Counting stitches isn't math, but it can still screw me up

oKAY, so maybe paying attention to one's knitting is important. Not paying full attention will result will henceforth be called the Britney-Pam Incident.

First, shots of Britney as she was last night. I was able to knit quite a bit on the train home, and was able to do the split/castoff for the armholes, and get a bit past on both sides.

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Looks pretty normal, doesn't she? I thought so. Until I decided to hold her up properly.

Then I noticed the problem.

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On the left, the back of the sweater, marked by the red arrows. Compared to the front, it's tiny. On the right, the front, marked by green arrows (and dots, because I was having fun). Clearly, I am not knitting this for myself, but for Pamela Anderson. As she can (and does) actually knit for herself, I figure I really need to be fixing this. So, much frogging ensues, and then the joy of trying to get something resembling lace made from packing string back on the needles. (I refuse to use a lifeline with yarn this big. Maybe I should re-think this.)

I decided to find some stitch markers. Having failed after a few minutes of rooting around my corner, I came up with a fistful of hairties. As I now have danged close to a crew cut, hairties aren't all that useful for hair-tying puposes. As stitch markers, though, they worked great. And their squishy elasticity makes it really easy to show off hte inside of the sweater. On the right is a happier, more well-adjusted Britney.

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Naturally, I had to stay up past midnight to get everything fixed and back to where it should be. (Note: I had to work late, then go help my mother clean up for her heater inspection tomorrow, plus the season premieres of CSI and Without a Trace were on - so I didn't get started until after 10 pm.) I'm now about 1/3 of the way up the armholes, working both sides of the sweater at the same time (with two different balls of yarn. Somehow steeking a lace pattern just seems wrong.)

[KnitStuff/BritneySweater4-armhole.jpg] Oh, look, it's smiling at you!

And, about those floors of mine...

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On the left, part of the chessboard floor, with various reading material: Historical fiction (Jean Plaidy) (red arrow); Regency romances (light blue arrows)/ contemporary romance (Alexandra Potter) (green arrow); Spanish language workbook (white arrow); Entertainment Weekly (yellow arrow) and some fun Jazz (magenta arrow). Books seem to congregate under the spare folding chair. My bookshelves runneth over! On the right, the compass floor when it was halfway cut, just because it's a cool picture, and you can sort of see how I did it.

Have a great weekend, everyone!