To Pick or to Throw?

Nobody ever really taught me to knit, although I do vaugly remember my Nana knitting Aran jumpers. I remember being interested but not enough to actually ask her to show me what it was she was doing.

Why I eventually picked up the needles I'll never know but I'm so glad I did. Of course my first effort didn't work out so well, it was supposed to be a baby cardigan but resembled more of a doily in a triangle shape with the amount of stitches I dropped and then picked up. So it got shoved in a bag in the back of a cupboard in my first home and has never been seen since, think it got left when I moved.

Then in 2006 I saw a knitting magazine and thought 'what the heck, I'll give it another go'. I bought cheap acrylic and some needles and me and my purchases went home happy.

The magazine had a how to guide in the back and was a revelation, I didn't even realise that needles came in different shapes and sizes, let alone the multitude of yarn choices, I was entranced.

The internet is a marvellous thing, my next knitting efforts actually worked, anything I didn't understand and the magazine didn't show how to do, I looked it up on the net and had many a eureka moment.

My confidence and abilities grew as did my stash, my ability to talk to other knitters was non existent as nobody I knew knitted (by this time my Nana was no longer around) so my only source of knitting knowledge was my magazines and the internet.

Then towards the end of 2007 somebody on a wedding forum was gushing about a knitting website called 'Ravery'. I signed up not really thinking much of it, epecially as I had to wait for my invitation.

Mooching in my email one day, there it was my invitation to join Ravelry. When I first looked at it I thought, okay this is neat, I can list my projects, my yarn, my needles and I can even get a load of free patterns.

Then, then I stumbled across the groups and howly cow, my knitting world exploded. There were all these knitters, talking and sharing information. Some of them were actually doing the same project as me and we could discuss it, we could share our highs and our lows, we could share our successes 'look, look what I made isn't it great?' We could also share our not so greats, 'what did I do wrong?'.

My knitting world expanded, I realised I wasn't this lonely knitter, there was actually thousands of people who 'got' it, this urge to pick up yarn and needles or even hooks. Yup, I got the crochet bug as well. I can still remember how amazed and chuffed I was the first time I made a granny square.

In my perrifferal I remember reading about people who were pickers or throwers (huh? thought I) if you knit you knit...right?

Wrong, there are all sorts of ways to knit and everybody either does it the way they were taught or the way that feels right. I'm a thrower as I didn't even know there was any other way. But now I want to learn continental, why? Because I want to speed up my knitting and not be put off by ribbing.

I've seen many a design that I thought, 'eek, all that ribbing or stocking stitch' and so never cast on for the project. Circular needles have gotten rid of my avoidance of stocking stitch (so long as the project is worked in the round), now I hope learning to knit continental will get rid of my avoidance of ribbing/purling.

I've some links for those that also would like to join my jouney and learn Continental knitting:

http://www.knittinghelp.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuRLFl36tDY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9XImtoQmZ8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kybhNmLWHhA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVxnSpFJl6s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNfG05FeLsE