Hoarding Again

Morning,

I hope you all had a lovely weekend. Today is the Tom's birthday, and he decided that he wanted to go see his favourite team play on Saturday for his birthday treat. He supports Aston Villa, so we had a nice day in Birmingham. Wandering around the shops in the morning, then some lunch and a train to Villa Park.

I've cast on a new shawl for my Grandmother. The pattern can be found on Ravelry. It's simple enough but I think it looks pretty cool. It's my first time using circulars, which I'm kind of enjoying so far. The pattern's kicked me up the bum a few times already though! The first time I realised that I'd been doing the M1 increases the wrong way - instead of lifting with the left and knitting into the back of the loop, I'd been lifting with the right, transferring it onto the left needle then knitting into the front. Silly Sara! I spent 25 minutes on the train undoing that whole row on Friday on my way to see Tom. I've already done one row of increases like that but it's too far back and close to the neckline so I'm going to leave it.

Last night after working out how to do the M1s (and knitting using a darning needle because the increases are so tight) I realised that I had double the amount of stitches I was supposed to and had been on autopilot doing K1, M1 increases instead of M1, K2. So I then had to undo 3 rows very carefully to get back to that, using the darning needle to put the stitches back on the needle (I'm hopeless at frogging, I normally always drop stitches)  and then knit the whole three rows again.

I'm doubtful I'll get the shawl finished by the weekend as I would like (I'll be going back home for the weekend so I could give it to her then) but I'll do as much as I can. Finger tip pain permitting!

I hit the craft shops yesterday afternoon. I've been meaning to make some Christmas presents this year since around July. I finally tracked down the two things I need to make them, which was no easy matter. Thankfully one of them was reduced by an unexpected £2.50 which helped alleviate the fact that the other wasn't £7 as I'd thought but closer to £12!

Oh well :) Now I just need a bigger room to put everything in, as usual!!

xx