On cold wintry nights I tend to find myself falling in love again with knitting. Or perhaps I should say the idea of knitting. I have idyllic images of being curled up in a warm house with the curtains drawn, a big mug of tea and some cake, and an ever-growing knitted creation spread out over my legs to keep me warm.
The truth is much as I love the idea of knitting, in practice it is not something I have had much success with, mainly because I find I lose patience. In hindsight, this is probably because I have been overambitious with the projects I choose. The prime example being my first knitting project: a scarf which took me about a year to complete.
Having not knitted since being a Brownie, a few years ago I was inspired by a friend to try my hand at it again. My friend Maud had started making a scarf and I was so impressed by this that she kindly (and with much patience) taught me the basics of ribbing and how to knit with more than one colour.Having started, I found it difficult to finish. The technique is easy enough once you get the hang of it (and remember to count - there are a couple of stitches towards one end which are purled when they should be knitted!). But I have to admit that the slow rate of growth (a few rows a night) meant I became disappointed with the progress I was making and that in turn meant that this became an increasingly neglected project.
Having left this scarf languishing unfinished for a couple of months, I came back to it and picked up the knitting needles with renewed determination. Once I had managed to repeat the pattern a couple of times, and the scarf was just long enough to wrap around my neck, I found that progress seemed to be quicker - it suddenly felt more realistic that I could in fact have a decent scarf at the end of my efforts.
I love my scarf, and the joy of wearing it more than makes up for the time it took to make; if anything, I get more enjoyment from it because of the time I spent on it.
There are lots of free resources on the internet giving basic instructions on how to learn to knit. learn2knit covers all the basics you'll need to know, including how to hold the needles, picking up dropped stitches and casting off. Fig 42 in the instructions on basic stitches shows the 2x2 ribbing technique, which was the basis of my scarf.
The about.com website also has some good instructions to help you start knitting, including instructions on knitting stripes. I made my scarf using the weaving technique; rather than cutting the wool at the end of each stripe, the strand in the colour you are not using is carried along the edge of the scarf until you next want to start knitting in that colour. Twist the two strands of wool (the colour you are knitting in and the colour you are not knitting in) at the end of the row (this will be at the end of every second row as the wool will be carried up one side) to secure the colour you are not using.
