Designing on the Fly

I joined Ravelry about a month ago. I linked this blog to my account, yet I rarely comment upon my knitting. I might as well do that now.

I have been knitting most of today. Currently I'm working on a short sleeved cardigan sweater. And I'm doing some things that I never do.

First, I never buy yarn just because I like it. That makes me different from most of the other knitters I hear about (I hear about these massive stashes of yarn). I have a stash, but it's not that large. It consists of yarns I inherited from Gram-Mavis and leftovers from my projects.

But last time I went yarn shopping I found a color of yarn that I just loved, so I bought some without a project in mind. I set the yarn aside thinking that I had just bought stash yarn.

It wasn't more than two days later when I was flipping through some catalogs that I had gotten in the mail (I'm on way too many mailing lists). This sweater caught my eye. I liked the look of it, but it wasn't quite right (not the right color among other things). That's when I remembered the new yarn I had just gotten. That would be perfect.

So, the second thing I never do I did next: I started knitting the back without a full pattern in mind. I just cast on some stitches (well, after swatching and using the template from a template book) and began.

The back is nearly done. I should finish it up this week. And today I also spent some time looking at cable patterns for the front. Which brings me to the third thing I'm doing that I never do: I'm only about one step ahead of myself with this project. I only have a vague idea of where I'm going. I have no idea if this will turn out okay.

If it comes out, I'll post pictures. I should finish the sweater just in time for summer.