Travel knitting...NOT!

Before we left for South Asia in early May, I came across the pattern for the Peasy sweater. I immediately decided I had to make it, and even worse, that I had to work on it while traveling to, in, and from Singapore and China.

Stupid me.

Why I thought I could tackle a new pattern, and a pattern with a rather intricate upper bodice design, I'll never know. (Maybe it was all of those raves on Ravelry which claimed the pattern is "easy.")

But think that I did, and the day before our flight from Boston I was headed to Rosemary's Yarns, a great yarn shop in Windham, to select my yarn. With the help of Rosemary herself, who knows all there is to know about yarns, I chose Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Wool in a sage green (officially, it's called "basil." I love basil.)
I was happy. I could start the Peasy sweater and, with luck, have it done before we returned to

Maine at the end of May.

I didn't have luck.

I cast on the sweater the evening before our flight; I knit from Boston to Chicago; I knit sporadically from Chicago to somewhere over the Pacific; I knew something was wrong.

I inspected the sweater's beginnings once we got to Singapore; I contemplated what I should do; I tried to think of ways to correct whatever the problem was without raveling the entire 3-4 inches of neck edge and beginning leaf design,...and finally two days after arriving in Singapore, I raveled the entire thing.

Then I dug deeply into my suitcase and pulled out the sock yarn and pattern that I'd brought along, just in case. At the same time, I buried the Peasy yarn deeply in the suitcase so I wouldn't have to see it or think about it until we got back to Maine.

Sock knitting is much more sensible for travel, for me at least. I don't have to pile a lot of yarn onto my lap and I don't have to try to learn a new pattern because I've knit probably twenty or thirty pairs of socks over the last five years and I almost have the steps memorized.

It took me about a week after returning home to face Peasy again. This time I kept extremely detailed notes of where I was in the pattern at any given moment. I've been slogging along with it since late May, and it's nearly done.

It's a rather weird pattern, to my thinking, because although it's a neck-down pattern (I love neck-d0wn knitting), the sleeves are finished before the body of the sweater is completed. I suppose I could have finished the body first, but I didn't dare wander from the directions, given my earlier disaster at knitting this design.

What's making it a chore for me to finish Peasy is this matter: While traveling to Vermont in early June, with Peasy in the car with me so I could knock off a few more rows, we stopped at a farmers' market in Danville, VT. We actually stopped to find a food vendor selling something we could have for lunch, but I immediately spotted a vendor selling yarn. (See second photo: What knitter could resist buying some of this yarn, really?) I bought enough skeins to make this sweater, and I can't wait to start it. This pullover, if all goes well, will be perfect for cold winter days here in Maine.

So while my needles are working on Peasy, my heart's with Mondo.