The Thinking of You Scarf kept popping up in my search results. It described the pattern as being suitable for an advanced beginner. By the time I saw this pattern, I had progressed through knitting, purling and cabling. I might have even tried my hand at yarn overs and K2tog at that point. So I considered myself an advanced beginner. My 2 knitting gurus certainly thought I had picked up this knitting thing like a fish takes to water.
But I hemmed and hawed at actually paying for a pattern. Now I had paid for many patterns in my life. I have purchased patterns for sewing clothes, magazines for counted cross stitch patterns, and all kinds of craft kits for beaded ornaments over my lifetime. I couldn't understand why I was having trouble paying for this one.
Seems I was having a hard time giving in to the fact that knitting had become an obsession and considering I really thought I would never had taken up knitting after failing miserably under my grandmother's tutelage nearly 50 years ago.
After weeks, of looking at this beautiful pattern I bit the bullet and purchased The Thinking of You pattern by Jackie Erickson-Schweitzer and distributed through www.heartstringsfiberarts.com. I then looked for the perfect red yarn. I settled on 2, Ella Rae Cozy Soft and the Silky Wool by Elsebeth Lavold. I then just read the pattern and I was so confused! Packed the yarn and the pattern up and decided that Knit Camp with my 2 knitting gurus would be the place to begin this project.
Ah, Knit Camp. Tucked away in a rural area north of Pittsburgh about 50 women gather for a weekend every year over the President's Day Weekend. It takes a special invitation to get in and turns out I knew someone, who knew someone and knew I would love the experience.
Imagine, visiting an alpaca farm, shopping at a local knit shop, and knitting, eating and drinking your favorite beverage of choice for 3 days! Heaven on earth for a knitting addict. I first went to knit camp in 2017 and I still considered myself a beginner. Turns out when it was time for show and tell, I was not considered a beginner at all!! So on the first evening I took out this lovely pattern and decided to use the silky wool. Under the guidance of 49 other knitters I cast on and began and had help figuring out how to read this pattern.
Cast on 29 stitches, a 4 row repeating pattern for 36 inches till the fun part of creating the hearts began. Sounds simple enough. However, I knitted a row or 2 and I never had 29 stitches! Ripped out and started again. Same thing happened again! Somehow 29 stitches would never be the magic number I would count in successive rows. I just had to put this advanced beginner pattern and project in time-out!
Fast forward to the fall of 2019 and I find myself back at a fall knitting weekend north of Pittsburgh again. Turns out we could not get enough knitting in during the winter knit weekend, we started a fall knitting weekend in 2018! Weather was warmer and the colors of the trees were golden. By now 3 years later I have actually taught some knitting classes and sing the praises of stitch markers!
Also 3 years later my yarn stash is out of control and the list of projects I want to knit is a mile long, and I spent a month cataloging my stash and queuing my patterns on Ravelry and I feel so much peace now. I also have a determination to knit the projects and use the stash. Out comes the Thinking of You Scarf again. Perfect! I have all the yarn and more than I need too! I am heading back to knit camp and I am ready to start again. Finished a sweater which was the first item in my newly organized queue while at camp and I cast on the Thinking of You Scarf again.
I was fairly confident. 29 stitches per row! This is a piece of cake. I stopped and counted stitches after a few rows and the magic number of 29 was still eluding me! A light bulb when off: USE MARKERS! So I placed a marker after the 1st stitch, then every 5 stitches till the end of the row where the last 3 stitches were supposed to be. Now I could move on and catch those tricky YO's and K2tog's in the right place. Finally, I found my rhythm and used my own advice!!! 2 days later the scarf with its beautiful interlocking hearts was finished! Blocked for a day of drying and I have a beautiful scarf and enough of the silky wool to make 2 more with confidence. (I have made a promise not to return yarn to my stash. Future gifts or knit camp auction items will be the destination for the additional Thinking of You scarves. It's been a 3 year odyssey that has brought me much joy as I finally conquered this Advanced Beginner pattern.
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