A friend of mine was working on a pair of socks and I started chatting with her about them – and found out she had a pretty unique story about how she came to knitting.
In her own words:
“I was in a car accident and unable to look at screens for 3 weeks. While bored out of my mind my roommate, a crocheter, offered to teach me.
I stubbornly said I only wanted to make socks. She said then I would need to learn to knit and she would teach me what little she knew.
The rest is history.”
Hard things come into all of our lives, like my friend’s car accident, and we all have to pivot and decide how to respond when they do.
Sometimes we “get in our own way” or make things complicated, like deciding to start a knitting journey by making socks. But that doesn’t mean we can’t succeed. Especially with a little help.
In this case, my friend’s roommate gave her the jumping off point she needed:
“My roommate showed me how to cast on and do a knit stitch.
She didn’t even know how to purl.
But she had Vogue’s “knitting bible” so I hunkered down on the couch and painstakingly taught myself different stitches from the diagrams
(remember, I couldn’t look at screens or watch videos at first!).”
Things are not always ideal, but that doesn’t mean they are not worth doing. And if we keep our goal in mind, it can help us take the steps necessary to get there.
In this case, in order to knit socks, my friend needed a few foundational skills and enough confidence to invest. Using Vogue’s “knitting bible” (Vogue Knitting: The Ultimate Knitting Book) and her determination she gained skills and confidence.
Again in her own words:
“After I knit a long “scarf” of different practice stitches with her yarn and needles and proved to myself I was willing to take things out when I made a mistake, I bought my own supplies.”
Wherever we start from, and whether we just dabble to try out a new skill or find ourselves with a “the rest is history” hobby, knitting is such a versatile skill worth picking up.
Who knows, maybe you’ll be designing your own pattern before you know it – like these cactus socks. Using the sock pattern she had already knit, she made it her own by adding the cactus motif!
Q & A
Q: How long have you been knitting?
A: less than a year
Q: What was the first thing you knit?
A: Lovely pair of wool socks
Q: What are some of your favorite projects you have made / skills you have learned?
A: I just finished a baby vest, which is my largest and most intricate project to date. It’s probably too big for the kid, but I’m proud.
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