I can’t tell you how happy it made my boy to know there were people out there getting our fucked up sense of humor. The title of yesterday’s post was, indeed, a bastardized version of the lyrics in “C’mon and Love Me” by the hottest band in the land: KISS. Bouncing around singing KISS songs the other night surely let some air out of this pressure cooker we’re living in. As good as C’mon and Love Me was – Firehouse was SO much better. Whoo Ooo YEAH!

Speaking of letting the air out, yesterday I spent THE most enjoyable couple of hours knitting of all things A SWATCH.

Can you believe it? First off, I swatched. Secondly, I liked it. The world surely MUST be coming to an end. This kind of hideous green yarn is just gorgeous in my book. I started off swatching for my new found love, Ariann, with the multitudes of Jo Sharp I have in the stash. It was clear to me pretty quickly that this yarn wasn’t going to work. It’s a very sticky yarn. Especially after you wash it. Which doesn’t seem like it would work very well for a kind of drapey lacy cardigan. And I really don’t think that you’d be able to see the cool pattern feature of decreases that Bonne Marie has worked out. The thing is, I was hoping to use stash for this project. My home runneth over with yarn and fiber and I’m not that into spending money these days so USE STASH! Perfect. Problem is I only have sweaters worth of Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran Tweed or Silkroad DK Tweed – all bought back in the great Elann sale of November ’04. Not going to work.

So I searched and searched the internets to see what kind of yarn people were using for Ariann. Turns out any worsted weight yarn will do, but what did I really want? And how long did I want to WAIT? The wait time is way more important than the yarn this time out because I’m desperate to get involved in something – not put it down – have it consume all of my waking hours. I need that right now. So I started thinking about which yarns I could get locally and wouldn’t break the bank and had lots of colors to choose from – and you know where this is going, right? I, like the rest of the knitting world, had a couple of balls of Cascade 220, the PERFECT YARN, in my stash. I took out the hideous green you see above (don’t ask why this is in the stash) and starting knitting. I knew right away it WAS the perfect yarn, and I didn’t stop until the swatch was done. Then I took the swatch with me to pick up G at the train station and to Home Despot and to the supermarket and finally I brought it home and gave it a good wash in the new SOAK I bought at Stitches (yummy and G-smell approved!) and blocked the sucker out.

Guess what?

I got gauge.

Well, sort of. The pattern calls for 19 stitches/24 rows per 4″ and I got stitch gauge, but not row gauge. And stitch gauge is SO much harder to deal with no? I’m getting about 28 rows to the inch instead of 24 which is totally fine with me because I was going to make it a bit longer anyway. Now I can just knit and be happy and not worry. Maybe I’ll start the armhole decreases a bit sooner – who knows. All I have to do now is find the right color (that they have enough of – I’m not going to be nitpicky about this) and cast on! I CAN’T WAIT!!! All you Ariann knitters out there – I’ve heard a rumor it’s running a bit small – should I go with the 38″ size or the 40.5″? I’m leaning toward the 40.5″. I don’t think I’ll care if it’s a little bit big and I’m fat these days, so that might be the way to go. Chime in with opinions please.

I can’t tell you how happy I am to be excited about something. I want this sweater done for my birthday. I’ve got about a month. I think I can do it.