It was a bust!

Yesterday, that is. I had every intention of spending the day knitting on the orders I'd received from Tara. I started on the first of the moebius hats. It was coming along... not great, but it was coming along. The first thing that worked against me was the needle. I was positive I had a 5.5 mm Addi Turbo, 40" long. Do you think I could find it? Of course not. I dug out the Denise needles and put together the right length, cast on and started knitting the moebius band of the hat. There's one thing that turns the pleasure of knitting into the work of knitting. Fighting with the needles and yarn. All I did for that entire band was fight with the needles and yarn. It just did NOT want to slide along the needles the way it should have. I fought to get that band done without tossing the entire thing across the room. My right wrist was aching. I should have quit right then, right? Well, I perservered. I finished the band. I casted off half the stitches as laid out in the pattern. I was ready to start the top of the hat. That's when I realized there seemed to be an extra twist in the moebius that shouldn't have been there. No matter what I did, I couldn't get it to look right. Notice I said "look right".

I pulled it off the needles. I tried to frog it. I fought with the yarn for a minute. It only let me unravel one stitch before the next stitch was so tangled I couldn't do anything with it. I looked at it again, more carefully this time. Know what? It was a perfect moebius, just the way it should have been. I was so disgusted, I tossed it into the garbage can. Oh, did I mention it was black? There was no way I was going to even try to get it back on the needles. Sometimes, you simply do not want to be reminded that you shouldn't start something when you're really not in the right frame of mind to work on it. *sigh*

Then I started one of the pairs of Mrs. Beetons that Tara ordered. I'm usually a well tensioned knitter. Well intentioned, and well tensioned. I usually cast on fairly loosely. Not this time. That beaded cast on was tighter than I've ever cast on. That first round was a *&%^$*^ nightmare!

Lesson learned: never, EVER, start a new project when the one you've been working on doesn't work out and you're really uptight and frustrated. I put the Mrs. Beetons away and picked up my Donegal Tweed cardigan. At least, that one's just stocking stitch and my tension's never off in stocking stitch.

Hopefully, today will be a better, more productive knitting day. And I'm putting off the moebius hats until I can find my 5.5 mm Addi Turbo.

Off to start my day with a shower. I'll let you know how the day turns out.