I have been utterly obsessed with knitting knee socks lately. I like to wear skirts, I live where it’s cold, but between long johns and knee socks, I can wear a broomstick skirt and still be plenty warm.

But! I have a problem. Slender, I am not. Shoot. Let’s not put too fine a point on it – I’m plus sized and carry my weight a lot in my legs. Yes, this means that regular knee socks aren’t going to fit my calves all that well.

But! I can knit. Not only can I knit, I am very good at adapting patterns and experimenting. I decided I was going to see what kind of increases worked well to get a sock that fit my calves as well as my itty-bitty feet.

I suppose iterative development has its place even in knitting, huh?

I’m well into Tri-Aran-Angle — a wonderfully-designed shawl for a cold climate, by the way. If you want to practice making pretty cables, this is definitely a great pattern to use! I’ve have learned some things about my mental block in following knitting patterns.

The convention in knitting patterns is to give line by line instructions for the creation of a garment. If you follow it line by line, and trust the designer, you’ll get a nice product.

I don’t think step by step for anything I do. I need to understand the principles of the whole, why I’m performing an action, and then not only will I be able to do what’s needed, I might be able to create variations on it. I think one of the reasons I found Knitting Without Tears such a delightful knitting instruction book was that Ms. Zimmerman spent a lot of time teaching the principles behind what she was doing along with the instructions for how to create the garments – whether it was the percentage system for constructing a sweater, or why wool acts the way it does.

This type of learning style has had its consequences in other areas of my life. Probably one of the reasons I never became much of a pianist (other than the fact I was not willing to practice enough. That was the biggie!) was that I was not taught musical theory anywhere near early enough in my studies. Not blaming my piano teacher. I’m sure to her eyes not only was I too young and not nearly interested enough in music, I was far too unskilled to handle theory before I got the process down. I am a theory-based learner, no doubt about it. As an adult, knowing that has big advantages. It means that I can pretty much learn anything I want to without being at the mercy of teaching style. Heh… I ought to thank my third grade teacher for being such a rotten teacher, actually. She might have turned me off to school and caused me to distrust teachers, but that’s when I started trying (with inconsistent success) to learn things on my own.

So, back to knitting. Instead of following knitting patterns, I’m deconstructing them to get the theory behind the techniques. I really wish Elizabeth Zimmerman’s style of pattern description were more common than the line by line convention that’s so common, but I can understand why it’s not. That much expository writing is pretty time-consuming.

Do you ever think about your learning style? What is it, and why does it work for you? (Why yes, that is of professional interest to me!)

So, having set myself the challenge of learning to knit from patterns properly, I started simply, and am going the Tri-Aran-Angle shawl.  Since it’s a shawl, getting the size wrong isn’t really a concern.  Also, I’m learning to do cables and such.

I’m actually doing the shawl for a the local hospital.  Like many places where people are in need of comfort, there is a Comfort Shawl project going on.   People who are caregivers for the elderly, or caring for very ill relatives, can get a hand-knit or hand-crocheted shawl if they want one.  There are people who find them a help in time of trial.  This one is a fairly heavy one, so it’s going to be like wrapping yourself in a security blanket.  Also, it’s appropriate for the cold winter weather.

So, what the heck?  I have yarn, the project looks like it’ll go fine, and someone can have a little something to feel better at a difficult time of life.  That works for me.

I’ve been knitting seriously for about six years. I can make basic socks, a scarf, mittens, whatever. I’ve posted pictures of some of my work, and it’s decent stuff. Wearable and attractive. Even creative. But most of the detail work in my knitting has been from stranded colorwork.

Confession. I don’t really know how to read a knitting pattern. Not well, anyway. Mostly, this is because I never knit to other people’s pattern, but use some design templates I’ve found such as Elizabeth Zimmerman’s seamless yoke sweater, or Wendy’s Generic Toe Up Socks, then added color details as it suited me. The colorwork? Mostly easy, because I learned how to do stranded colorwork from the We Call Them Pirates hat. Yes, that is a pattern, but using some really simple stitch techniques so I didn’t get bogged down in the chart. I’m confident enough with this kind of thing that a steeked Nordic sweater only presents the problem of what sort of pattern and colorwork would look cool on it.

However, I’d like to branch out. I’d like to make an Aran sweater; I’d like to add texture detail on socks. But for the most part, the charts with their symbols weren’t making sense to me.

Why? I was expecting to be able to skim them.

