In Which the Pirate is Untangled.

I seem to be getting the hang of this project. Mostly I work with one yarn in my right hand and two in my left, because I’m still not very good at knitting with the yarn in my right hand. Purling is still confounding me. English-style knitting seems like an exercise in wasted motion. I know many people who knit English who are considerably faster than I am (I’m looking at you, Janis) so I know it’s not a bad style… it just seems like a lot of movement! Anyway, the written instructions deviated from the chart yet again, so I’m ignoring them and just following the chart now. It’s knitting, after all, and no one’s going to notice if there’s a fudged bit here or there.

With a little bit of blocking, this will look pretty spectacular. I’m trying to remember to leave nice long floats so that there’s room for the knitting to stretch. Because I’m going to line the bag, I’m not worried about the floats getting snagged on anything. I’d like to find some horrifically gaudy camel print for the lining, since the recipient’s favorite animal is the dromedary.

I feel as though I’ve gone up a level or two in Knitting (ding!) and although I don’t like the way the pattern is written, I do like the way the product is coming out. Except for these decreases in the middle. They all slant properly, but I wonder if a centered double decrease might not look better. Ah well, too late now! I hate thinking “if I knit this again, I would change…” because I really, really can’t imagine myself ever knitting another one of these bags. Of course that jinxes it, and twenty years from now I’ll have a sudden Napramach craving…