MS3 Undergoes "Renovations"

click for close-up

Well, I wasn't going to do it. The thing is, for much of this week the phones didn't work, the internet didn't work, and I got really sick of the 6-row repeat in my melon shawl (see below).

So I started casting about, wondering what I could start or finish or mess with. I kept fondly going back to my MS3. Picking it up and sighing and wishing I had more pattern to knit. Once I started looking at it (FIRST MISTAKE), I realized there were certain areas where I wished there were more beads. To be specific, the leafy looking rows, and the flowery rows.

There is one row of leaves where each leaf does not have a bead in the middle, and the more I looked at it, the more I didn't like it. And, to me, it looked like each little flower in the flowery rows near the top of clue 3 needed a bead in its center.

I made myself sit down and think about this. I went back to the chart and figured that, in order to insert the beads and -- while I'm at it -- fix my most egregious errors, I would need to rip out 45 rows.

And the moon must have been in Sagittarius with Jupiter aligning with Mars, because I just said "What the hell" and started ripping. Here are some "after" photos. Please note -- the color is completely off in some of these, I'm not sure why ---

Beads added to leaves - row 175

Flower centers added - you'll have to trust me on this one.

Here's the good news: I seem to be learning this chart, as ripping back and re-knitting 45 rows wasn't nearly the cuss-fess that knitting the same 45 rows was originally. I think I'm learning to slow down, count my stitches on the purl side, keep good track of my stitch markers -- all the low-glamour type stuff that can make a big difference with lace.

"It seems, grasshopper, that lace knitting is teaching you discipline."

( Surely, somewhere, pigs are in flight.)

The kid is going to show me how g-mail works, if the cat will let him. (He thinks the computer is his, or at least the monitor.) So ta-ta for now.