Introducing ....

The newest knitter in the family ....



Seriously, isn't he adorable? I know, I'm biased and all that jazz, but I just think there is something so sweet about seeing those little hands work with the needles and yarn.



I cast on for him and we did 3 rows together today. Then he got tired and needed a break. Which I understood. It's hard work learning to knit. And remembering all those steps.



But he can't wait to finish his scarf. He thinks he'll do a sweater next. Or maybe a hat. Cause a hat's smaller. And he likes hats.



Which, hearing him plan his next project, really excites me. I know he might not always want to knit. He might lose interest next week. He is 5 after all, but I admit, I am loving this moment. The here and now. 



And yet, I can't lie ... I dream of the whole family sitting together one day, knitting away, talking about mysteries of life, dreaming of wonderful futures, listening to stories and music, and just hanging out and relaxing. And since 4 out of 5 us can now knit, well, I'm more determined than ever to get my husband knitting!!

Exciting news ...

Well, we have some pretty exciting news over here. Tonight, the number of knitters in our house hit three! The knitters now outnumber the non-knitters. (and yes, someday I dream about how we will all be knitters LOL!)



If you can't tell from her smile, she is beyond thrilled to be learning. It is so fun to help her learn this because she is just SO amazingly excited. She's been wanting to learn for a long time. I gave her yarn and needles for Christmas and somehow we just never sat down and worked on it.

But tonight, we put 3 year old to bed and 9 year old was out of the house, so it seemed like a good time to learn. And she took to it like a fish takes to water! (Although I did the cast-on. She just learned the knit stitch which I think is enough for now). She kept saying "stick it in. wrap around. pull it through. slide it off."



And yes, I am one happy knitting mom tonight. I love sharing this (and other things I enjoy) with my kids. And I hope in about 4 years, we will be getting a fourth knitter in this house!

Introducing ....

the newest knitter ....
Just learned today ... she's making a scarf.
I think she's a natural and she really picked up on it pretty quickly. However, when she started to try to go "fast" she was getting extra stitches! But aside from that, she did great. She is determined to finish it by Christmas so we'll see how it goes!


This is her progress for the day.
I did do the cast on row though ... wasn't ready to explain that to her yet.
For a child who doesn't like to sit for too long, I was impressed at how long she did sit and work on it!

Never enough time ....

I wish I could sit and just spend one day knitting. Just one. That's all.
As it is now, I do a few minutes here, a few minutes there, some work while I'm out, some at home. Which is fine, until I have to read a pattern. Yes, I screwed up a pattern recently. I believe the issue is working in small spurts and not really being focused on the work or reading the pattern. But basically, I had to frog 10 rows on the baby cardi Friday night. Which stinks because since frogging, I have only knit 3 rows. :::play violins::: wah, wah, wah. Oh well. Such is life.

On other news, I have started to teach my sister to knit. She wanted to make a poncho. We bought the needles (US 10's) and the yarn (lion brand home spun) and set out. The directions said to cast on 36. So she casted on the 36 most tightest stitches ever. We literally had to cut them off. I couldn't even slide them off. Not once, not twice, but three times LOL!!! Then we had our 36 stitches and she completed about 4 rows. She then had 42 stitches with about 3 dropped stitches interspersed. Poor thing (Oh, yes, she is 13 years old). Then we tried again, got similar results. And again, and again. So i sat down with her and told her I got she wanted to make the poncho, but it wasn't working very well. So we switched to size 15 needles. I gave her some very basic red heart yarn. I told her to cast on 20 stitches. I told her to count her stitches after every single row and every time she had did not have exactly 20 stitches, I wanted her to remove it from the needle, pull it all out and start over. Harsh? I don't know ... maybe. But yet, she obviously needs just to practice the movement and also focus on what she is doing and pay attention to the stitches she makes. I told her to do that until she had about 12 inches of work and we'd learn how to bind off and then move to smaller needles and practice some more. Then once she got that down we would practice with the 10's and the homespun yarn and then she could work on her poncho.
I told her what she is knitting now can be used as a blanket for her American Girl doll to attempt to keep her motivated to do it aside from just learning to knit.
I hope she does it and has fun with it and learns how to stop adding/dropping stitches! LOL!
It was nice she wanted to learn, but hard because she thought she should be able to pick up needles and wa-la! Be able to knit! And now my 6 year old wants to learn. I told her we would do it in the fall - that with warmer weather coming it would be better for her to run around outside and save knitting for chillier weather ;-)

Speaking of teaching, we had our first baseball practice this weekend and one of the moms saw me knitting. She mentioned she wanted to learn, bought yarn, needles and a book and was stuck. So I told her next practice to bring her stuff and I'd help her with it! Yeah! I'm just spreading the knitting around!

So that is my weekend. Still no finished products. Still no pictures to show that would mean anything. Blah. Just trying to get a few moments of knitting in each day! LOL!