Mistakes, Design Elements, and Opportunities for Growth

Remember this bag? It looks cool, but actually I made a major mistake early on... so it became a "design element". That's what knitters call mistakes that will still work out. (Also, you can count on felting to cover a multitude of sins... just like in Euchre - you can count on your partner for one trick.)

Here's what happened. I didn't understand a direction, so my stitch count was off. Then I made an assumption. I assumed that the base of the bag was round. I didn't bother to read the directions anymore. I was half way up the sides when I realized my "design element". It didn't adversely affect the outcome of the bag... except I saw how it'd be a bit cooler with the square bottom.

On to the 2nd bag... I figured out what I did wrong, and was able to make the bottom square. Nice. Got up the sides, no problem. Got to the point where you BO a bunch, then knit a bunch (for the handles - keeping the stitches live). Here's where things started to go wonky.

I did the BOs and the knitting, sewed in all my ends and kitchenered the 1st handle together. I held it up to admire my handiwork and realized my mistake. I had BO'd when I should have knit and vise versa. Now, this would not have mattered had the base been ROUND, but now since it was SQUARE, my knitting was 45 deg. off kilter. YAAAAAH. Only myself to blame... I ASSUMED that I knew what to do, and didn't refer to the directions. (Do you see a theme?)

I should have photographed it as I fixed it, but I was so mad...

I was unwilling to reknit the handle, so I used dpns to pick up the handle row that meets the bag. I picked up, with circs, all 200 stitches around the body of the bag a couple of rows down. I cut the stitches just below the handle, and detached it. I then ripped back to the circulars. I then (AHA) kitchenered the handle in the right place... live stitches to live stitches. I'm a GENIUS. OK, maybe not... but I have now MASTERED THE KITCHENER STITCH. Lee was pretty surprised at how good it looked and how you couldn't even tell. I was too.

Here is the bag pre-washing, with DVD for scale.

I think it looks like a tank top. An itchy, hot tank top.