Has Anyone Seen My Marbles?

I have officially lost the plot, gone doolally and am away with the fairies. Yesterday I started getting a craving. It was the sort of craving you get during pregnancy or when you have a monthly need for chocolate. I was desperate - to cast on a triangle scarf. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if DH decided that I needed an intervention. But I really, really, really, wanted to knit a triangle scarf. As I'm reaching my sixties, I'm willing to blame it on hormones, or lack of them, and part of me was fascinated at why I should feel this. The rest of me decided to turn over my room in search of some yarn cakes that I bought when bear was tiny, or even before. I think I may have donated them, but my room looked like a hurricane had breezed through and I couldn't find them. Instead I spotted some double knitting that I'd stashed ready for a sweater. I grabbed the yarn and a 5mm circular needle (US size 8) which are bigger than the 4mm the yarn asked for but give a better drape with garter stitch. I settled down, leaned back and loaded up YouTube.

Not only am I losing my sanity to triangle scarves, but I seem to be losing any sort of brainpower as it took me an hour and a half to cast on and set up a shawl. I kept trying different videos to get them to make sense. I felt better after I got going, though, and it currently looks like this.

The yarn feels lovely, snuggly, warm, and soft and you can't get in any more as it was a Marriner brand and they went out of business. I've got enough for a sweater pattern.

But I'm making some mental calculations. The pattern I have asks for 500g, as it's quite plain. You can find it here, if you're interested, but I want to make it two inches longer than the pattern. There are two issues with this. I don't want to get carried away on the really snuggly shawl and not have enough for an equally snuggly sweater and I'm not sure about the length of the yarn. The yarn called for in the pattern is sold in balls that are 345m long, while the yarn that I've actually got is 290m per ball. I'm not saying the yarn is thicker than average, but it feels like it's eaten a lot of big dinners compared to standard double knitting. I may be forced to knit a swatch for the first time in years. 

And then there's the needle issue. If I knit to gauge, which I've always done in the past, I need a 4mm needle and the best one for the job is currently occupied with the multicoloured scarf in hurdle stitch that I only started a couple of days ago. So I need to finish the scarf and hat before I get carried away by the soft snuggly sweater which, when finished, will allow me to know whether I've got enough left for an amazing shawl. My track record for finishing things is not stellar, but at least this time I have an incentive. 

Not only am I concerned about my mental capacity, or lack of it, but I've done something interesting to my arm. When I told DH that I hurt my arm turning over in bed wrong, he stared at me, shook his head and told me, 'well, you will go taking risks.' I think I may have pulled a muscle of some sort, but I'm in a lot of pain, can't raise it above my head and I'm very restricted. Last time I had anything like this, it eased off eventually, but I cannot tell you how unimpressed I am at the whole business. After an evening losing all sense of proportion over a triangle shawl, I planned to go out today and find a quite corner and sit and knit. This has always helped my mental health. Unfortunately, my arm is so bad that I daren't risk driving. 

I made this on Canva yesterday. I can knit for short periods, and moving around is uncomfortable, but I may be able to get some writing done without excuses to be elsewhere. This is a good quotation to have in front of me.

In my case, action inspires me to new knitting projects. 

Hugs and good health to all.