I am hearing a lot being said about how compromise is good. It is, but you need to be careful, some things are non-negotiable. In the techie world it is often the goal to find what is “necessary and sufficient” for a procedure — no extras. In that case, negotiating a compromise is futile or even tragic. Example: some members of the family want a pet, others don’t, so they compromise — they will get a pup and give it water but no food…
I could see keeping the Bush tax cuts BUT it would be for only one year with that year dedicated to very serious reform of the tax system. Given that the tax cuts shouldn’t have been passed to begin with, that is a very generous compromise.
Sometimes you just have to admit things have gone the wrong way and start over. A couple days ago I picked up a top-down cardigan sweater that I last worked on in May 2009. The sleeves were done to below the elbows and the body down to the waist. I knit a couple rows back and forth on the body, then marked and put the stitches for the openings of a pair of pockets on the front on some waste yarn to pick out later.
The previous cardigan I loaned to my mom when she felt cold while visiting. It was made of natural black (dark brown) handspun wool and was very soft and light. It looked nice on her and went well with one of her favorite blouses. I had the idea that a cardigan would be easier to put on than a pullover when she has limited use of her left arm. That is when I started a second cardigan in dark blue heather yarn. The brown cardigan was returned though because it wouldn’t hang on a wire coat hanger. I ended up sewing the fronts together and have been wearing it as a V-neck pullover.
I decided that I might use a similar strategy to recover the work already done on the blue sweater — sew the front edges together then knit in a facing for a V-neck pullover. While counting the stitches for the pockets, I discovered that there were considerably fewer stitches on the front side than the back. I had forgotten that I had planned to knit a fairly wide band up the front, across the neck, and down the other front edge.
I pulled out the needle and markers and unraveled the sweater up to where the increases for front edge stopped, thinking that I could continue increasing until the front matched the back, then join the stitches to knit in the round.
Another snag, the increases that I had started at the neck edge ended above the armholes. So, I unraveled the arms and part of the yoke and started picking up and counting stitches. Then I went back to my notes and discovered that I had forgotten an increase or dropped a stitch on knitting the raglans. I unraveled further, and still there was a discrepancy in the stitch count. I ended up unraveling the entire thing and wound the yarn into skeins and tied them. They are stacked waiting to be washed now — ready for a clean start.
I can’t complain about the knitting season so far though. I made a new pair of socks and have redone the feet in two older pairs. Also discovered that the Ford City Library has an informal knitting group that meets Wednesday afternoons.
