First sadness, now pain!

(Blocking 2.0 has not been attempted yet. I think I'm saddened by the thought of it not working. Thus, I procrastinate as a defense mechanism.)

So. I've been working on a bag (here and there) for the past few weeks. Last night, I felted it.

Let me take a minute to remind you that I am a college student. I do not have access to a non-laudromat style washing machine. Thus, if I want to felt anything I have to do it the old-fashioned way. In the sink. With hot water. And lots and lots of Dawn.

Let me resume. So, I felted my bag yesterday. 45 minutes later (yea, 45 freaking minutes!) I was done. I had no idea that the process would take so much time. After 15 minutes, my fingers were hurting and my wrist was aching. But I didn't want to have to come back and felt some more later. So I kept at it.

I gave myself blisters! Blisters! On my fingertips! I am officially nuts. My absurd obsession for knitting has finally hurt me. Don't believe me?

See the white skin right near the tip of my fingernail on my middle finger? A popped blister. And the red discoloration on my ring finger? Another blister.

But anyway, I'm pretty happy with how the bag has turned out. I've felted some bags before, but they've never come out the way I wanted. I wanted something deep enought to fit some school books so that I can use it when I go to class. Finally, I got what I wanted. See -

I think it turned out pretty well. I still have some minor finishing to take care of, but I'm incredibly pleased with it. It makes me want to hand felt things more often (I feel like I had more control in the process - the finished product wasn't a suprise). If only I could do it without seriously injuring myself. Hmmm.

Anyway, I was inspired by a Classic Elite pattern that was pictured on the back of a copy of my interweave. Here's a photo. Let me know what you think. I think I came pretty close.


Olympic update: I have everything mostly swatched. I still have to decide on my major cable, but since I'm knitting the back first, I can decide on that later. I think I'm going to take it easy on the amount of knitting I do between here and friday so that my hand cramp (stupid hand felted bag!) can completely go away and not bite me in the ass later.