Texture and the miracle of blocking

Back in February, I acquired some lovely yarn and started a scarf for myself. Then school and work and my desire to both graduate and remain employed intruded, and somehow it was July before I had the scarf finished. On the upswing, besides having a great scarf for the winter that I swear is coming (I'm so ready to be done with this 90 degrees stuff), finishing it when I did made for more fun photography, since I'd just gotten a new camera.

Blocking has always amazed me. You take some wrinkly, misshapen, unfortunate-looking piece of cloth, apply some water and pins or some careful steaming, and suddenly there's this amazing thing before you. It's like knitting achieves enlightenment and only through blocking can it reach its full potential. I'd just never satisfactorily captured the process until now.

The pre-blocking amorphous pile of stitches.

Which by magic turns into a neat, orderly, smooth, scarf.

I probably shouldn't admit how much I love the contrasts here, the directions, the differences between stockinette and dropped stitches, between front and back sides...

Not such great photography, but I love how it's trying to masquerade as a pair of pants. It's like it saw "The Wrong Trousers" too many times.