Like many others, I am rather procrastinate-y when it comes to finishing my knitting projects. Before the new year, I made a beautiful irish mesh cowl (Curtesy of Purlavenue). It's had a rough time coming into being.
I bought the yarn from a shop waaaaaay back in Edmonton. Alpaca yarn died the most beautiful shade of blue. Then it was promptly put into my knitting box and ignored. Then put into a moving box and ignored. It became very forgotten. I was not friendly to my yarn. And it payed me back. The tangled mess that resulted from the neglect took me 3 days evenings to untangle.
Finally free from it's purple friend/fiend, I followed the lovely purlavenue's pattern (adding a couple extra knits for my wide shoulders) and finished a lovely cowl. But it's sat finished waiting to be blocked for ... two month now.
Since I've been home sick a week now I finally got up the motivation to finish the project! Haha. Time and opportunity! So I started by soaking my project. 20 minutes was good enough (in cold water so the colour didn't run), and then I squeezed out as much water as I could (no wringing allowed!!). Placed it on a towel, rolled up the cowl, and squished more water out. Then, with a new dry towel, the pinning began. I seem to have lost my ruler, or I think the process would have been less guess work and more actual square-ing. Highly recommend using a ruler when stretching out a project! Regardless though, it worked out! Go half-assed blocking! (Still technically blocking, haha.)
-Andrea
The Half-Assed Hobbyist