areas…

So, I was a little flattened when my (second) parcel arrived. The colours looked flat and dusty and not at all hot and exciting.

I set it to one side and hoped against hope that the original parcel would arrive and I could send this one back with a sigh of relief.

Eventually, Second Sock Syndrome asserted itself. I needed something to knit that didn’t involve casting on sock #4 (not yet, anyway.) I printed off the pattern for the Clapotis and went to find my needles and sat down to cast on.

Stupid woman!

Returning to the office, I enlisted the help of my beloved, and gave him the hank to hold. I wound the yarn into a ball. As I did so, I was amazed to see how the yarn had come to life in his hands. All those jewel colours that I had thought were not there - yep, there they were after all! This yarn must not take kindly to being hidden away in packets. perhaps it needs to feed off the light.

I made a big ball from the 200gms skein. (See how the colour even looks better when wound into a ball?)

Then I cast on!

I knit three rows, and suddenly realised that my yarn had broken: knitting in one hand, yarn in t’other - and ne’er the twain would meet.

I cast on again, discarding my broken end. I left a longer end this time. But look at it now!

What to do?

Yes, I know I should frog it and start again and leave a good length. Yes, I know that I need a really good length of silk to sew in.

I KNOW!

But (shhhhh) what I want to do is to keep knitting…

…and so I am thinking I’ll superglue it. Whaddya think? What would you do?

What I did was to go to bed and knit for a while and try not to think about that end.

This is where I was up to when I got up this morning. I’ve not done much on it since because I still can’t decide what to do.

Please - I need input! 

Anyway, the silk turns out to be quite beautiful to knit with. The finished item is going to have great body and drape and will be eminently stroke-able. I keep stroking it even now. I lay it in my lap and pat it, and I beam at it. I am really glad that my beloved bought me that set of bamboo needles, though. I think I’d have gone mad without them.

There’s just one thing wrong (if we carry on ignoring that end) - I don’t like the colour! Yes, I know what I said up there. And this is notwithstanding the fact that I love the individual shades, In fact, I relish them. I am knitting with childish glee, in fact. I concentrate on each stitch and the lovely jewel colour of it. I grin like an idiot every time that a purple stitch comes around - let us not even try to pretend that purple is not my most favourite colour ever, bar none.

But I don’t like the way that the color is combining as I knit it up.

There. I said it.

I think that Knox is telling me that it does not want to be a Clapotis.

*sigh*

What? Oh, the stitch markers? Not using ‘em. I don’t have the patience for that kind of messing about. I’m knitting a rib, with the stitches to be dropped reversed; purled on the knit side/knitted on the purled side. I can’t see that this will affect the final finish, and I can see where I am more easily than with stitch markers and don’t have to faff about so much. Plus, I only own four stitch markers, not eighteen.

This is how it looks on the reverse side.

Anyway… now that this thing is cast on and causing me grief … can you guess what arrived in the post today?

Can you?

And can you imagine just how much I do not want to send this back?!

Just look at those zingy colours.

Imagine them swathed around the shoulders of a basic black…

I see no reason for the package having been so much delayed. It isn’t damaged. There are no notes attached. It’s fully stamped. There’s no obvious reason for it having been delayed by the Post Office. I can’t read the postmarks to see if it has been around the houses.

I think they did it just to annoy and to tease. I can now mourn my beautiful Vibrant Clapotis -  because I’ve cast on the Knox and cannot send it back and really cannot afford two lots of yarn

SPIT!