On second thought

So I'm knitting another market bag and get to the part where I need to turn the work. It took me a couple moments to remember how the needle can get in a position to pick up stitches. It's not rocket science, but I'm still learning.

I also came to the realization that I didn't need to knit another row to get the needle in place to do this, which is what I did the first time. I could have just turned the knitting around and gone from there. Again, not exactly a genius level observation but a worthwhile one for me.

Picking up stitches is not the easiest thing to do, especially when it comes to determining how much space to leave in between them. I have more rows with the available edge than I need. For instance, I need to pick up fourteen stitches on the short sides, but I could pick up more. I did OK with this on the first short side, but on the second short side I was picking up too many on one half and had to leave larger gaps between the last ones so I could reach the turn that marks the start of the round.

It occurs to me now that a simple solution would have been to drop the stitches I picked up on that side and started over, but this didn't cross my mind at the time. I have another idea for this problem when making a third bag, though. I should pick up more stitches than I need but which correspond to the number of rows or close to it. The next time around I can knit two together at the corners. (I'm thinking I need more along the lines of sixteen or eighteen stitches on the short sides.) This way I'll still be working with the suggested number of stitches and make cleaner corners where I've picked them up.

As it stands, two of the corners look pretty good. They're definite improvements from the last time I did this. One looks kind of wonky but is acceptable. The last corner has more of a hole than I'd like, but I knew I had to cover more ground with the last six picked up stitches. Weaving in the ends should cover it up sufficiently.

Improving on past and current mistakes is one of the benefits of knitting the same thing over and over, something I do that may be alarming to anyone who looks at my projects on Ravelry.