Wednesday, May 12

time and practice

Back in 2006 when I was really getting into knitting I tackled Ene's Scarf.  I remember battling with the charts and making quite a mess the pattern in the middle - muddling up the middle section and making a hash of the border.  But I did it and I thought it looked great.

Fast forward to now - when I unpick or rip back if it isn't right or I drop a stitch.  When I check what the knitting is looking like as I go - not just blindly following the pattern but looking at what the texture is and the knitting that I am creating.  I am not sure when I started doing this but I remember a time when I just knitted and looked at the pattern but not really my knitting.  I didn't understand that, at least not til I read the instructions for the baby surprise.  Elizabeth Zimmerman makes you look at your knitting, makes you take responsibility for the rows gone by,  you have to own it.  This I think for me was when I really became a knitter.  I no longer blindly followed the pattern and hoped for the best.  Fingers crossed it will fit, it will look OK on me -and those fudges there wont be noticeable.

Now I think about the projects I embark on - perhaps a plain knit is less taxing but I still check the tension, and  think hard about what it will look like when it is finished.  Will I like it?  Will it really suit me?


But more importantly as I go after each row I look at my knitting - does it look like I want it to look.  Do my stitches look right?
I take responsibility now for my knitting.

So May 2010 I cast on Ene's scarf again - it was like re reading a book - but this time I learnt as I went.  I observed the construction,  the charts and my own knitting.  I still made a mistake in the border but I actually left it there to remind me that I am still learning and I can fix my mistakes on the go more by reading my own knitting along with the pattern..




now I just have to block it - and the Knitabulous yarn was a delight to knit with.


5 comments:

Anonymous said...

great post fee, i know what you mean about that lightbulb moment when you realise what the YOs and the K2TOGs are meant to look like, in a pattern, and you can see the pattern in the chart. its a great feeling. i look forward to seeing the finished product! EZ is a genius.

Kris said...

Lovely post... and particularly timely as last night I took a deep breath and frogged like 6" of my Juno Regina. I'd done one row wrong when I started the scarf bit, and it didn't look right. I'm much happier now. :)

Geek Knitter said...

Great post! I'm not sure I could pinpoint the project it happened on, but all of a sudden I could 'read' my lace too. Marvelous, isn't it?

Virginia G said...

I hear ya!

I have no idea when it happened either, but it became a really huge step forward for me with my knitting. I all of a sudden went from dabbling to being a full on KNITTER. It was awesome.

It was probably on a lace project on my 50th or 60th time tinking a damn row. :)

Bells said...

oh i like this. Taking responsibility for our knitting. That's a new and yet not unfamiliar concept. I mean, I it's what i do and I'm not sure when it started either, but it makes sense that you put it like that.

Nice one!