The biggest yarnover in the world

Of course, it had to happen, the minute I announced that I'd got the hang of lace knitting. Hubris - the kind of pride that comes before a fall....

I was swatching in the round, on a circular needle, with my yarn in one of those 1950s Bakelite beehive-shaped yarn holders. Every time I needed to stop, I put the beehive down in the middle of the circle, leaving it in a little moat of knitting. Every time I started again, I would move the beehive out of the centre, pick up the swatch, and carry on.

Except this one time. I can only excuse myself by saying I was talking (you should see me try to walk and chew gum at the same time), but I picked up the swatch first, then moved the beehive, pulled a length of yarn from it and started knitting. The quick-brained among you will realise what I did not (for two more rounds) - that in doing so, I had looped the working yarn down the inside of the swatch, back up the outside and up to the needle.

In other words, without noticing anything wrong with the position of the yarn, I had worked the world's biggest yarnover - not round my needle, but around the entire depth of my swatch.

And then I managed not to notice the fact for two rounds.

When I shut my mouth long enough to actually look at my knitting, it took me a good ten minutes just to figure out what on earth I'd done. And then another ten hiding my red face under the duvet so that it wouldn't distract aircraft overhead.

I tinked back the entire two rounds to make sure I had put it right, and to double-check what I had done wrong. It took a while.

Ahem. I can assure you I now double-check where my yarn is every time I restart, talking or not....

Now, to distract you from my tales of incompetence, a challenge. What is this?

Yes, yes, I know it's a strip of knitting. You know jolly well that's not what I meant. What is it going to be? Answer next time, when I show a variety of ways to tame a wild yarn....

Tigger says, "Leave me alone. The swine have stolen an hour of my nap time..."