Friends don't let friends drink and knit

Last night was the bbq at Laurie's place. It was so much fun and very hot. Laurie is a good southern girl who knows how to grill. No gas for this chick, she uses a charcoal grill heating up the coals with a chimney. The only time I've seen that is on the food network. So, I was really impressed. I grew up with gas grills myself. Which are dangerous! We had this one where the button to ignite the grill stopped working, so you had to go underneath with a spark gun and light the gas through this hole.

Well, one day I'm lighting the grill. I turn on the gas. I go underneath the grill. I stick the spark gun into the hole. I light the spark gun. And I forgot one little detail. Open the lid. The gas that's been collecting in the grill lights and the flame goes whoosh through the hole burning my arm. I could smell the singed hair. People, when lighting gas make sure flames will shoot up and not down onto your arm. Remember to open the lid. Me and fire have a long and sordid past together. So, I'm only too glad to leave the bbq'ing and grilling to the pros. Jennifer & Laurie


So, there was eating and there was alcohol. And there's one thing I learned friends don't let friends drink and knit...at least not on their own. I brought over my knitting and was very excited because I would be finishing my drop stitch ribbon scarf. However, by the time I started knitting I'd had a couple, four, five glasses of wine. And the heat. Did I mention the heat? Oh yeah, that fogged up the brain real well, too. The only thing that could have made my brain a little less functional was a hit off a bong. I thought I was doing really well. I even took a picture of the scarf nearing it's completion.

The almost completed Scarf.

This is in fact there very spot where things started going terribly, terribly wrong. The drop stitch scarf is a simple pattern. Knit 2 rows. 3rd Row knit one, one over until the end, 4th row knit one, drop stitch, knit one. Well sometime during Row 3 I forgot an over. I did not discover this until Row 4. This has happened before and I've always managed to work my way backward out of the problem by patiently undoing a stitch at a time. In my befuddled state however, I messed up and I cannot even describe it. So, I went to the tried and true quick fix, rip. As one knits, one shall rip. So I rip a couple of rows. Get my needle back in.

Feeling good about the whole thing. Knit 2 rows, 3rd row knit one, one over, etc. I look at it and it was terribly, terribly terribly wrong. There was this long bit of yarn just hanging between 2 stitches with 5 or 6 stitches in between. Many times when I've made a mistake in a project I'll chalk it up to my persion flaw. A little sacrifice to the Gods to show I'm humble and realize only their work is perfect. This mistake was so horrendous I think the knitting gods would have blighted all my needles. Yarn stores would probably reject all future credit card transactions. I suddenly had visions of my scarf revertin to a less organized and balled form of this:

The yarn from stitch cafe

Which meant only one thing. That's right rip. Rip until I got back to a point where I could actually begin anew and hopefully that didn't mean starting over the entire project.

I'm happy to say that although I lost my work from the last hour, the rest of the scarf remained in tact and I finished it. That's right it's done. This little project has seen me through my first four stitch n' bitch session. I just love it. Gray and sparkly. It knits up fast and I highly recommend it to anybody looking for a quick, fairly mindless scarf that's a step up from your garter stitch project.

I'm also glad to know I wasn't alone in having problems mixing alcohol and knitting.
Jennifer knitting
Jennifer has been knitting the longest scarf ever. And it's beatiful by the way. But, last night she was constantly convinced she was adding a stitch. Thankfully she didn't have to rely on me to double check her stitch count. Laurie was there to take care of it. ( Remember befundlement with the drop stitch scarf. ) Laurie was also kind enough to weave in my ends. Not only was I little off my game, turns out I had the worst needle ever. Knew I should've bought the crochet hooks on Saturday. Drunk or sober it's always better to knit with a friend so you can shamelessly steal their accessories and take advantage of their kind hearts.

Soberly yours,
v.carrie