Skill

Thanks to everyone who stopped by yesterday!  I was pleasantly surprised by the traffic!  Hopefully I can entertain you well enough to keep you coming back. ;)

Today's prompt compels me to define my knitting skill.  I find this quite difficult.  I've been knitting for four years now and I don't feel like there is anything I cannot do.  Does that make me an expert knitter?  I don't think so.  I'm content to call myself intermediate or advanced, I suppose, but the truth is that I can't do anything that no one else can do.  Knitting consists of two stitches: knit and purl.  If you can knit and you can purl, you can do anything from stockinette to stranded knitting.  You can learn all the fancy ways to cast on and bind off, but you can also get through life on just one method.  Last month was the first time I had ever knit a sock using a standard pattern.  People get very anxious about turning a heel.  Really, you just knit, purl, and do as the pattern says.

I suppose it might take some skill to know how to alter a pattern or to realize when the pattern is just not right and figure out how to correct it.  But that's not really skill either.  It's math.  And not very hard math, either, because even I can do it!  I haven't written any patterns, but I could.  I haven't tried entrelac, but I know how it's done.  I use a Norwegian purl instead of the traditional continental purl.  I have no problem with complicated lace.  I can't work two sleeves on two circular needles at the same time, but I can knit one sock inside another on dpns.  It only took me four years to figure out what my bust size is and how to pick the right size for it.  I frog every project at least 3 times before I finally finish it correctly.  So what is my skill level?  Beats me!

I pushed myself in my first couple of years of knitting, so I don't have any aspirations this year.  The only skill I wanted to learn was fair isle, and I achieved that (though I could use much more practice).  I suppose I aspire to enjoy all of my knitting this year, hard or easy. :)

Since I have a few people to interact with now: what is a skill or a project you plan to tackle this year?