Lifeline

This is what happens when you take the directions in a pattern as suggestions, not instructions. Beavering away on my Gradient Yoke Sweater, I get down near the hemline where it says to put a life line in the row to which the edge of the hem will be sewn after its turned. Pffft. As if I couldn't follow a row of purl bumps on the back side of stockinette. I tootle on down, purl a row for the bottom of the hem fold, and knit on 8 more rows, ready to hem. [Boring technique note: often a knit hem is made by running a circular needle through the appropriate row and binding it and the edge row off together. This pattern said sew, so I was going to sew.] Came time to sew the hem and--uh oh--I wasn't as good at following those purl bumps as I thought. The result was all skew-whiff and uneven and looked terrible. So terrible I didn't even take a photo of how terrible.

I could either abandon the sweater at this stage to the Heap of Malfunctioning Rubble, or pull my socks up, undo what I had done, and put my life line in after the fact. Reader, I put in the life line. And it made all the difference, see?

Here's the resulting hem, inside and out, just as tidy and straight as you please:

Now it's just a question of sleeves, with yarn weighed so it can be divided half-and-half, length to be determined by how far the yarn goes. How long will they be? elbows? 3/4? All the way to the wrist? Only the scale knows.

Swimming in the Seasilk

Note to Winter Sunset Cardigan: It's not my fault that the weather turned warm and the thought of a giant lapful of wool is so much less inviting than a hanky of lightweight slippery seasilk in cool marine colors.  You'll just have to wait in your basket for a while.

Here's what I've got so far:

That's a lifeline a couple of repeats down, and the waviness is a demonstration of why it's such a good idea even though it's a hassle to put it in.  No prizes for guessing why it's there or how many times I ripped and redid the first couple of repeats before I caved in to necessity.  If you think it's a hassle to pause and thread the lifeline in, you haven't had to rip 10 rows back and try to pick up live lace stitches.  Part of all this trouble is that the center lace pattern is deceptively complex.  I still haven't been able to memorize it like I have the edges, and have accepted the fact that I probably will have to carry around a little 5"x3" lace chart for the duration.  The great thing about knitting a stole shape is that once you get established, you just repeat and repeat until you run out of yarn. No shaping, no change. And the center being as tricky as it is, one has to be on one's toes all the time, so it's not likely to get boring any time soon despite the repetition.  The hawkeyes among you will discern that there is a mistake in the middle (below the lifeline), but I have judged it too minor to be noticed when the shawl is worn.  As my Scottish friend Molly used to say, "A blind man'd be glad t' see't."