How I Recently Discovered That I Knit Oddly

Recently I was reading a book called Designing Knitwear by Deborah Newton.  Besides from the fact that the projects pictured in the book, in many cases, are not to my taste the book is filled with a lot of useful advice regarding knitwear design.   I read something in the book that really shocked and worried me.  It stated in this book that people who knit left handed almost always (or always) twist purl stitches.   This statement lead to an obsession.   Are my purl stitches twisted?  Well, are they??  I have always thought that my knitting looked just like any other knitting I had seen but I wasn’t sure.  Other than my Great Aunt Alice showing me how to cast on and do the knit and purl stitches when I was eight I have had no other personal knitting instruction.  Everything I know about knitting beyond the very basics was self learned from books and trying to imagine everything in mirror image.

So I spent a bunch of time on the internet viewing videos of other left handed knitters.

My Great Aunt Alice was from Switzerland so I always assumed that I knit continental, but only left handed continental.   I don’t.  I don’t knit left handed yarn over either.  I definitely do knit left handed but what I discovered from viewing dozens of videos is…

I don’t knit quite like anyone else. I am Odd.

Oh, and my purl stitches are not twisted even though I definitely knit left handed.

I also learned that:

• A lot of people who think they knit left handed because they are left handed don’t.  They knit right handed.
• Some people believe that anyone can knit right handed and no one should knit right handed.
• In Germany (maybe other places too) they actually have speed knitting competitions!  Some woman can knit so fast it is a blur.

I may not be a left handed orphan knitter for long though because my daughter’s fiancé, Mike, has agreed to let me teach him to knit.  He is left handed.  I have to wait for him to return from deployment next April.

Knitting Meme

I found this list on several other knitting blogs and was curious to see how much of it I could check off as done.  I added a few items to the list as things that I had done but were not previously on the list.

Bold for things I’ve done, italics for things I will try in the future, and normal for things I’m Unlikely to do.

Afghan

I-cord

Garter stitch

Knitting with metal wire

Shawl

Stockinette stitch

Socks: top-down

Socks: toe-up

Knitting with camel yarn

Mittens: Cuff-up

Mittens: Tip-down

Hat

Helmet

Beret

Knitting with silk

Moebius band knitting

Participating in a KAL

Sweater

Drop stitch patterns

Knitting with recycled/secondhand yarn

Slip stitch patterns

Knitting with banana fiber yarn

Domino knitting (=modular knitting)

Twisted stitch patterns

Knitting with bamboo yarn

Two end knitting

Charity knitting

Knitting with soy yarn

Cardigan

Toy/doll clothing

Knitting with circular needles

Baby items

Knitting with your own handspun yarn

Slippers

Graffiti knitting: knitting items on, or to be left on the street

Continental knitting

Designing knitted garments

Cable stitch patterns

Lace patterns

Publishing a knitting book

Scarf

Teaching a child to knit

Button holes

Knitting with alpaca

Fair Isle knitting

Knitting to make money

Norwegian knitting

knitting socks- or other small tubular items- on two circulars

Dying with plant colors

Knitting items for a wedding

Olympic knitting

Knitting with someone else’s handspun yarn

Knitting with dpns

Holiday related knitting

Teaching a male how to knit

Bobbles

Knitting for a living

Knitting with cotton

Knitting smocking

Dying yarn

Steeks

Knitting art

Fulling/felting

Knitting with wool

Textured knitting

Kitchener BO

Purses/bags

Knitting with beads

Swatching

Long Tail CO

Entrelac Knitting and purling backwards

Machine knitting

Knitting with self patterning/self striping/variegating yarn

Stuffed toys

Knitting with cashmere

Darning

Jewelry

Knitting with synthetic yarn

Writing a pattern

Gloves

Intarsia

Knitting with linen

Knitting for preemies

knitting lingerie

Tubular CO

Freeform knitting

Short rows

Cuffs/fingerless mitts/arm warmers

Pillows

Knitting a pattern from an online knitting magazine

Rug

Knitting on a loom

Thrummed knitting

Knitting a gift

Knitting pet sweater

Knitting cat toys

Shrug/bolero/poncho

Knitting with dog hair

Knitting with cat hair

Hair accessories

Knitting in public

Knitted Hem

Knitted Pleats

Crocheted edges

Crocheted inserts

Knitting w/fabric strips

1” /12” scale Dollhouse knitting

Too Many Works in Progress

It wasn’t until I had the thought to put pictures up of my unfinished knitting projects that I realized that I had so many wips.  I understand why I have a couple of projects going at the same time.  I do have A.D.D. and I do get bored easily.  I also have the common problem of loving the knitting part and hating the finishing part, but this is just ridiculous!  This isn’t even all of my partially completed projects.

Doll Sweaters that I will be listing on Ebay…

Super Fluffy Violet Angora Yarn

The sweater and Beret set on the left just needs a couple of yarn ends hidden and buttons on the cardigan.

Pink Cotton Yarn Sweater and Beret

The sweater and  beret set below only needs the smallest amount of finishing.  The beret needs to be blocked so that the shape is more uniformally round and the yarn ends on the beret and one piece of yarnon the sweater needs to be finished off.  It already has the buttons on.  It amazes me that I can get this far on something and actually set it down without finishing it.

White Angora Fuzzy Sweater for 15"-16" Doll

Pale Pink Angora Doll Sweater for 8" Dolls

The two sweaters above are both knitted with angora and only have yarn end finishing and buttons needing to be sewn on before both are completed.

I also have two pairs of socks that are 50% done or close….

For the blue and green sock on the bottom the specks of silver are silver thread that woven in to the yarn.

