Catching up

Hi, everyone. :)  This is my first post on my amimono no monogatari so, I have some catching up to do! :P

I actually started "thinking" about knitting the year my grandma died.  She was an avid knitter and always made the cutest sweaters for herself (and boring but practical vests and sweaters for my grandpa).  Why (do you ask) did I not have my grandma teach me how to knit?  Well, no matter how hard (and often!) I tried to cajole her into teaching me how to knit, she never had to patience for it. :P  She often said that it would be easier for her to make me something than to teach me how to do it. :P  So, I was stuck watching her knit and not really understanding how she managed to make a ball of yarn into one of her cute sweaters. :(

So about a year or so after her death, I actually took the plunge and started knitting (or at least vaguely trying to).  I had managed to inherit all her leftover yarn (yes, yarn as in some leftover (very small) skein she had - Grandma wasn't much of a stasher) and one metal circular needle (she had other needles but, as she got older, she had given them away before I could ask for it - bummer!).  I fumbled (and mumbled) my way into my first swatch and this is what it looked like:

It was a horrid experience and while I managed to make "something", it was a struggle as I "tried" to knit and purl my way through this swatch.  It took me nearly two+ (yes, 2!!) years to make this 28 cm (at it's "extreme" widest) x 19 cm swatch.

It was a struggle for me to learn how to cast on then figure out how to start my next row much less figure out which stitch was a knit stitch and a purl stitch. In short, while I borrowed (practically) every knitting book from my local library, perused through every knitting book I could get my hands on at my local bookstore, and watched some youtube videos, I struggled to figure out if knitting would be for me or not.  This little swatch was picked up, stared at (a lot!), worked on in bits and pieces and often forgotten as I wondered if it was worth the effort and time I took to work on this (at the time) Herculean project.

So (you ask), what turned you around?

Well, I had recently transferred (like six months ago) to another job and met Ariana.  The office that I work in can get quite chilly,  I often wear a scarf with a balloon clip (don't ask - it's actually an inside joke from my old office) to hold it together.  Short story short, Ariana often teased me about my clip, saying that I should just get a shawl pin.  Somehow, some way, I managed to find out she was a knitter.  So, I asked her if she could teach me how to knit.  After a few hands-on knitting lunches, I was on my way to finishing this little swatch.

Throughout this time, I managed to amass a stash (and not of my own doing).  For some reason or another, various family members had given me their bits and pieces of their stash as they decided to turn to other crafts/projects.  So, after I finished my first swatch, I decided that I wanted to get rid of my stash by using it to make a shawl.  My hopes for my shawl was to use it as a practice piece - to ensure I really understood how to knit and purl (and knowing when I was doing which stitch) as well as how to "read" my stitches.  So, I picked a length (I wanted a really wide shawl) and a pattern: seed stitch to get in my knits and purls.  Here's what I've done (so far) (yes, my inadvertent stash is pretty big):

The initial color, mint, was really my first hurdle but I learned a lot from it.  I learned which stitch was a knit vs a purl stitch; how to fix my mistakes (and dropped stitches) and how to weave in my (enormously long) tail (and why one needs to have a tail just long enough - not too short, not too long).  The next color (christmas green) was great! :)  I speedily whipped out row after row and my stitches became more even ... I was showing great progress! :)  I continued on to the other colors, learning how to add on a new color, how to change needle sizes as I changed yarn type, and getting better at weaving in my ends.  Then I hit Black.  I will never ever knit a whole black object.  Black is evil - it's the worst color one can even think of ever using ... Struggling with knitting was back! :(

I had such a hard time seeing which stitch I was doing if I ceased to pay attention to which stitch I was actually doing and reading my stitches (especially at night) became impossible (it was vaguely possible in full daylight).  The "stash" of black was a very small ball of yarn but, I began wondering if it was worth the time to continue on ... It was such a small ball but, it was sooooo hard! :(  I wanted to continue on but every time I saw that little black ball, I cringed.  It was time to take a break from my shawl.

Since my stash was so big, I decided to make a water bottle holder (I needed one anyways). So began my next project.  Ariana helped me get started, came up with a "simple" bottom up pattern for me and set me off.  I choose a Red Heart yarn and began my adventure in making my first rounds.  I learned how to use DPNs but struggled with my project.  The yarn wasn't very elastic, I was using some borrowed caspian DPNs that wasn't very flexible and since Ariana started me out (she's a very tight knitter), I struggled to make the next row.  I persevered on and as it grew to a weird shape, I hoped I could salvage it (somehow).  But, I knew it was doomed when one of my co-workers looked at it one day and asked if it was either some kind of gigantic flower or a pot holder! :P  This is how it came out:

I knew I had to start over.  I talked it over with Ariana, told her of my struggles and started over.  This time, Ariana help me come up with a top-down pattern and I started myself off.  This is how it came out:

Success!!  I learned a lot from this project.  I learned how ribbing worked, how to close up the bottom, how to add on a strap and even how to make a button hole! :)  *Yay!!!*  Knitting isn't so bad and even useful! :)  I was on my way to becoming a full fledged knitter! :)

This was such a success that my hubby kept eyeing out my bottle holder and even attempted to steal my first completed project for his own use! :P  So, as I continued to struggle with finishing up the black portion of my shawl, I decided that I could "whip out" a bottle holder for him.  Over the course of a weekend, here's what I did:

Not too shabby, huh? :P

Ok, that's a wrap for my first post.  I know it was very, very long, but, hey!  It was my saga and adventure to actually getting to this amimono no monogatari! :)  Don't worry, the next post will be much shorter!  I promise! :D