In the round
I have an awful habit of picking up hobbies and dropping them. Sometimes I will come back to them again later, reminding myself how much I enjoyed them in the first place, but again they lose favor with me, and I trade those hobbies for something else new and exciting.
Having mastered some very basic crochet since my freshman year at my first University, I thought I might take up knitting. So, with pair of US size 9 aluminum needles and some cheap acrylic yarn, I taught myself to knit over Christmas holiday. Not sure how long it will keep my fancy, but already I prefer it to crochet, and I have a long list of patterns I’m itching to try. I have a few things cast on but not finished, so I’m trying to discipline myself and finish one before starting another - just like I intend to ‘finish’ learning to knit, instead of dropping it for, I don’t know, embroidery. On a related note, I am currently reading 4 books right now!
The internet is an absolutely wealth of information, with so many free patterns and videos showing techniques, that it was quite easy to pick up the basics. I made my first hat and it ended up far to short, but it was just a practice go for my second hat, which went much better:
My 'Hot Head' hat
I have a scarf in the works, but what I’m enjoying the most right now is a pair of wristwarmers I started yesterday. Like the hat above, there is a ‘ribbed’ effect, which is very basic, but what’s keeping them interesting right now is trying to knit it the round. In order to make a tube-like structure without stitching a flat piece together, and thus to avoid a seam, you can knit with double-pointed needles, which is a very fun balancing act between 3-4 shorter needles.
Simple Wristwarmers
There’s something satisfying about juggling those little bamboo sticks, to create something useful and sorta cute. I just hope I can bring myself to make two of them!