Wool Sock

One Down, One to Go

And then if that was not enough…there is more….a robe for me that I am knitting out of a super soft fleece yarn…a queen sized blanket that I am crocheting out of a red heart ombre yarn called “Monet”.  The blanket project is what I work on when I don’t have to pay attention to what I am working on.  It is totally mindless crochet.

Fluffy, Soft Robe

Monet Blanket

And there is more.  I have promised myself that I will finish at least 5 of these projects (or one not pictured) before I start any new projects.

Organic Cotton Washcloth

Small Section of Silk/Wool Lace Wrap

Beginnings of Silk/Wool Shrug

Teh Deej is really irritated that I would not let him run off with one of the angora sweaters and even more annoyed that I kept taking pictures of him while he was asleep.

Sleeping DG

Sleeping DG 2

What...huh?!

WTF!!?!?

New Puppy and teh Deej

Look at these eyes!

This is the new puppy that lives with my Aunt.  I drove down with her to pick him up and had the joy of having this little guy snuggle against my neck for a two hour drive.  So sweet!  And smart.  He is half standard poodle and have golden retriever.

DG was very happy that I left my laundry on the banister and quickly jumped on it to take a nap.  He was not happy with me when I tried to get him to move!  He has been shunning me ever since I made him move.  Good thing his attention span is so short of I would be worried about going to sleep tonight.

Off the Needles and Off the Hook

I finished the first pair of self striping yarn socks a while back but had a lot of trouble getting a good picture.

These turned out so well that I added several more skeins of self-striping yarn to my stash and immediately started another pair.  Unfortunately self striping does not mean the same to all companies. Where as this pair is lovely with yarn by Red Heart called “Heart & Sole” I also purchased a yarn made by Bernat that claimed to be self-striping but was more of a traditional variegated yarn.  I cast on stitches for a sock and by the time I was done with the ribbing it looked gawd-awful!  What should have been lovely stripes of red, yellow, green and blue ended up with one side all red and green and the other all blue and yellow.  Arg!  So I ripped it all out and created some nice phone and ipod socks.  The shortness of each color repeat works for these small items.

Unfortunately I do not have the wrapper for either of the Bernat skeins so I can’t add that.  Next time I am at the yarn store I will look and see exactly what it was.

The last project of note that I have finished most recently is a filet crochet curtain panel.  Sometimes crochet is a nice break from knitting.  I have started more than a few overly amitious filet crochet patterns in the past only to get bored and give up but I finally managed to complete one.  I will have a better picture once it is blocked and ready to be hung.  I am still trying to figure out where I can block something that is four feet long without having cats sleep on it or try to destroy it.

Hello wordpress?

Moved here because I could export some of the content from Vox.  It just makes me more sad about Vox.  Can’t move the videos or audio.  Feeling kind of lost.  Can’t figure out how to change things.  I know it will come with time but now really isn’t the time in my life when I feel like trying to figure out a new site.  *sigh*

Interesting Knitting Book

Toni Carr

This is a strange book with an eclectic mix of items to knit.  Quite possibly the strangest knitting book I have ever seen.  I guess if you need to knit some crutch arm pit pads, an arm sling, or a I heart Derby sweater this is the book for you.  It is nice that Amazon lets you look inside some books.  The pea bag cozy is pretty cute with a little ‘peas’  texture.  If you have to hold a bag of peas on a swollen ankle it would be cute.  I have a hard enough time finishing more practical items so I will skip this book.

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Knitting Therapy

“What have you been doing since your nervous breakdown” you might ask.  Or maybe not.  I will tell you anyway.

(Besides looking for a job, too, of course)

I have been knitting.

Knitting socks.

Self striping socks!

Below is a picture of the most recent one.  Almost done with the first one of a pair.  I was just beyond this point with the first sock.  I was shaping the toe with just half an inch to go.  Trouble was the toe shaping was making it look like the head of a snake.  This happened because I was using the red heart pattern designed for their Red Heart “Heart and Sole” yarn and not one of my regular sock patterns. Their pattern sucks. I had also been thinking while knitting it that it just looked like it was going to be baggy.  So I did something that is sometimes hard to do…

I unraveled it *gasp* and started over with my own pattern.

The bit done on the picture below took about four hours…

Between the knitting and not reading any news on the internet I am feeling a whole lot better.

First Sock of Pair

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Say “Thanks, but No Thanks” to KFC

Considering the fact that coronary heart disease is the leading cause of death for women and that almost twice as many women in the U.S. die of heart disease than all forms of cancer combined each year I find this promotion by KFC appalling:

Promos_pinkbucket

KFC says they want to raise 8.5 million which is a strange coincidence as the number of women in the U.S. currently living with heart disease is around 8 million.  How many buckets of artery clogging chicken would we need to scarf down at 50¢ a bucket? 17 million.  This would help KFC far more than women.

 

Don’t get me wrong Breast cancer is bad.  Women in the U.S. have a 1 in 8 lifetime chance of developing invasive breast cancer and a 1 in 33 chance of breast cancer causing their death. According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 40,000 women die from breast cancer annually.  But the truth is that more women die of lung cancer each year and this still does not come close to the number of women who die from heart disease which is around 315,000.  In fact, more woman die of heart disease than men.

What is one of the leading causes of heart disease?  Cholesterol.  Sodium.  What is KFC chicken loaded with?  You guessed it.  Cholesterol, sodium and fat.

All things considered it would appear that womankind would be better off in the long run skipping the chicken and ignoring KFC’s bogus promotion.

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John Hughes (February 18, 1950 – August 6, 2009)

Another one gone too soon. R.I.P.

Thebreakfastclub

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