Determination

Well, picking up those stitches along the edges of the bolero is every bit as bad as I thought they would be. Oh, and it's 300 stitches for the front, not 200. I managed to do the right front starting with the lower edge and going up to the neck, but haven't done the neck yet. The pattern does try to be a bit helpful by breaking it down into smaller sections (pick up so many stitches along the lower edge shaping, then so many stitches along the straight selvedge, then so many stitches until you get to the neck). I'm doing myself a favor and dividing those areas in half so instead of picking up 24 stitches in 4 inches, I'm picking up 12 stitches in 2 inches, then another 12 in two inches or whatever it is. Still, I sometimes get to the end and still have to pick up 5 more stitches, or I pick up all the stitches I'm supposed to pick up, but haven't made it to the end yet. *sigh* After fiddling with it last night, I ended up putting it down and knitting a washcloth. Sometimes, you're knitting muscles need the equivalent of mindless tv.

Despite it being tedious, I am determined to get all of these stitches picked up with the next couple of days so that I can work on knitting the ribbing over the weekend. I think that's what keeps me going--once I finish picking up stitches, I can get back to the knitting part. I'm already jumping ahead of myself and reading up on seaming. I've never done proper seaming and I have spent so much time and effort on this thing, I want it to look nice when I'm done.