You can’t skim when you don’t know the language. Just sayin’.

I get this with my computer students all the time. They don’t have the vocabulary for whatever it is we’re doing, and it short circuits their brains. Abbreviations and symbols are difficult to decipher until you’re actually fluent in the language. When you’re used to things being easy and fluent, going back to it being tedious to decipher can be a bit of a difficult leap.

The simple fact is that while I can knit some classes of garments quite well, and am a structural thinker, until I’m fluent with the language, puzzling out the charts and patterns for textured knitting is going to be hard. Nothing wrong with that mind, but I’d gotten too used to knitting being easy and automatic and had forgotten that tacking on a new skill is going to require more concentration.

I’m knitting a pair of socks right now.  Pattern?  Heh.  I don’t really use one.

What I do (for you knitters out there), is a figure-8 cast-on toe-up sock knit in a stockingette with short row heels and a 2X2 rib for the cuff.  It’s the way I made the first pair of socks I ever made, and I like the basic idea.

I don’t even know if I do the short-rows “right”, mind.  But since the shape works, I don’t really care.

Hand-knit socks are funny.  If you’ve never worn them, the idea of getting socks as a gift seems a bit lame.  I get that. But I’ll tell you what, the look on a person’s face when they first try on a well-knit pair of hand-knit wool socks is funny as can be.   They look apprehensive at first, trying them on.  They don’t want to offend, but really, it’s a sock. How exciting can a sock be?  Besides, a hand-knits sock made to the specs of a specific person’s foot can look weirdly-shaped — not at all like commercial socks.

So here the person in, trying on… socks.  How silly.   They poke in the toe, and slide it over the foot gingerly.  After all, this is something hand-knit, and the maker is right there.  What if they <gasp> tear the sock that the knitter is clearly so proud of? How are they supposed to react?  Then, as the sock slides over the foot and nestles over the heel, the wearer gets this goofy look of bliss on their face, holds out the foot and wiggles the toes.  There is this dawning look of delight, rotating the foot and grinning.

You knitters know what I’m talking about.  I just wish I’d the sense to get pictures of people trying on hand-knit socks for the first time.

Dear 100% Wool,

I’m so sorry I abandoned you.  I loved you so much for your warmth in chilly, damp Northern New England. I didn’t like what a pain it was to wash you, but I’m so sorry, I didn’t know there were ways around that.

Noel

I’d been knitting with a wool/acrylic blend for the last year or two. I idly mentioned to the lady who owns my LYS¹ the reason I was choosing the yarn I did, but that I liked wool’s insulating properties a googleplex times better.  It’s just that I only own five or six sweaters, so they do need to be washed several times a winter.

My LYS guru looked at me strangely, and mentioned a method she uses to wash wool sweaters.   You fill a washing machine with warm (not hot) water and a little gentle soap.  Then you turn it off, but leave the basin full.  Add the sweaters and drop a towel in if the load needs balancing.  Walk away from it for a half hour or so.  Then turn the water to the spin cycle.  This will get the water out without agitating the sweater too much.  then you take the sweaters out, fill again and repeat without soap for the rinse.

The spin cycle does remove the water far, far better than the roll it in a towel method.  This means that if I wash a load of sweaters, I don’t have the damn things on every large flat surface for more than a day.

I’m back to knitting with wool, my preferred fiber for sweaters.  They make a better, longer-lasting sweater.  I realize that there are people who are allergic to wool, but I’m not, so that’s what I’m making for me.

I was complimented three times today on the sweater I’m wearing.  It’s the one I call my Thursday Sweater because of the red and purple joke with the Mjollnir pattern.  I was even asked where one could buy such a sweater.  I commented that I’d made it and the woman sighed, “Of course.  You can’t find a good wool sweater in a store any more.  They’re all cotton.”

That may not seem like much, depending on where you live.  But cotton is awful for cold or clammy weather — be it for socks or sweaters.   Cotton or cotton blend socks are certainly easier to care for.  But they don’t wick moisture well.  If your feet sweat, you get clammy.   I was never the world’s biggest wool fan until I started knitting up here in New England.  Wool socks are a thing of joy, let me tell you!   Wool wicks moisture, and is wonderfully warm.  In damp weather, wool doesn’t get clammy and lose its ability to insulate well.  Oh no.  It retains heat beautifully even in a drizzle, or if you step in a puddle.

Sure, wool is a pain in the butt to care for.   But warm?  Oh dear lord…