beginner knitter

Keeping a beginners mind

I think one of the most popular blog posts I ever wrote, back in the day, was entitled Death by Scarf. In it I talked about how I had come across an acquaintance who was a new knitter and he had asked for recommendations for starter projects. He’d been given the traditional advice often given to newer knitters that he should start with a ‘nice garter stitch scarf’ and well, let’s just say that the idea didn’t appeal to him.

And I didn’t blame him one little bit. As far as I’m concerned there is nothing more likely to bore the pants off a new knitter and to firmly turn them off the hobby for life than making them sit through the tedium of knitting 6-feet of garter stitch no matter how lovely the yarn.

Unless it’s a scarf for a teddy bear then nope, I’m afraid you can keep your nice garter stitch scarves.

Instead I directed him towards the amazing Tincan Knits website where they have a fabulous (and free) range of patterns aimed at beginners. The instructions are clearly laid out with tutorials to everything the new knitter is likely to need.

The next time I saw him, in a matter of a few short weeks he had knitted a hat, some mitts and was shopping for yarn for his first pair of socks. The man was well and truly hooked and believe me when I say I rejoiced inside.

People only think it’s hard if you tell them it is

It’s a fact that’s common to most areas of life, when you are a beginner you literally know nothing. Not only that, but you don’t know what you don’t know. Indeed, in the Four Stages of Learning this is rather insultingly defined as Unconscious Incompetence. But it’s true, you can’t know something until you’ve started the process of learning.

Gradually people move through a process of being aware of what they don’t know (conscious incompetence), becoming more proficient (conscious competence) and finally through to being so skilled that they can do it without thinking (unconscious competence).

Turning the heel of a sock is a classic example of this. Often people will tell me things like they have been knitting for years but have always been scared to try socks. They will talk about ‘turning the heel’ as though it is somehow imbued with magical properties rather than a series of easily followed instructions.

Literally all you need to do is follow the steps in front of you faithfully, to the the letter and you will have a successful heel turn. It’s isn’t magic, it’s maths.

Some people react in horror when I suggest socks as a beginner knitting project but really when you think about it they are ideal. Yes, the cast on can be a little tricky but that’s the same of any cast on when you are just starting out. As a young girl my Nana used to cast on and do the first row for me when she was teaching me to knit.

But once the cast on is done you are literally just knitting round and round, there’s nothing else to distract your attention. You come to the heel turn, concentrate and follow the instructions. Then it’s plain sailing all the way to the end.

As a beginner you don’t know that socks are thought to be hard. You only know they are hard if other knitters tell you that they are.

Keeping a beginners mind

I’ve seen teachers and other education professionals refer to ‘keeping a beginners mind’ when approaching a new topic or skill and it’s a great thing to do. It’s not meant to be insulting or patronising, but more it’s meant in the spirit of being open to learning and to new experiences.

It’s a term translated from from Shoshin - which comes from Zen Buddhism -and it describes the way that a beginner doesn’t have any expectations or pre-conceived ideas about how something should be. They are literally experiencing something for the first time.

“If your mind is empty … it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.” - Shunryu Suzuki

And no matter how expert we might be in something, there’s a lot to be said for stepping back sometimes and seeing it fresh, with a beginners mind.

We might be surprised at what we find.

PIN FOR LATER

A corner to corner blanket: Free pattern

I knit this simple garter stitch blanket last year sometime and published it as a free pattern on Instagram for those who follow me there, with the full and certain intention of adding it to my free patterns page here too.

I have no idea why it fell off my to-do list, I can only assume that life, combined with my butterfly brain conspired against me.

In any case, I wanted to add it here as it’s such a lovely, straightforward knit. Ideal for a beginner or for those times when you just want a bit of relaxing, stress-free knitting. I knit this small lap blanket with DK yarn on 4mm needles but you could easily adapt it to work with fingering weight yarn (suggested 3mm needles) or worsted/aran (on 4.5/5mm needles, respectively).

It produced a perfect little square blanket - ideal for baby knitting as well in an appropriate yarn.

You can find the blanket over on my free pattern page, or it’s written out here (below) as well if you wanted to bookmark it for later.



Top tips for faster knitting

I originally wrote about this in 2017, but I thought it was time to revisit the topic of faster knitting. A lot of people comment that I must knit very quickly in order to be able to churn out the projects that I do. Having seen other, very accomplished knitters in action I have to say that I’m pretty slow in comparison.

