"Do not worry about your problems with mathematics. I assure you mine are far greater" - Einstein

A quick recap:

A few months ago, John says, "Why don't you knit something nice for yourself?" and I think, "He's right. I should do that." I stash dive and find 2 skeins (580 yds each) of cobweb weight alpaca in a pretty cream color, and start looking for a pattern. I think I'd like a shawl to throw over my shoulders at John's cousin's wedding on Aug. 15th. I need something with a short, easy pattern repeat so I can work on it while watching Milo. I settle on the Swallowtail Shawl, which I made for my mom (in an aran weight).

Things progress nicely. I finish 14 repeats of the Budding Lace pattern and realize that the thing isn't going to be big enough since I'm using a smaller-than-called-for yarn. I need to add repeats, but a little figuring and looking at the 3 rows of border lace and I realize that however many stitches I add (at 4 increases every other row), that number has to be a multiple of 6, 8, and 10. That makes 120 extra stitches increased, or 10 extra repeats of the Budding Lace pattern. I trust this will be sufficient to make the shawl big enough (keeping in mind that I am 6 feet tall and have broad shoulders). Of course, without taking it off the needles, I have no way of knowing how big the thing will be, and there are 195 stitches on the needles, so they're not coming off. Blind Faith. I had it in abundance. So much so that I had a lifeline thread 60 rows back, and I didn't tie it and at some point Milo gave that bright blue lifeline a good tug and about 2 inches of one side were stitches without a net.

Hey Nupp! You can SUCK IT. Love, Stephanie
With the budding lace pattern (24 repeats) down, I started on the Lily of the Valley lace #1. The first row is all knit save 4 increases. I purled back. Then I set up for the nupps and amazingly all the numbers came out right. On the purl back row, I had to purl 5 together at each nupp to make the little bobble. Somewhere well past the halfway point (so, say, around 200 stitches in, I was doing this little maneuver, and the yarn broke. In the nupp. Not the working yarn. The part already knit. I didn't cry. I didn't even say anything unladylike, though I did tell John he needed to sit down and be quiet and not offer suggestions because he didn't know anything about it. (Sorry, John.) The shawl went into time out while I decided what to do.

A day later, I was ready to face facts: there would be no nupps in this shawl. The yarn was way too fine for rough handling. Also, I was not going to unravel the thing back to the lifeline that didn't go all the way across. No, I was going to do something way more rational. I was going to pick up all 319 stitches in the knit row 2 rows back.

One thing about me: I don't take kindly to being told that I can't do something. WHen I was in college, I saw this advisor and he said I wasn't serious enough to be a math major at the University of Michigan. He may have been right, but he shouldn't have said it, because a week later I went to the chair and declared myself an honors math major. About a month later I met another female student who'd been told by the same advisor, "Women don't major in honors math at the University of Michigan." About a year later I made a pop-up book called, Calculadies: The Women of Mathematics. No, I never emailed the guy to tell him what happened to me. I did sit in on his class about a decade later when I was in Ann Arbor, and when he asked me who I was I told him I was a graduate student from UCLA working with some of the top guys in the field. I may have given him the middle finger under the desk while I said it.

Now, nobody said I couldn't pick up all 319 stitches, but John, who provided coffee and stopped talking when I said, "Honey, I'm counting," did say, "This might not end well."

But, after 8 hours (4 long Milo naps) later, all the stitches were picked up and I was on my way. I was slowly going blind, but I was on my way nonetheless.

I know! Beads!
The next day I placed a call to my knitting buddy Elaine, who is a crafter and an artist and has good suggestions. Mostly I wanted her to confirm that I could NOT put the bobbles in the piece, and to agree that maybe I could put beads there instead. You know, because I'd never done that before and it was a good time to try something new. Elaine knows how I roll with knitting, and agreed I could add beads. She even told me what size to get (11) and lent me her crochet hook (.75 mm -- yes, you read that right). So I went to get 400 size 11 beads, and the woman at the bead store, when I told her what I was doing, said, "Oh, I don't think you'll be able to do that," which was all the push I needed to plunk down $2 for the beads and get to work.

