Grrrrrrr! (Knitting-related)

[gnomi]

So, I've been looking for knitting patterns for mittens and gloves, since it's getting to be that time of year (though, to be honest, you couldn't tell from this week's weather -- it's been in the high 50s to low 70s since Sunday). I've now got a whole bunch of them, having borrowed some books from the library and having searched online. And I've started knitting various ones, to see what I like and what I don't.

One pattern, from knitty.com, looked really cool. It produces fingerless gloves with a mitten overlay so that you can keep your fingers warm but still have them to use when necessary. It seemed like the perfect thing for me. So I knit myself up a pair. Or, at least, I tried to. The pattern is rife with errors. I knit the first one, didn't love it but figured it was OK. I then knitted the second one, making the corrections to the pattern that I noted after the first time through. And oh, boy, does the second glove fit much better than the first. So now I'm on to knitting my third glove of this pair (well, actually, 3.5, as I had yarn-related issues on my first go on the second glove).

And here's my dilemma. This pattern was first put up as part of knitty's Fall 2002 issue. So it's been up there a while. The knitty website says that if one has an issue with a pattern, one should contact the designer and the designer will contact knitty with erratta (which will then be marked in red on the pattern page). Well, there are no corrections whatsoever on this pattern. Which leads me to two possible conclusions:

1. No one has ever reported errors to the designer
2. The designer hasn't reported the errors to knitty

And now I'm wondering if I should send the designer e-mail offering her my corrected version of the pattern. I'm sort of hesitant to e-mail the designer and say "your pattern is flawed." At the same time, however, others may be attempting this pattern and getting completely annoyed.

Thoughts?

Comments

[rikchik.livejournal.com]

If it's flawed, it's flawed - definitely let her know. Wouldn't you want to have a user let you know about a typo or incorrect fact?

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you're right.

I'm just wondering if others have reported the errors and she hasn't passed them along, since the pattern's been up there for 3+ years.

[byrne.livejournal.com]

cc the site, hon. That way you know they know.

I *hate* patterns with errors, and if it can be fixed, it's all good.

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

It just makes me cranky, since I've become convinced that I'm the only one who sees this pattern as flawed as written. And the designer's website as linked from knitty no longer exists, which makes me even crankier.

[kuroshii.livejournal.com]

that might be part of the problem. maybe the designer is AWOL, so corrections haven't made it to them to then make it back to knitty. i agree you should cc the site.

[perpet.livejournal.com]

E-mail her. If she doesn't respond, I say e-mail th site. If anyone's told her, she obviously hasn't passed along the information, and there's probably a bunch of people with ill-fitting mittens who would be grateful that someone tried to fix what was wrong.

And congrats on the mittens! I have a crochet pattern for some, but I'm trying to figure out if I'm brave enough to try. Although, I make a pretty mean wrist cuff and could probably just add a top.

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the advice. I'll try her first, and if it bounces, I'll e-mail the site's editor.

And mittens aren't that hard, I've found. Gloves, even, aren't that bad, even though they've got more fiddly bits because of the fingers.

[theodosia.livejournal.com]

You could also try the knitty.com boards, where people talk about the patterns and so on....

[gnomi.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the tip! I poked around a bit and found people asking about specific parts of the pattern but not the (what I considered) major flaws that I found. So now I'm beginning to wonder if I'm just completely wrong. Though her math doesn't work out at all on some parts of the pattern as it's on the site, at least to my mind.