Knitting is a whole new language

No I haven't turned to the darkside. I knitted as a kid and then revived it a bit when I dyed my own yarn. Of course that project is still staring at me to finish.

Went to Stitches West on Friday last. I had signed up for a class on how to do scarves as I figured that with my limited knowledge I might be able to follow along. I learned buckets about how to do some effects (making holes, angles, multicolors, etc.). I asked lots of questions. The teacher didn't seem to mind since the other 3 students only asked vey mundane questions and just took in the whole exerience. I also introduced the teacher to some design color concepts like "poison" color use to make other colors "pop".

Then armed with my new yarn and needles I walked part of the floor before heading off to the "learn to knit" class. There were all sorts of threads and beads. There was also a fair contingent of things for spinners/weavers. Bought some yarn which is called "pencil" roving. It is tighter than true roving, but it should felt up really nice when knitted. I also bought some lovely dyed roving which will spin and knit up into something. Then I treated myself to a drop spindle. I wanted a nice one so if/when I go to events and spin, I'm not using the clunky one from class.

The "learn to knit" class came with plastic needles (far nicer than the old plastic ones) and baby blanket type yellow yarn. The best part was the instruction booklet. I was having some problems with remembering the pattern for perl. It also had good instructions for the knit stitch cast on (I had always done the half hitch cast), and several different ways to add, substract, and end off. Wish I had such good instructions for embroidery stitches. I'll need to do some thinking on what makes the booklet different than all the embroidery books I have in my library. (Note that I "won" at the EGA meeting opportunity drawing the book A-Z of Embroidery this week.)

Walked around a bit more after class before making myself leave without more purchases. I did treat myself to some more of the muskox yarn. Well, it was a little less than I paid in Fairbanks and I'm finally getting to the point where I might actually be able to knit with it; so it was my reward and goal (or so I reasoned TIC).