Here's the thing: each bead has to be placed individually on the (very delicate) yarn using a hook so small that I had to use my thumb to feel which side had a hook on it, because I could not tell by looking. Also (and we did not consider this), the hook needs to be held in the right hand, which then completes the manipulation to get the bead threaded. I am left-handed. This process felt very much like I was doing it with an oven mitt on my hand. Each row took about 2 hours to complete, and I clicked the row counter with real gusto every time I finished one. I needed something to live for, and watching the dial go up by one was all I could look forward to. Even the purl rows started to take forever.

However, I got through all 20 rows of the two Lily of the Valley lace, and put that tiny hook back in the container and felt thoroughly proud of myself. Take that! Unsupportive Bead Shop Employee!

The Wrong (Multiple of 8) plus 19

One lace pattern to go. 16 rows of lace, then 2 more rows and I'd be done. I started the Border Lace with 2 stockinette rows, and then on row 3 of the pattern, I realized I'd made an error. See, way back when I added those 120 stitches, I added 15 multiples of 8, and though I am not a number theorist, I do know that 15 is an odd number. The pattern repeat was 8 stitches long. So my bad math waaaay back before the nupp/bead fiasco meant that I'd added 7 pattern repeats to both sides, but had 8 extra stitches lying about in the middle. That wouldn't do. I realized this only after I got to the middle of the now nearly 400 stitch row, and had to unknit, in a lace pattern, that half of the row. That took about an hour. I added a stockinette row and increased 8 stitches across it's length. That seemed fair. Now I had the right (multiple of 8) plus 19 (presumably) and I proceeded with row 3 of the border lace. Only when I got to the middle, I had 6 stitches left, which didn't make sense.

(I'd like to take this moment to point out that I have a Ph.D. in mathematics, but not one in arithmetic. However, I still knew I'd done an OK thing, and that it should have worked out.)

At this point, I could either burn the thing or unknit the half-row AGAIN and count everything. Also at this point, I did say some rather nasty things to the shawl. And when I finished unknitting and counting, I realized that I was spot on.

I knit row 3 a third time, and things came out OK. I knit the second half of the row, and that was OK too.

I worked another 9 rows or so without incident, but the ball of yarn was getting very, very small.

The 30-minute Ball Wind
Six (SIX) rows from the end, the ball of yarn gave out and I realized that yes, I would actually have to wind the other 580 yard, very delicate cobweb-weight skein (which I was now referring to in very nasty terms). It took 30 minutes and was painstakingly slow. Also, you know who likes the ball winder? Abby. The cat.

The yarn broke once, but it was far enough into the ball that I decided it would only have an effect on the NEXT person to use the yarn. I added it in and kept knitting.

In which the shawl gives me the middle finger under the table
I got through the last bit pretty easily, actually. The rows were really, really long and took forever, but whatever. Nothing compared to picking up 319 stitches or keeping the cat away from the ball winder.

In the past, my lace bindoffs have been a little tight, so I went up a needle size. This had a nonstandard bindoff, presumably to make it stretchier, but I got the pattern down and started in on all 443 stitches. And before I got halfway, the working yarn broke. I'm not even making that up. John was there, and saw my head explode. I grabbed that tiny crochet hook and undid the complicated bindoff a few stitches (I was getting REALLY good at unknitting lace), reattached, and in one blessed sitting, bound off the damn thing.

John was sitting next to me when I got to the end, and he said, "Have you thought about how the yarn is going to stand up to blocking?"

I forget, what was the fuss about?
I'm glad I get to report that this ends well. The ends were easy to sew in, though there were many, many of them (in my opinion, a lace piece should have a beginning end and an end end and no ends in the middle. Elaine. Nod if that makes sense.) I picked up each scallop with waxed dental floss and ran floss across the top. I doused it in the guest room sink, blocked it on the guest room bed (using the floss to pull it tight) and unpinned very carefully to make sure I didn't catch any yarn in the T-pin. It's lovely.

I'd show you, but none of the computers I have at this moment have a working interface with my camera. Seriously. But it's really, really beautiful.