Why yes, swatching IS cheating

Last night when I got home from a very stressful day at work I was pleasantly surprised to find my yarn order for the Mary Tudor cardigan had arrived! I tried to convince myself that knitting a swatch wasn't cheating. Didn't work, I felt guilty just thinking about it.

So instead, I pulled out the Silken Slippers and finished them up. Aren't they cute?







Feeling much better about my WIP situation, I tore open the package sitting on the bed and dove into the yummy yarn. I sorted it all out by color, preparing to knit just a few rows of a swatch (surely just a few rows isn't cheating) and groaned. Most likely the only person reading this who will understand why what I am about to say is so stupendously idiotic is Marina. I stared at the balls of yarn and the color chart in the book, trying to put everything in order, and wondered how on earth I could have NOT ordered Oasis and Ginger, and why on earth I had so many balls of Pistachio and Yellow Ochre. Ummmmmm you big dumb@$$ the color names of the yarn you bought are different than the colors in the book! Of course, this realization didn't hit me until I had stuffed all the yummy yarn into a bag and had given up on the idea of knitting the few rows of a swatch. That's ok, since even a few rows of a swatch would have been cheating right?

So I pulled out the Lake Park gloves and finished up the first one. Any idea how hard it is to photograph a glove on your right hand by yourself when you are righthanded? This is the only photo out of about 10 that was decent enough to save.



Tonight I cast on for the second glove and knit this much ribbing .....



and then .....



OK I FREAKING CHEATED!!



All in all, I'm quite pleased with the substitutions I had to make due to discontinued colors. I don't think I'll be changing any of them. The only modification I plan to make on the cardigan is to shorten it. Normally I need something no longer than skimming the hips or I look shorter than I am. Sometimes I can get away with something longer, but I don't this is one of those times.

Now to get back to that second glove so I don't become a complete cheat by casting on the sweater!