3KCBW Day 6 -- Improving Skillset

Improving Your Skillset
How far down the road to learning your craft do you believe yourself to be?  Are you comfortable with what you know or are you always striving to learn new skills and add to your knowledge base?


I don't know if I will ever consider myself to be a proficient knitter.  I joined Ravelry in the fall of 2008 and that is when I feel I became a Knitter rather than someone who knit garter stitch scarves with hanging ends because I never learned to bind off (yeah, I was that person).  One of the nice things about teaching myself to knit is that I had no concept of what was "hard."  For me everything was hard and maybe that was just because I had no idea what I was doing.  I've had some spectacular failures -- there's an alpaca lace halter top of which we do not speak.  Do not immerse alpaca.  Lesson learned.  But there have also been some great triumphs when something just clicked and I realized what I was doing made absolute sense.  Those moments are not super frequent, but they do happen more often (expect a fabulous screw up sometime soon -- I set myself up for that one).

One thing I really want to do but that I have only dabbled in is colorwork.  I've done some striped shawls and hats, and I knit the Cairn hat and mitts which use mosaic knitting, but I want to do more.  Really, I want to do a sweater in more than one color.  The dream is to one day do intarsia (complete with steeks), but stripes would be just grand.  Like say Allyson Dukhuizen's new Umbre Lovre?

Striped, mod, and done in Knit Picks.  It looks like something I'd see in a magazine and wish I had a pattern.  I have the pattern, I just don't have the yarn.

Then there's the idea of colorwork socks.  Like the Crystal Socklet pattern by Lynn DT Hershberger.  They look perfect for using up some leftovers.

But probably the only thing I will actually make in the next year or so is Ysolda Teague's Hendreary.

It's a hat with a knitted button.  It must be mine.

Don't forget to read other Knitting and Crochet Blog Week posts by searching 3KCBWDay6!  And thanks to everyone for the positive comments left on yesterday's video post.  It was a lot of fun to make!