What I do however, is short bursts of very focused knitting where I can power through quite a lot in a short space of time. The other thing that I do is to take my knitting everywhere - and I mean everywhere - so that if I find myself with an unexpected wait somewhere I can whip the needles out and get a few rounds in. It’s amazing how much those little moments accumulate throughout the day.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I do love a good meditative knit sometimes and not every project knits to be rushed off the needles. But as deadlines loom or a loved ones birthday approaches there are always those times where a bit of power knitting is called for. If you’ve ever wondered how to knit faster I hope that these few simple tips will help.

Top tips for faster knitting:

  1. Use super slick and shiny needles: As slick as you can get away with without your stitches flying off the needles. I like Addi Turbos in particular for lots of stocking stitch. The points aren't the sharpest but they really are super speedy.

  2. Front load your stitches: Scoot as many stitches as you can to the tip of your left hand needle. That way you don't have to pull the next stitch to the top of the needle - it will already be there.

  3. Knit at the tips: Knit each stitch right at the tip of the left hand needle - but be sure to wrap the yarn fully around the wider part of the right hand needle as this is what determines the tightness of each stitch.

  4. Set your timer for 10 minutes. Eyes down and why not see how much you can knit when you really put your mind to it.

When is a skein not a skein

When is a skein not a skein? A chance conversation with an online pal lead to a very confusing "crossed wires" situation.
I'd shared some advice for new knitters (in my last post) about not trying to knit direct from a skein but to wind it first.

She responded that she always knits direct from the skein. And I wondered how on earth she ever left the house.

I turns out that we were talking about 2 completely different things. To me, a skein (let's not get into pronunciation 😂) is a tightly twisted length of yarn as in the picture.

But to my friend, this is a hank. She refers to the kind of fat ball (swipe left) that sits neatly on a shelf as a skein - hence the confusion.

Partly it might be a geographical thing I guess. I've only ever heard hank refer to rope - or embroidery thread.

But it was a timely lesson to remember, especially for newer knitters, to always be clear exactly what you are referring to. And not to assume anything.

So what would you call this?
Skein or hank? Let me know in the comments

Five things I wish I'd known when I started knitting

5 mini skeins from As Yet Yarns

I’ve been a knitter a long time now, first learning as a child sat on my Grandma’s knee. Then in my early 30s picking up the needles again by way of respite from life with two babies under 2. I knit most days, on a variety of projects and I’m never without knitting on my person when I leave the house. In short, I’m a knitter with a capital K.

But everyone starts somewhere and it’s easy to forget that things we now take for granted, we once didn’t know. Not only that we didn’t know. But that we didn’t know that we didn’t know.

It would never occur to me now to try and knit from yarn directly from the skein. But once, I did. Not only that but I tried to do it in a parked car with the yarn looped around the gearstick. As I said - I didn’t know what I didn’t know.

But, we live and learn - at least most of the time. I still persist in thinking that I don’t need to make a note of the needles I’m using for a particular project for example. But most of the time we do.

And in that spirit I thought I would present a short list of things I wished someone had presented me with (ideally on a laminated sheet for my project bag) back when I was a new knitter.

  1. Wind the yarn into a ball before you start. I know I already mentioned this one but it really is my top tip for anyone new to knitting who is tempted to try the joys of hand dyed yarn. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you need fancy equipment. Just loop the yarn around two chair backs pushed other or employ the hands of a handy helper.

  2. Keep a knitting notebook - either on paper or digital. Make a note of the yarn and needles you are using along with any notes you might want to refer back to. It also really helps when you are getting to grips with gauge swatches and helps you keep a record of the stitch count you are likely to get with certain yarn weights and needle sizes.

  3. Gauge matters - I’m not going to labour the point on this one. Others have done that much better than I - see this post. But it really, really matters.

  4. There are better alternatives to the thumb cast on. This was the one I used for years (thanks, Nana) before it dawned on me that it was a bit wibbly and unstable for anything more than a short piece of knitting. Finding the long tail cast on was a revelation. There are others, of course and it’s always worth experimenting, but this is the one I always turn to first.

  5. Always mark the right side of your work. I generally clip a little bulb pin to the front of my work, just to remind me which is the right side. On a stockinette sweater of course, it’s easy to tell once you get going but just for those first few rows - and particularly if you are a new knitter it really does help to orientate you - and stop you picking up your work and accidentally knitting back the way you have come.

How about you. if you could write one piece of advice to your younger knitting self what would it be? Why not let me know in the comments.