If there’s anything I learned from the Knitting Olympics it’s this:
1) I am a better knitter than I think I am. I am a better knitter than I was a few months ago. My goal was one pair of socks: I finished them in a week.
2) I am so bad at knitting only one thing at a time. I always have at least three things going on at once.
These two dovetail to mean that when I knit only on one project – my Olympic socks – I finished them insanely fast. Seven days, Saturday to Saturday, and I was done. I kinda stared at myself and wondered what happened, because I’ve never knit something that fast before.
How’d I pick my sock pattern? I started off thinking I’d do Aran Braid socks, and could not get gauge for the life of me. I knit a pair of Broadripple socks instead — they’re a lace pattern, but still doable, and not too terribly difficult, right? I’d started a pair of Broadripples last fall and could not figure out how to make the k2tog and ssk decreases look different: I was twisting all of my stitches and didn’t realise it. This time around it made sense right away, and I didn’t get any pesky laddering next to each yarn over. I need to give myself more credit.
Of course, I felt like I had to keep knitting during the Olympics, so in the past few weeks I finished my bottom-up striped raglan sweater and started a pair of socks for my dad. Since getting home for spring break, I’ve also made two stuffed bears for Bay Window Bears.
I started a pair of Norwegian Stockings from Nancy Bush’s Folk Socks, and am working on another stuffed bear. I’ve got to finish my dad’s ribbed socks (the most boring things in the entire world, I swear) and only an insane effort of will is keeping me from casting on for the Print O’ The Wave Stole with my new determination. I can knit it, so why not start now? But I’m going to finish something else first.
Knit-Spin-Quilt 