I'm a Rogue knitter

I just couldn't take it anymore. The beautiful cabled Rogue hood kept taunting me from the website. I bought the pattern last week, joined the Rogue-a-long and after nearly crying (it's 19 pages long), I took a deep breath and decided to knit a swatch and see how I'd do. The swatch was the sleeve and I knit it in Araucania Nature Wool in green. I somehow managed to get gauge but man was it itchy and heavy! Plus, the variegated colors don't do well with cables :( SO, what I learned is...
** Do your research BEFORE buying wool for a project (I scoured the Rogue-a-long pages and took heed of their warnings about certain yarns.)
** When in doubt, talk to the LYS (Bobbie, the owner of EweKnitKits, was SO helpful and talked me through the pros and cons of using certain yarns with Rogue) when you're trying to find the right yarn
** Knitting an actual piece of a project is very helpful (I would have loved a simple swatch but didn't love the sleeve)
** Don't knit cables in reduced lighting (I was knitting the sleeve swatch in the minivan at 10 pm and couldn't see a HUGE mistake that I made in a cable that I couldn't fix - boo hoo)
** Check your cables after the completion of each section to make sure that the stitches are going in the right direction (this gets easier as you move through the pattern and know what to expect)
** This pattern is exhilarating!!!

So, for the yarn, I chose Cascade 220 Tweed in oatmeal brown. Jenna, the designer, cautioned against using blends such as silk/wool, cotton, or wool/cotton because the cables don't "pop off" the item as well when you use them. So, I had to stay away from some of Rowan's yummy yarns. I really wanted to knit it in alpaca (and may just add some to my stash for another Rogue) but it's a bit fluffy and sheds like crazy. That's okay. The tweed is perfect, will go with anything and does a great job of showing off the cables. What you see in the pictures is a view of one of the side panels. I'm about 1/3 of the way finished with the body. Rogue is knitting faster than I thought so I may finish this project in a couple of weeks (I'd planned for a month or more). What you DON'T see in this picture is the cable on the other side that underwent some surgery this morning. I didn't heed my own warning about knitting in the dark and in addition to dropping a stitch (in the body), I forgot to knit one of the cables. So, using some advice that I found in the Rogue-a-long, I frogged the five stitches that needed to be repaired (three rows worth), added the cable and knit them back up. Voila! Problem solved. I can't believe that I was able to do it. I was agonizing over frogging 600 stitches to get back to the error so what a saving grace. What you also don't see is the kangaroo pocket that had to be frogged and will need to be knit again SOON since I almost need to reconnect the body to it. I didn't do as Jenna suggested and highlight the size BEFORE I started to work the pattern. I finished the pocked and found out (after an hours worth of knitting) that it was off by one inch because I knit the wrong size :( That's okay too because I wasn't happy with my decreases and now know what was wrong. Everything happens for a reason. I'm nervous about the hood and the detail around the throat but I have a while before I start that. One step at a time.

Well, I didn't get much else done in the way of knitting. I didn't finish MondoCable but expect to by the weekend. No felting either :( But I did have a great night out at the beach with DH sans DSS so I was a VERY happy girl this weekend!

My baby boy turns eight tomorrow. I can't believe that so much time has passed. He's so wonderful. Both of my boys are :) And my biggest boy, DH, turns 35 next Tuesday. Age is creeping up on me. I'm next on the birthday list (Oct. 31). I'm not ready to be a mature adult yet - tee hee!

I'm out of town tomorrow so won't be bloggin again until Wed. Peaceful knitting all...