Oh, to be young and ignorant again!
Or, the history lesson, or, my life as a knitter -- take your pick...
My mom showed me how to knit and purl when I was pretty young. I think the first thing I ever knit was a scarf for the Barbie doll. It didn't teach me much except that I didn't like garter stitch and still don't. But that was the only knitting lesson I ever had.
As a teenager I got intrigued by the look of cables and other knitterly things, so I taught myself to cable and made a scarf, designing it from cable patterns I found. I also found that cable takes up a lot of yarn, requiring a second trip to the yarn store for more of it. Back then, the LYS was the local five and dime. Anybody else remember Kresge's and Woolworth's? (I know I'm dating myself.) About this same time I got slightly sidetracked and taught myself to crochet. I crocheted some vests for myself and my buddies, and did a scarf or two and a hat; eventually I even made a couple of those ripple afghans. I finally decided I just don't like crocheting with yarn and switched to lace crochet, but that's another story...Anyways, I decided to knit a sweater. Mind you, I had never knit a sweater, and really didn't know anyone else who knit and could tell me a thing or two, and I picked what I thought was a really cool sweater out of a craft magazine. It was a Nordic style sweater knit on circulars. With all the ignorance of my teenage years I figured out the pattern and actually got it knit -- and the thing was too freakin' tight in the yoke because I learned the hard way about leaving the stranding loose enough. But it never occurred to me that there might be easier things to try for a first timer. It did teach me that I can probably figure out any pattern there is, given time and a willingness to frog a few times. But I wonder if I'll ever have that much of the daredevil in me again!
No hiking this past Monday. The old man has been working a bunch of twelve hour days, and he was sleeping so soundly I didn't have the heart to wake him up. So we just went out to lunch and did a little shopping. Hey, even that's an improvement over the way it used to be!
My mom showed me how to knit and purl when I was pretty young. I think the first thing I ever knit was a scarf for the Barbie doll. It didn't teach me much except that I didn't like garter stitch and still don't. But that was the only knitting lesson I ever had.
As a teenager I got intrigued by the look of cables and other knitterly things, so I taught myself to cable and made a scarf, designing it from cable patterns I found. I also found that cable takes up a lot of yarn, requiring a second trip to the yarn store for more of it. Back then, the LYS was the local five and dime. Anybody else remember Kresge's and Woolworth's? (I know I'm dating myself.) About this same time I got slightly sidetracked and taught myself to crochet. I crocheted some vests for myself and my buddies, and did a scarf or two and a hat; eventually I even made a couple of those ripple afghans. I finally decided I just don't like crocheting with yarn and switched to lace crochet, but that's another story...Anyways, I decided to knit a sweater. Mind you, I had never knit a sweater, and really didn't know anyone else who knit and could tell me a thing or two, and I picked what I thought was a really cool sweater out of a craft magazine. It was a Nordic style sweater knit on circulars. With all the ignorance of my teenage years I figured out the pattern and actually got it knit -- and the thing was too freakin' tight in the yoke because I learned the hard way about leaving the stranding loose enough. But it never occurred to me that there might be easier things to try for a first timer. It did teach me that I can probably figure out any pattern there is, given time and a willingness to frog a few times. But I wonder if I'll ever have that much of the daredevil in me again!
No hiking this past Monday. The old man has been working a bunch of twelve hour days, and he was sleeping so soundly I didn't have the heart to wake him up. So we just went out to lunch and did a little shopping. Hey, even that's an improvement over the way it used to be!
posted by Pat K | 9:31 PM
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