I am now fully convinced that knitters do exist in real. After interacting with knitters  only online, I had begun to wonder whether knitters are a species which exist only virtually. Only my eyes have been trained to read knitting related words, so it was a thrilling experience to actually ‘hear’ words like Ravelry, stockinette stitch and blocking. Wow, what an experience it was.

We met at M G Road and spent some time in Hard Rock Cafe. We were a bunch of chatty knitters who loved to talk about everything under the sun – from Obama, BJP and RSS to ghost writing and pets. And of course, lot of knitting stuff too. Rima had gifts for all of us – a bag full of lovely yarn. I have been ogling at it ever since she gave it to me. I am looking forward to more such meetups!

Continuing with knitting baby stuff, I made this cute baby kimono. I loved it the moment I saw the pattern. I had some pink 6-ply acrylic yarn I bought from Raja Market. The pattern calls for 100 gms of 8-ply yarn. I had a little more than 100 gms, so I assumed it should be fine. Boy, was I wrong!

By the time I reached the sleeve separation part, I had used up half of my yarn stock. That is when I realized I am going to run short of yarn. Luckily, I had some candy floss pink yarn in the same guage and I decided to use that. I haven’t really done color work earlier, so this was a great opportunity to learn a new skill. After some head scratching and calculation, I decided to alternate 6 rows in both colors.

It was not easy to do color work, especially the sleeves. I did not want to have too many loose ends to weave in, so I decided not to cut and rejoin but to carry it up (I think that is what it is called). I don’t know if that was the best thing to do! The yarns loved to get tangled up and I had a tough time untangling them.

The only problem I have with this kimono is the neck edge. It does not have a garter stitch border and hence is curling up. I am taking expert advice from Rima and Sanhita on doing a crochet edge to fix this problem.

Looking back at the knitting experience and the finished sweater, I am glad I ran out of yarn. The kimono would have looked plain and boring in one color. I think this is the best knitting I have done so far. The individual V’s of stockinette stitch are clearly visible (which I couldn’t achieve earlier) and the kimono has a ‘proper’ finished look. The kimono is already a hit among my cousins and I am expecting requests from them very soon!

Next up is Tetris baby blanket. This is the first time I am doing intarsia and I hope I can manage it.