Horror

In the wee hours of Thursday morning, I cast off on the wedding shawl. A very sleepy me went to bed, and washed and blocked the shawl Thursday afternoon. Blocking went well, the yarn got nice and soft, and I was happy! This morning, the shawl was completely dry, and I unpinned it. I admired it, tried it on with it buttoned like a wrap, admired my handiwork. I spread it out on the back of my couch, at breakfast, and got ready to wrap it all up for the bridal shower tomorrow. I admired it a little more, and to my complete horror, saw this: Two dropped stitches. HORROR. Now, had I had a week or more, or it was for me, I would put in a lifeline, take out the cast off, rip back to the boo boo, and reknit the rest. It was about 5 repeats from the end of the shawl, so it would suck, but life is life. I, however, am giving this as a gift tomorrow. TOMORROW. No time to rip back, knit five repeats or so, and rewash and block the damn thing. I had to get creative. First off, I picked up the dropped stitches. I figured, since it was two stitches, that they ended in a decrease. (That little tool, by the way, I love. It's an itty bitty crochet hook, but it's totally perfect for picking up dropped stitches. I use it all the time. ) At this point, I was at a loss. What do I do know? I perused the interwebs a bit, and found no help. I decided to just go for it, and grabbed some of the leftover yarn, and thread it onto a tapestry needle. I went through both of the stitches from the front, then underneath one of the legs between two stitches, like so: The red is the extra yarn, the blue the two dropped stitches, and the green, the leg. After that, I went back through the two stitches, and pulled both ends through to the back. You can hardly see the boo boo at this point: I know knots in knitting are generally a no-no, but I wasn't about to have this one fall apart. So on the back, I firmly tied a square knot: I then wove in the two ends, and now you can barely see where it was. I have to really look for it, and even then, can only really find it by finding where I wove the ends in. A non-knitter should never see it. Success! A truly beautiful knit. It is light and airy, but warm and cozy at the same time. I love it. I'm totally going to make myself one! A few side notes: tomorrow I'll be out of town, and probably not able to blog here. I promise to do some old-school blogging (AKA journaling) tomorrow, and I'll post it when I get back on Sunday. Lastly, some tags for those poor folks who have the same issue and need some pictoral help: finished knit lace dropped stitch stitches help fix repair pick up