bet ya didn't know...

one of the problems when knitting fairisle with long floats, it’s hard to get it perfect,

bad cats, sad cats!

especially with Silver Reed machines. The second colour that isn’t knitting, over more than eight needles, begins to feel left out and wants to jump in on the backside of the second colour, especially predominant when there are a few bent needles. Not even seriously bent, just latches that are maybe a little sticky! On the first cat blank, I had sort of forgotten this – you don’t really see it while you’re knitting unless you’re aware and really looking  for it but when the thing comes off you can see a few places where it makes a vertical line on the front of the fabric. I’m hoping it’ll wash out. Ha! ha! We know that never happens! Anyway, it’s not serious enough to rip out or abandon the whole thing - other people, a.k.a non-knitters, won’t even notice.

good cats on left

2nd cats after needles changed

Toward the top of the piece, I did spot these vague lines and made note of the needle numbers. Swapped out ten or so needles and did a little work on the stitch pattern to eliminate some of the larger solid colour areas. The second bunch of cats came out much better. I’ll be honest with you, I didn’t toss the needles – there was nothing really wrong with them and, even though I’ve been to your house and see that you put the bent needles back in at the end of the bed and I’ve made fun of you for that, I just put these aside and they will be my backup stash – no point in putting them at the ends as I’m using the full width of the needle bed!
Oh yeah, and if you’re going to be knitting 200 stitches wide by 350 rows at T9 fairisle, you should stop halfway through and check the clamps. At about row 250, fortunately the carriage was almost to the end of the row when the right-hand side clamp let go! I was quick enough to realize what was happening, grabbed the ribber, held it up and got the carriage to the end without dropping anything! Thanked the machine-knitting gods, re-adjusted and re-tightened everything and continued! Repeated this between each fairisle piece!