Why I love cup holders

Mr W and I spent last week driving around New Zealand checking out the sights (and yarn stores). We started in Christchurch, and travelled around the Canterbury Region - including Akaroa, Hanmer Springs, Waipara (wine region), Lake Tekapo, Timaru and Ashburton.

All that time in the car, meant a lot of time available for knitting (except when it was my turn to drive). So I managed to just about finish off this little cardigan - well not quite, it's still missing buttons. There's a batch of babies coming along the end of this year, and beginning of next, so it will be added to the stash.

I made two pretty cool discoveries knitting this cardigan.

I knitted both sleeves at once - so they'd be the same length - each from a separate ball of wool. Things were going along pretty well, but I'd have to keep stopping every now and then to untangle the two balls, along with the dangly lengths of yarn from the cast on edges. That was, until one of the balls accidentally dropped into the cup holder next to the hand brake. As I went to retrieve it, I noticed that it was, in fact, a double cup holder, and each section would snugly secure a ball of wool. HURRAH! I would have taken a photo of this fantastic phenomenon, but Mr W would have thought it more than a little strange.

Discovery number two was teaching myself to work stocking stitch without turning my work. By the time I got to the end of those raglan sleeves, I was sick of turning the work each row - and making sure the circular looped around in a nice way. So I started knitting the purl rows without turning it around. I'm not sure if it's quicker than turning - but I figure with a bit of practice, it could be, and could save a bit of angst in the future.

So that's why I love cup holders. More on those yarn stores 'we' visited next post.