My Knit-savvy-ness

Recently, I was browsing my awesome friend Ashley’s blog, and noticed the pictures of her sweet-lookin’ striped arm-warmers. I thought to myself, “You know, I should knit something awesome like that.” I whipped out my Knitting Patterns For Dummies book, and found a pattern for fingerless mitts that was just waiting to be knitted. The real issue was that I had never used double-pointed needles before, although I own several pairs of them. I decided it was worth a try. As the book pointed out, “getting started can feel a lot like juggling chopsticks,” but it improved from there. To all knitters who are intimidated by double-pointed needles, remember:

I. You aren’t actually knitting all four needles at once
II. It gets easier after you’ve knitted a few rows
III. Start out on a simple, cylindrical shape before you move on to fancier stuff
IV. Make the corner stitches of your “triangle of needles” tight enough to avoid a seam
V. Give yourself some time to get used to it

You divide your stitches onto three needles, like this:


You knit onto a fourth needle, working in a circle and switching off needles. I will now say something that I think few knitters would vouch for: I love using double-pointed needles!

I used a yarn with some delightful color variance, and it sort of striped itself.

I finished my first fingerless mitt, which looks like this: