Nothing like a little more homework!

Yet another Monday has slipped by.  My daughter apparently ran home from the bus stop, she was almost 10 minutes early, absolutely demanding that we sit down and knit right away!  The thought had slipped my mind!  I honestly forgot about her wanting to learn to knit.  Today was more busy for me than it has been in a long time!  Tomorrow is shaping up to be just as busy too!  But she insisted that she wanted me to teach her to knit.

So I had to dig around in my memory bank and remember how my mother taught me about knitting.  I came up with nothing, its like knitting has always been a part of me.  I turned to the computer instead.  I grabbed a pair of size 9 needles, some of my cheapy acrylic yarn, Red Heart of course!  And we set off.  I did cast on and do the first 2 or 3 rows for her.  I am teaching her the throw and wrap, aka English style, because that is what i remember learning first.  I apparently now knit Continental style, which is also known as European or even German style, which is also known as left-handed!  I have always been quite ambidextrous, with the exception of writing.  But for about 2 months my 3rd or 4th grade year I got to experience handwriting with my left hand.  It became quite legible too! Yay for horseback riding accidents!  Ok, not really a "yay" moment.

K did happen to ask me why I don't knit the way I was teaching her, why I knit left handed.  I told her in all honesty, "I don't know why, it is something my knitting teacher taught me to do, and have done since I was 14 or 16." I think it may come in quite handy when T wants to learn to knit, like he insisted today, then didn't want to participate.  I love how he witnesses his sister want to do something so badly that he wants to do it too, then realizes "Oh, this is no fun." and scampers off to play. 


Ok, so a bit of clarification.  Continental style looks like this:

 Yarn is held in the Left hand, while the right and left are working together to bring the stitches through.


English style, or throw and wrap looks like this:

Its a little tougher because you are completely letting go of the needle to throw/wrap the yarn around the needle.  

K was having some difficulty because she has such skinny legs i can't get her to prop the needle up on her leg.  So she modified my instructions to make them work for her.  In 30 min in her room alone, she worked 4 or 5 rows of knitting with only a couple of missed stitches.  No dropped stitches at all!  Amazing!  What do I mean when i say "missed stitches"?  Just that, she tried to knit, and the wrap either came off before she finished the stitch, and she didn't notice, and kept the old stitch on the needles, or she got confused/frusterated and just let it stay. I was so proud of her! She wants to do more tomorrow, but we used almost all of her homework time tonight to work on knitting.  I may have to bribe her to do her homework with knitting.  Maybe in the next day or two I can teach her the purl stitch!


Proud mommy signing out!