Needlework Tuesday - Knotty Afghan

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I was making an afghan with some leftover yarn which I cut into short lengths and tied back together. Trying the strands is so tedious and is taking forever. However, I had enough to at least start. Why oh why did I start with a big project???

I went with stocking stitch for the knotty variegated yarn and made sure all of the knots ended up on the right side. If I'm going to have them, I might as well make them visible. I also figured that they might catch on something on the wrong side when I used the finished afghan. I figured the yarn would be most visible with this stitch.

Because I didn't have enough of the knotty variegated stuff to make a whole afghan, I had to use some full skeins of yarn, which were also laying around without a purpose. I used seed stitch on those rows because I figured some texture and variety might be nice. Those are the grey and burgundy rows. I'm mixing bands of plain yarn with bands of varigated yarn.

I'm not entirely happy with the results so far. I didn't envision is looking like this...rather chaotic and unsightly. I really like order and pattern, so I tied the strands back together in a pattern (colour 1, colour 2, colour 3, colour 4, colour 1, colour 2, etc.) hoping that it would show up in the finished work. No luck. Also, since I cut each of the strands roughly the same length I was hoping that the knots would also form some kind of pattern. No luck there either. *huge sigh* It's all kind of random and has me feeling anxious.

The only thing I'm happy with is that some of the cut up yarn matches the plain bands, although you can't see that in the photo below.  

Anyway, here's the first photo of the thing:

It's not laying flat because I'm using a circular needle to knit the whole thing in one shot. At least, I hope that's why it's not laying flat. Hopefully, when I have more done I'll be able to get a better shot.

Needlework Tuesday is hosted by Heather over at Books and Quilts.