What I Know
I'm enjoying the lists of things knitters wish they'd known when they started out, such lists appearing in a knitting blog near you -- just go surf the ring. I can't think of anything I wish I'd known at the start, though -- I've too much enjoyed the process of finding things out. I'd hate to have been an expert when I started; but then, I'm only really interested in things about which I can say, in Chaucerian fashion, "the lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne." I get bored with the easy stuff.
On the other hand, I do have a list of
-- which is probably more or less the same thing:
1. You will need a lot of needles. No, more than that. You're going to need about three different sizes of needle every time you start a new project. You're going to need double pointed needles, and duplicates in circulars. You're going to need needles in different materials, for use with different fibers. You're going to find that it's not enough to own one pair of each size, because you're going to have several projects on needles at one time. Don't bother going and getting one of those complete matching sets of needles, though if somebody gives you one, be immensely grateful. Just keep buying needles. If you buy them one or two sets at a time, it's not so scary.
2. That gorgeous yarn you adore is going to be discontinued. Maybe not this year, maybe not next, but at some point.
3. On the other hand, soon after it appears, you can probably buy it cheaply on eBay.
4. But if you wait too long, it's going to cost you way too much money on eBay. Timing is all.
5. Despite what all the pundits say, gauge does not always matter. Really. Do you need exact gauge for a scarf? Nah. Dishcloth? Nah. Shawl? Nah. Easy fit pullover? Probably not.
6. But someday it's going to really really matter and then you'll be sorry you didn't swatch. On the other hand, you'll have a story, and isn't that the point of life? I for instance have "The Time I Had To Frog An Entire St. Brigid Sweater," more about which in another blog.
7. Never name the well from which you will not drink. Diss somebody else's yarn, or pattern, or design, and find yourself making the very same thing the next year. It's an extension of the glass house law; good to remember your house is glass; even better to conceive the idea that it might be a different sort of glass in the future.
8. Adore your yarn. That's when possible, of course. We can't buy all the nice yarn we see, and sometimes, out of financial necessity or cause the pattern calls for it, we have to use yarn we don't like to work with. (Cotton! Bleh! Hate it! But I knit with it anyway, so that I can have the finished products, which I enjoy.) But when possible use yarn you adore, because life is short and the craft is long (see Chaucerian quote above).
That's it. I could invent 10, the usual number, but in the spirit of anarchist knitting, I provide only 8.
On the other hand, I do have a list of
Things I Know Now But Didn't Know Then
-- which is probably more or less the same thing:
1. You will need a lot of needles. No, more than that. You're going to need about three different sizes of needle every time you start a new project. You're going to need double pointed needles, and duplicates in circulars. You're going to need needles in different materials, for use with different fibers. You're going to find that it's not enough to own one pair of each size, because you're going to have several projects on needles at one time. Don't bother going and getting one of those complete matching sets of needles, though if somebody gives you one, be immensely grateful. Just keep buying needles. If you buy them one or two sets at a time, it's not so scary.
2. That gorgeous yarn you adore is going to be discontinued. Maybe not this year, maybe not next, but at some point.
3. On the other hand, soon after it appears, you can probably buy it cheaply on eBay.
4. But if you wait too long, it's going to cost you way too much money on eBay. Timing is all.
5. Despite what all the pundits say, gauge does not always matter. Really. Do you need exact gauge for a scarf? Nah. Dishcloth? Nah. Shawl? Nah. Easy fit pullover? Probably not.
6. But someday it's going to really really matter and then you'll be sorry you didn't swatch. On the other hand, you'll have a story, and isn't that the point of life? I for instance have "The Time I Had To Frog An Entire St. Brigid Sweater," more about which in another blog.
7. Never name the well from which you will not drink. Diss somebody else's yarn, or pattern, or design, and find yourself making the very same thing the next year. It's an extension of the glass house law; good to remember your house is glass; even better to conceive the idea that it might be a different sort of glass in the future.
8. Adore your yarn. That's when possible, of course. We can't buy all the nice yarn we see, and sometimes, out of financial necessity or cause the pattern calls for it, we have to use yarn we don't like to work with. (Cotton! Bleh! Hate it! But I knit with it anyway, so that I can have the finished products, which I enjoy.) But when possible use yarn you adore, because life is short and the craft is long (see Chaucerian quote above).
That's it. I could invent 10, the usual number, but in the spirit of anarchist knitting, I provide only 8.
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