Knitting Archives - Catherine Gowthorpe

Smug post about knitting

I wrote a blog post on 17th February about the trouble I was having with my knitting… and said I’d write a smug post about it if I ever got it finished. Well, ta da! It is finished. If you recall, the item in question is a cowl, or snood, made out of Manos del Uruguay Lace, a beautiful yarn. The trouble was in casting on exactly the right number of stitches (v difficult), avoiding the Mobius strip problem I described in the earlier post, and avoiding mistakes in the pattern. It was just so difficult. Even once I’d cast on the correct 240 stitches and then got it straight, the pattern was so complicated and demanded so much attention that I ended up making lots of mistakes and having to take the knitting back to correct them. It’s a 20-line pattern, repeated 11 times, so there was plenty of scope, and I was still making errors right up until the last line. Still, I eventually got there. So here’s a photo of the finished object:

And another showing the pattern close up. It’s really pretty, but a massive pain in the neck.

So, definitely no more knitting for the time being. I’ve had enough. I shall get back to what I should have been doing in the first place, which is stitching. More on that in due course.

Digression: knitting socks

It’s a digression because this is not intended to be a knitting blog. (Or, indeed, a sock blog). When I was a child I was taught how to knit socks but I don’t think I’ve knit a sock since turning 18, rather a long time ago. At the Knitting and Stitching show at Alexandra Palace, however, I found some lovely yarns crying out to be knitted into socks, and bought a ball of variegated black, grey and white and five double-pointed needles. Well, I’ve so enjoyed making these socks I thought I’d share the result:

I’ve found it very relaxing sitting around in the evening, with the cat on my knee, knitting round and round and round. The complicated bit is turning the heel, but it must be a thing you never forget once you know how to do it as I managed without too much trouble.

Knitting seems to be getting popular again. I went to K&S with three young women, all in their 20s, and all keen to knit. But I was struck by what an expensive hobby it’s become. Anyway, that’s it for the sock report. I mustn’t get distracted into too much knitting, as I have lots of stitching to do, but it really is a pleasant thing to do on a long winter evening while watching the telly.