Day 4

Or is it?  Ok, right, this is day 5 of the Olympics.  So far I am not making good time on my shrug.  I am on row 9.  That works out to about one and a half rows or about 140 stitches per day since Friday.  Since there are 33,372 stitches (give or take a couple hundred) in my cabled shrug...  I'll be finished in...  um... about 240 days... 

I cast on 103 stitches Friday night during the opening ceremony and worked the 'set up' row.  No problemo.  I moved on to row one and proceeded to cable my little heart out. I was just using the page right out of the magazine but I photocopied it so I could use my magnetic board to keep track of what row I was on.  Moving along the charts to about row 4 when I realize there are two pairs of symbols in my chart that look exactly alike.  But they have different descriptions.  I was totally perplexed.  I stared at the photocopied chart for too long and had no idea what to make of it.  So I picked up the magazine and looked closely.  The symbols WERE different.  My photocopy just hadn't picked up the tiny little corners that were white on one pair and grey on the other pair.  In addition to that problem, I was not even sure which of the four symbols I was using where.

 

So I ripped and cast on again.

I wasn't too mad or frustrated, but glad I figured it out before I got through one whole repeat of the 36 row chart.  I got up and got four different colored markers.  I filled in the four different symbols with four different colors.  I didn't put too much thought into choosing what color markers to use for each symbol, I just grabbed four colors that would look pretty on my chart together.  Blue, light blue, turquoise and purple.  See where this is going?  

Here is my color-coded chart.   What?  you only see two colors in that chart?  yeah...  let's not dwell here too long, the problem is obvious.  Well, now it is anyway.  

I ripped and cast on again.

So today I enlarged the big chart on the photocopier at work.  and also made two enlarged copies  of the smaller side chart (it goes on either side of the big chart).  I cut the charts out and frankensteined them back together in the orientation I would knit them.  I chose four VERY distinct different colors and carefully color coded my enlarged Frankenstein chart.  I made little notes on the margins reminding myself of the tricky little things I had discovered during the four times I worked the first 5 to 9 rows of the charts. 

So now I am home.  The Olympics are on tv and I am ready to give this new chart with the knitting equivalent of training wheels on it a try.  Because the fifth time's a charm, right?  

I am not sure the 9 rows I have on my needle at the moment are correct.  Some little sections look like they are setting up to be cables.  There are other sections that look like I've been making stuff up as I go along.  I think I'll try to follow the charts for a couple more rows and see if those rows start to make sense.  If not...  I'm going to have to call in reinforcements.  I don't know who or what they'll be yet,  so this color coded Frankenstein chart better help.