Skills

Today's prompt was hard for me last year, too. I'm supposed to tell you about my knitting skills: where I think I am and where I'd like to be. I think I'm quite skilled. I can't say that I've ever run into anything that I couldn't figure out or ever thought, "No, I just can't do that yet." I don't think that makes me an expert or anything. Like I said last year, I can't do anything that no one else can do. Knitting is knitting and purling and minor variations on the two. You just have to give certain things a shot and keep trying if they don't work out perfectly the first time.

Last year I said I'd like more practice with fair isle knitting. I'm getting it this year and I see that I sorely need it. I have a terrible time with the stranding. Tacking is fine and causes me no trouble. Switching colors is fine. It's the stranding. I think it's only when I do it on dpns, though. It's always the corners that have the goofy pucker. It's something I'm going to have to keep a very close eye on as I knit a giant blanket, though.

In other realms, I could say the same thing. I know how to do a lot of stuff, but I don't typically take the precious time to do it by the book or try it more than once. Intarsia is a fine example. Tried it once or twice, hated it, but didn't try very hard to make sure I was doing it 100% correctly. I have discovered, however, that two skills I lack entirely and may benefit from learning are brioche and knit-one-below. I am told these are two different things with similar results. I thought they were the same thing. I have no idea how to do either.

As knitting continues to evolve, there will be more and more skills I should learn or try at least once or maybe even just read about to figure out. In that way, no one can claim to be a knitting expert, so don't let new skills scare you off.

Let me take this brief bit of space to tell you again, how much fun I'm having this week and how thankful I am for all of your comments and the time you take to read my posts. I really appreciate it! Tell me about a skill you're too afraid to do but want to try this year.