Slow and Painful

I am working on my Olympic Knitting project every day, but I don't know if it's the needles, the yarn, or the way I purl, but too much working on it makes my hands ache. I'm getting a few rows done a day, 3 or 4 maybe, and that's a whole lot more than I've been doing so I'm happy with my progress. Not as happy, you understand, as I would be if I were, say, down to the place I want to add stripes at the bottom, but I'm getting there. Nobody's blowing out any Torch just yet.


Sunday night my hands were aching and so I thought I'd put the cardi aside for an evening and work on the Lava Shawl. I was on the fourth row of the lace section and I knew it wasn't right. I didn't have the correct number of stitches and the lace squares weren't lining up correctly. Nothing to do but pull it off the needles and frog back to the end of the stockinette section and start again. It was only four rows, after all. I got it ripped back and put on long straight needles, thinking that I could do the first few rows on them without the annoyance of a circular needle adding to the mix. I knit to the first marker just fine, but when I was coming up on the second marker I realized that I didn't have the right number of stitches, and I had counted that I had the correct number after the frogging--twice, so I ripped those few stitches back and put the whole thing back into time-out. I love the yarn and I like the way the pattern looks. I will triumph, just not today.