Knitting Blues And Greys

[kerravonsen]

Right now I am writing this blog post, but just before now I was frogging my, um... 10th maybe... attempt to needle-knit. I am a crocheter. I can crochet. I can hook-knit with a crochet hook. But I thought I'd try learning needle-knitting because all the needle-knitters look at me funny whenever I mention hook-knitting. And because it would be easier to learn fancy stitches because nobody makes hook-knitting tutorials beyond the plain knit-and-purl. So I have watched multiple videos on knitting-for-crocheters and on Contininental Knitting (because Continental-style knitting is easier for crocheters to grok). And I bought a set of interchangeable needles from Ebay, because I thought value-for-money.

So.

Long-tail cast-on. Not a problem, especially after this video broke it down in a way I could grok. (That isn't a video for long-tail cast-on, it's a video for a more fancy cast-on which is related to long-tail cast-on)

The actual knitting... ugh. Lumpy, awful, my tension is all wrong, the stitches either won't move or the needle slides out of them, I split the yarn, the yarn keeps sliding off my needle before I can pull it through, I get confused about what direction I'm supposed to wrap the yarn, I slip a stitch when I think I've knitted it, I mysteriously add stitches, I get odd loops hanging out, it is utterly horrible!

Part of me wants to give it up as a bad job, and part of me wants to prove I can needle-knit so that people will stop looking at me funny. And because I want to learn fancy stitches. And because Continental knitting is supposed to be fast, and it would be nice to be able to knit faster. Well, I'm assuming that Continental knitting is faster than hook-knitting, though I have zero data about this. I just know that Continental is faster than English.

(sigh)


I know all the knitters in the audience will say "it's easy!" but you probably all learned it at your grandmother's knee. My grandmother wasn't a knitter, she was a mad-keen gardener, and so was my mother. So I was not able to learn from them. My sister can knit, but she lives in another state, so opportunities for face-to-face knitting-learning are few.

(sigh)

Comments

[watervole]

Try a yarn with a tight twist - that won't split as much. Don't go too big on the needles - it's easier to see the stitches on big needles, but they do tend to slide around more.

Go with a light colour of yarn, and don't start with circulars. I find them fiddly and they get in the way. (though others will feel different)

I'm not a fan of circular needles. I've tried them, and even when kitting socks, I've gone back to double pointed needles.

Scarfs. Always start with a scarf on ordinary average size needles. (they're average for a reason - that's the size that people find easy to use)

[kerravonsen]

Well, my frustration has been in doing garter stitch swatches, I haven't even gotten as far as trying to actually make something.

Go with a light colour of yarn, and don't start with circulars. I find them fiddly and they get in the way. (though others will feel different)

Hmmm, I think I have one pair of straight needles, which my sister gave me, but I'm not entirely sure where they are...

[tree_and_leaf]

As I said above, I love my circulars, but I would agree that they're not good for absolute beginners. And the cheap ones are quite difficult to use, too.