It is Session 3 of the Miss Dashwood class. Everybody is finished or nearly finished with the Lace Border, the most intense section of the shawl, and most of them have picked up stitches along the long edge of the border as I showed them last week.
Now it is time to begin the body with its straight forward lace pattern and the wrap and turn short rows.
Here is where I should explain that I make multiple samples and swatches for class encompassing every technique that's in a project. That way I can demonstrate as we go as I had done that with Miss Dashwood. However I made the short row swatch weeks before and put it away until class time.
What I forgot in the interim was that I swapped out a US Size 7 needle from the swatch and replaced it with a US 6. No problem there except that I paid too little attention to replacing, and I was in the middle of a short row. So as I lifted out the class sample I had the needle tips on the ends of the row and the working yarn coming from the middle. It took me a few moments of staring at my swatch wondering how on earth I was going to continue knitting it until it dawned on me to slip end stitches on one side to the middle.
Sitting in front of the camera while I came to terms with my swatch brought on a case of knitting anxiety. Everybody loved the class. They have romantic Jane Austen-inspired shawls to wear or give, and mastery of more than a few new techniques.
Note to me: It costs more to fix a mess up than to get up out of the recliner, walk across the living room to the supplies closet and get an empty US Size 7 knitting needle.