Change Your Gauge, Change Your LIfe

My sister gave me this lovely (that's a huge understatement) yarn that she spun herself for Christmas last year, and ever since I have been struggling to find the right thing to knit with it. This is serious, it must be perfect.


This means:

It must showcase the beauty of the yarn. It must be something I will wear a lot. It must be suited to a bulky gauge. It must require no more than 582 yards and preferably no less than 570 (I want to use every last bit, naturally).

I have had a tough time with this list of requirements.

Finally, after much swatching, I opted for a hat & scarf. Then I can knit the scarf until the yarn is all gone. Great.

Why is it so hideous, though? I ripped it out countless times over the first week. A hat should be done in a week, not a hopeless ball of yarn giving me dirty looks from my purse and making me feel bad for being so mean to it.

I swatched a lot over the past several months. I even swatched with a couple different balls of yarn, since there was a little variation in the weight.

What I didn't do, was swatch in the round.

I have been knitting for almost 35 years. I am not yet 40. This means I have been knitting longer than I have been reading. I should really know better.

Dropped two needle sizes for the ribbing and the clouds parted. Droppped one for the body of the hat and I swear I could hear the little birdies singing and I felt like I had lost weight. No lie. I have been knitting like a crazy woman, making it up as I go along. Thank goodness things are back to normal.

Just to make sure everything was ok again, I bought some more sock yarn.


Black Sheep Dyeworks Sock Weight in Fig Multi