some things that are helpful for knitters

Posted by marne on November 23, 2010 in knit | 12 comments

My knitting mania is continuing, and I'm really wanting to clean up my stash, so I took a break from all the stockinette I've been doing and used a lone ball of Koigu KFM for a small Ishbel scarf.

I like all these colors, but they're a bit much all together like this. The yarn was a total impulse buy last summer when we spent a day in Ketchum, Idaho while I was visiting my family. I found a little yarn shop, and there was a single, lonely hank in the 50% off basket. So for $11 I have a cheery, lacy scarf. It's not quite my usual thing, but I'll probably wear it now and then. 

 Ultimately, knitting this little confection only took a few days, but it did take three attempts at starting the lace section before I got it (mostly) right. I'm still learning to read lace, so I'm glad I did this before getting into the lace on my Seraphim shawl. I'm not sure what my problem was, it's a pretty simple lace pattern, but I kept losing stitches and couldn't find them again. Once I realized the double-decreases were stacked right on top of each other, it got a little easier. There were still mistakes, but I just figured if I missed a stitch somewhere I could just pick one up in the approximate spot and it would all work out in the end. I don't think anyone will notice when I'm wearing it all draped and squished around my neck. 

Because I'm in such a stash-busting state of mind, I've been doing a lot of thinking about knitting, and thought I'd share some things I've been finding useful lately. 

1. It goes without saying that if you knit, you should have a Ravelry account. What I love about it is that you can use the site however you'd like. I don't spend a lot of time in the forums, but with all the groups, you can certainly find some like-minded knitters to chat with. I do, however, have a few friends, and I just discovered the friend's activity tab. It's a great way to find new patterns, especially if you have friends with similar taste. I'm also keeping better notes on my projects, and slowly adding my stash yarns, which will make it easy to match up that stash yarn with the perfect project, and therefore, clear out my stash even faster. Yes! 
2. Ravelry related: Ariane of the Falling Stitches blog does a regular post called What's Hot on Ravelry, where she searches out the best of the newly listed patterns. She has reliably good taste, and has posted some lovely patterns that I might not have otherwise found. 
3. I've taken a break from audio books (I still haven't listened to the last disc of Edgar Sawtelle), and I've been listening to knitting podcasts during my commute. The Knit Picks podcast has some good episodes, and I found the one about blocking your knits (episode 123, I believe) truly helpful. I've only listened to a couple episodes of The Knit Wits, but this married couple is pretty darn funny and entertaining. The Knitmore Girls are an adorable mother-daughter knitting duo, and I've also enjoyed a few episodes of Ready, Set, Knit, the WEBS podcast. Do you have any good knitting podcasts to recommend? 
4. This is a pretty cool tool if you like knitting from charts (which I do!): KnitChart. Give it a minute to load, and then you can easily chart your design. 

One more stash project:

I had to try out Malabrigo's sock yarn. I'm happy to report that I really like it and would like lots more socks knit from it. Do you like my rustic back drop? It's been dark and dreary and in every picture I took inside the socks were a different color. This one is actually pretty close, although they are slightly more purple: 

I think this is the fourth pair of Embossed Leaves socks I've knit. I know I need to branch out more, but I like everything about this pattern. It's interesting but not too hard, they're pretty, and they fit perfectly.