Friday, September 19, 2008

A Knitting Fool

This whole knitting thing is going quite remarkably well. I have knit a couple of dishcloths using simple stitches (sorry, no pix yet...I'm just not tech savvy enough to figure out how to get them out of the camera and into the computer without them running out through the wires and ending up all over the floor, and The Chief has about had it with computers lately, as he's had to do a number of fixes on our network around here). The good news is that the dishcloths actually look like dishcloths...they are square and everything! The bad news is that I would never in a million years actually use a dishcloth that looked like that, and besides, I was getting really bored with knitting them.

Cheryl Fuller over at Jung at Heart, who does some absolutely superb lace knitting, suggested that I get away from the dishcloths and start knitting some simple lace patterns, since that is what I really want to do...she said if I was comfortable with knit and purl and could keep the right number of stitches on the needle, I was probably ready to do some simple lace. The perfectionist in me had other ideas. She had this knitting thing all mapped out--she had decided that we were going to knit a dozen perfect dishcloths, all in different stitches, and in a variety of colours, and only then would we be sufficiently practiced to even think about trying our hand at lace.

Well, I told my perfectionist to go to hell, bought some lovely dusty rose yarn, and began knitting a simple lace scarf. And it's actually turning out pretty well! (Maybe well enough to put in Little Mouse's xmas stocking, but don't tell her!) I'm quite proud of myself for actually being able to do this, because for years I've had this mental block about knitting: I'm too stupid to learn to knit...even Mum couldn't teach me, and she's got the patience of a saint...

Pictures soon, I promise!

9 comments:

Monica Cassani said...

yay! sounds lovely...and I'm jealous of your daughters christmas stocking!

sbwrites said...

Ah, it's so great to learn that one's knitting mentor is successful. One of these days I'm going to send you my knitting needles and the damn yarn and have you cast on for me.

Susan

Jazz said...

Gianna--
It's really pretty, I'm very surprised it's turning out so well. And the yarn is really a lovely color!

Jazz said...

Susan--
Have you checked out www.knittinghelp.com? They have videos that show you how to do it...I wasn't able to figure it out from the books I have, but my mum helped me do it over the phone...if you want, I could try to talk you through it on the phone...problem is, I do it left handed, so what I do may not make a whole lot of sense to you. Email me if you want to try that...

Aqua said...

Yay you! Congrats on breaking through the knitting block. It sounds like you feel a great accomplishment in doing so. Keep up the knitting...sounds fun.
...aqua

iHanna said...

This post makes me so happy my dear! I would love to know what pattern you're using and how the scarf turns out! I've made several things knitting but nothing lacy to talk about yet... it scares me!

Jazz said...

Aqua--
I've been intimidated by it for so long, that it does seem like a big accomplishment. I used to crochet quite a lot--afghans and such--and I always used to feel so sad that all the really pretty patterns that I really felt drawn to were knitted, so I couldn't do them. I went on like that for years until I saw Cheryl Fuller's beautiful work and told myself enough was enough, and that I could learn to do this.

Jazz said...

Hanna--
The pattern is really easy...it is here

It knits up really fast...since it's only a four-row repeat, you can see the pattern after only a few rows.

Jazz said...

Growl...I do not know what the deal is with blogger, but it it doesn't seem to want to do linkys in the comments...

The address is: http://www.knittersreview.com/article_how_to.asp?article=/review/profile/020704_a.asp

but the pattern is pretty simple:
cast on 22 sts and knit 2 rows
row 1: (right side) K all sts
row 2: K2, P18, K2
row 3: K2, (K2tog) 3 times, (yo,
K1) 6 times, (K2tog) 3times, K2
row 4: K all sts