I'm Knitting!!!!

You've probably spoken to your teacher by now, but you just knit into the back leg of the stitch on your needle instead of the front leg of the stitch.

If you need help check out knittinghelp.com It's a wonderful web site.

take care, Linda D. in B.C., Canada

Good to know about that online help link for late at night questions :-). I have spoken to the teacher and have already started on a project using this pattern. Of course, I think I have done about 6 rows and each one looks different because I keep screwing up something -- LOLOL! It's going to be part of the afghan I am making for MOI so it's OK if it looks a bit wonky and imperfect. My new mantra is "It's a learning project!" This means, of course, that it needn't be perfect because it is simply a way for me to practice!! CiaoMeow >^;;^<

Thanks, I might give that a try for a change !

"mirjam" wrote .

That book is currently out of print, so if you want it you will have to try used booksellers.

Dawne

How about Readers Digest Knitting and Crochet Stitches - yet another of their well laid out books, though I am not sure if it is out of print. ISBN 0-7621-0405-8

"Karen C - Calif" wrote

It does seem to be fairly readily available--I found a number of links, including one through the company I work for. I always remind people that these are links to private sellers, who might be bookstores or individuals. Dawne

I wonder if using a lighter yarn but staying with bigger needles would give the lacy effect Sheena is looking for. Might be worth a trial swatch with some cheap yarn first, to see if it works.

Joan

I've learned from the eBay world that 98% isn't really all that great, especially if they are a bigger seller and the rating isn't based on two transactions. It takes multiple bad transaction ratings to bring someone down to 98% and I sure don't want that risk I'm going to be their next bad one. One bad rating, fine, it happens, but multiple is a huge red flag. And lots of people submit their feedback rating before they've even received their item, or they're rating the item and not the seller, or they click positive but if you read the comments see that it wasn't positive at all. I've bought and sold many, many used and OOP books online and there's a lot of leeway in what one person considers "like new" or "good used condition". Buyer beware!

Back to the knitting book front, I'm a fan of "The Knitting Answer Book" byt Margaret Radcliffe. It's $14.95 regular price and is easily found at B&N, Michael's and JoAnn's. Not to mention that you can use your 40 or 50% off coupons on it if you buy it at the latter two. The book is easy to understand and diagrammed well and I am nothing more than a beginning knitter. Sometimes those all-inclusive, more formal stitching bibles aren't written well for self-taught newbies.

On the crochet front, I refer back to the Crochet Answer Book by Edie Eckman all the dang time. I actually keep the book in my crocheting bag. I've been crocheting consistently for about 30 years and I still find this book helpful. It's what led me to the Knitting companion book in the first place.

Jinx

Good suggestion.

You can try anything you wish, but I have tried using sock yarn and larger needles, it didn't look very good, at least not to me. If one wants a lacy effect there are much nice patterns, such as this one:

Cast on 17 sts (or any odd number of sts) and repeat the following row until you run out of yarn or you lose interest:

K3, *yo, k2tog*, repeat to last 2 sts, K2.

Cast off when done.

Try it with worsted weight and 6 mm. needles or just play around. I knit it up in Louisa Harding "Jasmine" and it turned out gorgeous. Btw, I found this pattern through Knitting Patterns Central, but can find the link at the moment. There are a lot patterns on that site, have fun!

take care, Linda D. in B.C., Canada

Not a problem, can quite see how, with odd number of stitches, the pattern would work.

Sock yarn isn't all that expensive if you don't insist on hand-painted extra-special -- and a skein of fine yarn will last you four times as long as yarn that is twice as thick.

Socks are easy to carry, and a sock-in-progress can be wrapped in a handkerchief and stashed in an ordinary purse or attache' case.

And you *always* need more socks. Take to knitting afghans, and pretty soon you run out of sofas.

Nearly all of sock knitting consists of mindlessly knitting round and round and round and round and . . . very good for knitting when you have your main attention on something else.

The nearest to a tricky bit in socks is turning the heel.

Some techniques for turning heels require you to know how to knit back and forth and how to pick up stitches.

"Auto" heels require you to know how to knit short rows. There are various methods of not leaving a hole where you turn at the end of the short row, or you can do what machine-knit socks do, and just turn the work over and work back, and call the rows of holes a design feature.

Elizabeth Zimmermann, in one of her books, suggested just knitting a straight sock, then snip one stitch where the heel should have been, pick out two thirds of the stitches, pick up the exposed live stitches, and knit a toe to cover up the hole.

Ah, yes, to make a toe you'll have to learn how to decrease. (A library of decreases is nice to have, but knit two together will do for all occasions.) In coarse yarn, you'll also need to learn how to graft, but in fine yarn, you just knit down to eight stitches, break the yarn, run the yarn through the stitches on the needles, pull it tight to draw the hole closed, and weave in the end.

Joy Beeson

Tia Mary i have a wonderful pattern for Mittens if you lile to try that !!! mirjam

I think I will wait a bit before I try something like mittens :-). I'm still having trouble with this VERY EASY pattern I'm working on that someone here -- Dawne maybe -- recommended. It's nothing more than as repeat of knit 2, *knit one in the back, purl one* knit 2 . VBS I'm hopint that by the time I get about 2 inches of this done up, I'll FINALLY have gotten the whole thing correct and will finally start seeing the design-- LOLOL!

PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^<

OOO -- yes, yes, yes thanks for the link (bookmarked, of course) and a very nice pattern it is. *IF* you remember to do it properly that is

-- LOLOL! I just tell people that I am VERY new to knitting and this is a LEARNING piece :-))). I'm just plodding along and waiting to finally get it right so that I can actually see the pattern :-))). CiaoMeow >^;;^<

PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^<