Did The Academy take a Smart Pill?

I found last night's Oscars entertaining!  I even got the impression Hollywood has smart, thoughtful, witty people in it!

Seriously...

• Very few endless lists of faceless anonymous coworkers thanked and rethanked.
• Best Actor and Actress nominees profiled by costars/friends rather than with clips of nominated rolls. (Most people have already seen the movies haven't they? (The only movie I've seen is "Up" but my kids tell me that's weird.)
• The thoughtful "Hurt Locker" movie winning Best Picture over the blockbuster Avatar.
• An independent film (Precious) being acknowledged with nominations and awards.

This show, that revolves around people who entertain for a living, seems to have this year been put on so as to be entertaining!

But I admit as I "watched" I was also very focused on knitting.  The weight of the great sheets of mock ribbed Alpaca is tiring to work as the yarn goes from front to back to front to back. If at one time I thought about knitting this in the round to the underarms I'm now so glad I didn't. I don't think I could have managed turning the total weight of the thing to work on it. As it is my right elbow and left hand are both quite sore after even a couple of hours of knitting on it.  (In the evenings I can easily put in 5 hours or so and over the weekend I put in more than that!) This morning my shoulders are tight and my upper back loaded with painful knots.

But I'm ready to do the three needle bind off for the right shoulder and begin knitting the cowl collar.

The collar measures 10" x102 stitches(knit flat and then seamed. By comparison the lower edge of either the front or back is only about 90 stitches. The collar done on a smaller needle than the body will make its finished measurement more narrow but still its going to use a significant portion of the last ball of yarn while putting even more strain on my overworked knitting muscles/tendons.

I ended up knitting the front panel  2" wider than the back up to the armhole shaping. There I integrated additional decreases to make front and back match at the shoulder.

 (The ribbed pattern can't accommodate shaping mid row so out at the edges it must be. I don't know how this is going to look once assembled but that mystery is all part of the process of this project so I'll have to wait and see.

To make altering patterns like this  less of a crap shoot in future I'm drawn to taking Veronique Avery's class on Custom Fitting Knitting Patterns being offered at the DKC Frolic next month. Robin Hunter is teaching a class earlier that day on how to know which patterns to choose and how to alter them to best suit your figure which would also be timely and useful.

Veronique's class is for Advanced Knitters. I don't know if I can claim membership in that level just yet but I do have a lot of background in sewing which might help bridge any gaps in understanding I might have. Robin's class is for all levels - I guess all you need for that one is a body to assess and I do have one of those so I should be okay there. ;)

And speaking of bodies - I'm off now to drag this aching package of mine on my walk before it gets too warm outside!?! (I'll enjoy it while it lasts, there's a good chance by week's end we'll be once again looking at measurable accumulations of snow) Maybe a good work out and a solid session of stretching will ease my aches before tonights' collar knitting. Here's hoping!

Thanks for dropping by!