How not to knit a poncho

1. Don't knit harsh yarn on too small needles unless you want the poncho to stick straight out like wings front and back!



2. Don't increase eight stitches every two rounds unless you are really knitting a flamenco skirt for a very thin woman!



3. Don't even increase eight stitches every four rounds [incarnation 2] - unless you want to poncho to look like a bell tent!*

4. Don't overcompensate and increase four stitches every six rounds unless you want your poncho [incarnation 3] to fit a barrel!



5. Don't stay up till 1:30am to finish those last few rows unless you're sure the poncho will be as wonderful as you imagined! Frogging is a poor choice at that time of morning!



6. Don't put your stitch markers in the wrong place unless you want the centre line of your poncho [incarnation 4] to end up looking like this!

The yarn is Panda's Baby Lustre 8ply which I picked up in the bargain bin at Wangaratta last year for the enormous sum of $12 a kilo [or $0.60 per 50g ball]. It's certainly not a soft yarn and I wouldn't use it for anything a baby was going to wear close to its skin but for a little girl's poncho that bit of sparkle is 'just right', even if the centre line isn't; I'm hoping it won't look so bad once it's on a 3D person!!

It's completely knitted in garter stitch [despite those seemingly interminable rounds of purl - especially in the "bell tent poncho"]; only one row in four has *yo, K2 tog* to make the holes. The pattern is mine, designed on the needles from a vague idea in my mind's eye. Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't! LOL

*picture of the bell tent from surplusandadventure.com

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Apologies to everyone whose feed readers told them I had published several times - I wish I saw all my mistakes before I hit "publish post"!