I taught myself to knit as a teenager. I was a “thrower” - right hand/American. Very, very slow. I am good at following directions, picking up stitches from watching videos and I have actually knitted a lace scarf for a present with some mohair yarn I got from an aunt, but it was laborious & it took months!!
Two years ago, I decided to switch to Continental. It never worked for me - I was used to seeing the stitches using the right hand feeding the yarn. Purling Continental is awkward & I never did it long enough to get comfortable with it. At that point, I gave up on knitting projects - I’d made a baby hat for a cousin & it was “ok”, but again, long process.
Knitting continued to “haunt” me. It’s not as chunky as crochet, which I like, & there were some projects I really wanted to make. I was looking at videos on how to hold yarn in my right hand & came across a video on “flicking”. You do not let go of the needle when you flick, unlike throwing. I “practiced” on a pair of arm warmers (see post 76) for a friend and as I knitted, my speed started picking up! Within the week, I am guessing my speed has at least doubled - probably tripled. The gal in the video has been flicking for 20 years so I have a few years to go to get up to her speed. Let’s just say that I’m speedy enough now, after only maybe 2 weeks of flicking, that doing projects in a reasonable amount of time is feasible.
Another “biggy” for me - learning to do Magic loop. I looked at several videos and finally found one that explained it to me in a way that was very clear & I could grasp the process. I now use magic loop all the time (rather than double pointed needles, although I have done 2 baby hats with DPNs). I converted the arm warmer pattern from ‘flat’ & seaming to working it in the round using magic loop - no seaming.
So, here are the video links that have been most helpful to me:
Knitting Help - Flicking
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y547Q5Hjcuo
Knitting Help - Flicking Q & A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmEGLLbbRB4
Knitting in the Round on Magic Loop - Basic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KccLlkTKzE
BTW, I use a 29” cable all the time for magic loop - she uses a much longer cable in the video (47”). I’m doing fairly small projects (40 stitches for arm warmers) - if I had more stitches that filled up more room on the cables, I’d have to use longer cables.
I hope this helps - I’m actually rather excited about knitting again. I am obsessed with fingerless mittens - working now on some knit ones with bhooked’s pattern (post 78 has link), but there are others I’m anxious to try.
Thanks for posting all of that; when I have time, I will look at it all.
Since I’m not an experienced knitter, I can probably go either way. I’ll try and figure it out.
I taught myself to crochet from books and diagrams; maybe I can do the same with knitting. I have several patterns that I’ve crocheted, but also have patterns for the knitted versions. I like the more soft, flexible texture of knitting. :-)
// https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=y547Q5Hjcuo VeryPink knits //
Interesting. For future reference :-)