Off the ledge

For the moment, anyone. I did some more work on the poncho, and f-cked it up majorly. DH convinced me not to rip out the whole thing and start over, yesterday I pulled out my error (including a 1/2 row bind off), and futzed a bit to get to where I can start the 4th diamond. Then I put it aside. Given how sick I've been, I've been working on a simple simple project that requires no brain power other than measuring! (Wise advice from a friend on the previous post!)

I've decided I need to finish a whole bunch of stuff before starting any new projects. I really want to take some time and turn the toes of my socks, so I can plug away on the feet. I'm planning to do Wendy's Feather and Fan socks in a Lorna's Lace, and I'm wondering how hard it would be to do the lace pattern on the foot of the sock as well. I need time to sit down with the pattern and figure it out. Since I like to wear my hand-knit socks with my Keen Maryjane's, having the pattern on the foot would be good. I need more braincells than I have currently as well.

So, at this point on needles, I've got:

1. The poncho
2. A gift for someone who might be reading this blog so I can't talk about it
3. Another gift for someone else who might be reading this blog so I can't talk about that either
4. One of the socks is cast-on (just the provisional cast on)
5. A scarf for my sister

Lots to do!!

More poncho anxiety

Okay, I need someone to talk me down off this (very low) ledge of knitting anxiety.
I am making the Artyarns Poncho P53. And I'm feeling like the sizing is just going to be way, way off. I've put so much energy into this already, and I'm really worried that I'm going to finish it and hate it, or worse, be unable to wear it! So, the bummers so far:

1. The actual yarn (Supermerino 108) is an entirely different color scheme than their picture of it (the picture on the pattern is worked in the same yarn as I am using). It's much, much darker. Pretty, but not at all what I was expecting (and those who know me, know I don't do well with unexpected differences).

2. The pattern isn't going perfectly. You make an initial diamond, and you can size it however you want it - I took their suggestion to make sure it covered my back. Then you work 3 diamonds off of it (4 sections total). I have worked 2 of the 3, and I am convinced that it's going to be HUGE. I am worried that the neckline is going to end up so big that there's no way it'll stay on my shoulders.

3. My diamond #2 and #3 and different sizes and I have no idea how it happened. I have an entire extra pattern set (6 rows, one of which is dropped YOs, so big) in diamond #3. So it's an inch or so taller. How big a deal is this? I don't know how to fix it (other than frog the whole thing and start over).

I am feeling really bummed and discouraged, and I'm not trusting that it's going to work out. If it's really too big, the only option is to pull the whole thing out and do it over, and I think I might cry. I love the pattern, but I'm having a hard time seeing how it's going to work.

Knitting Anxiety

I finished the second (of four) diamonds for my poncho. I am feeling anxious about whether I did a couple of things correctly or not. It's hard to even describe what I did, if you're not familiar with modular knitting. But, you're knitting back and forth, moving down the row to the center. The pattern says to knit until you reach the center stitch. Now, first, I can't remember if I moved my marker or not - I know I set it up the way I thought it would be, and the way it was set up (you have the other stitches on a holder), the number of rows worked out. But, I'm worried that I didn't set it up correctly. (I know, this is totally unclear, but it makes sense to me.) So, I just knit it the way the pattern called for - on the last row, you bind off half of the stitches. We'll see in the end if it comes out. And hey, if it's totally wrong, I'll either suck it up and wear it anyway, OR I'll rip it out and (cry) and redo it. Perfectionism be gone! The other thing I was confused on was with the binding off. You bind off to the center stitch, which is an increase. I did the increase, and then bound off the last pre-marker stitch, since it says to bind off all sts to the marker. I don't know, hopefully it's right. It's fine for now, since I'm where I need to be, but it may be kerfuffled at the end, when you're joining two sides together with a three needle bind-off. I am not sure what to do if I have some random different number of stitches.

I don't usually get this anxious about making mistakes, but this is such a big project!