As my 8th wedding anniversary approaches it has me thinking of gifts that meet the traditions. Each year I look at the traditional and modern ideas list and try to get something for my husband. Many years I have made his gift based on the themes. For the 5th wedding anniversary, I stained a wooden frame and put our wedding picture in it. Last year the traditional gift is wool. Can you believe that, wool?! I made sure the hubby knew that and he got me two skeins of Wollmeise! There are many years in which the gifts match up with our fiber habits so we thought we would make a list to share. We are not sponsored by any of the ideas, but our just sharing some items that we like as gifts.
1st Anniversary
Traditional: Paper Modern: Clocks
This would be a good opportunity to give your knitter a pattern book that she has been coveting. Maybe she wants the Rhinebeck Sweater book. Or one of the humor books written by the Yarn Harlot.
2nd Anniversary
Traditional: Cotton Modern: China
This works perfectly for knitters. Give her a nice skein of cotton yarn, or a braid of cotton fiber. Get a project bag to store projects in made of cotton.
3rd Anniversary
Traditional: Leather Modern: Crystal or Glass
Leather seems a little trickier, but Namaste cases for needles or notions would fit the bill! Glass knitting needles, or shawl pins would be a great gift that goes along with the modern theme. I do have a set of needles from the link that I got at Rhinebeck in 2012. The best part about the needles is that they have a lifetime warranty on them for any damage whatsoever. Athena chomped my needle cable in an instant one day. I mailed the needles back to the Ernsts and for a small fee to cover shipping my needles were fixed and returned to me, good as new.
4th Anniversary
Traditional: Fruit/Flowers Modern: Appliances
This one is trickier, so maybe an electric yarn ball winder? I have never used one, but I think it would make winding go a lot quicker.
5th Anniversary
Traditional: Wood Modern: Silverware
For wood you can go with a couple different ideas. I have a set of beautiful wooden sock blockers that I got from the Loopy Ewe. Wooden needles are also a good choice, maybe a set with fun clay animals on the end. If she is a spinner, you could get her a spindle, a wooden niddy noddy to wind her handspun, or more bobbins for her wheel.
6th Anniversary
Traditional: Candy/Iron Modern: Wood
I always like candy. You could get candy theme stitch markers like these or these. Iron rusts so it would not be good for stitch markers or needles. See wood ideas from the 5th anniversary.
7th Anniversary
Traditional: Wool/Copper Modern: Desksets
I think this is my favorite anniversary, too bad it only comes around once. My hubby had heard me talk about Wollmeise and assumed I never bought it for myself because of the price, he didn't realize how hard it is to find. He did find the skeins on ebay after discovering the online shops that carry the yarn did not have any in stock. Another good place to look is for people destashing on Ravelry. There are many wool yarns and fibers that would make a great gift. Malabrigo and Madeline Tosh both come to mind. There are wonderful indie dyers as well that you can find on etsy. One of my favorites is The Cyborg's Craft Room.
8th Anniversary
Traditional: Pottery/Bronze Modern: Linens/Lace
For pottery, I would go with a lovely yarn bowl. Not only are they functional, I think they look quite nice on a table. You can do a play on words and get her some lace weight yarn, or some needles that are made for knitting lace (nice and pointy).
9th Anniversary
Traditional: Willow/Pottery Modern: Leather
I really have no idea what to do for Willow. I have no idea what I would give a non-knitter that is made of willow. Pottery ideas from 8th anniversary and leather ideas from the third.
10th Anniversary
Traditional: Tin/Aluminium Modern: Diamond Jewelry
Tin or aluminum would be good for stitch markers and shawl pins. Diamonds would also add some sparkle to your knitting :-P
Showing posts with label tips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tips. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Beginning Knitter Techniques
As knitters we all have preferences in needles, yarn, cast ons and bind offs. So I thought that I would share what I think are good tips for someone who is new to knitting. These tips are based on my experiences knitting. You get to benefit from my mistakes!
1. Your first project should be something small. Most beginner knitting classes I have seen are for a scarf. A scarf?! A project that is 5-6' long! Most of these projects are all garter stitch too! So all you learn with that is a cast on, knit stitch, a bind off, and that knitting is incredibly boring. Don't get me wrong, there are great scarf patterns out there, and I am even going to be knitting a 12' garter stitch scarf for a Christmas present. I just think that when you are learning something new that it should be something you can finish relatively quickly so you get to experience success early in your learning! So I recommend a washcloth. Not only is it small project, it is a functional item you can use all year long! A washcloth can use knit and purl stitches. Increases and decreases. You can even do lace work in a washcloth.
Another good option for a beginner project is a hat. You learn how to use circular needles (which you can use even when knitting flat), you learn how to knit in the round, knit, purl, decrease. You can learn how to cable right away, do lace. The sky is the limit!
2. I prefer smooth metal needles to wooden ones, but as a beginner wooden needles can be your best friends. Wooden needles are more "grippy" and make it harder for the yarn to just go sliding off the needles. It is that reason that I use metal more than wooden now, I feel like wooden needles slow me down. I also am a tight knitter so I tend to bend wooden needles. When working on my first hat I changed to smooth metal dpns (double pointed needles) near the crown. I was almost done with this cabled awesome hat! The next thing I knew one of the needles was in my lap, and the stitches were starting to drop! It was a knitting EMERGENCY. Luckily I was able to catch as many of those stitches as I could and a woman at the local knitting shop was able to get everything back on the needles. This traumatized me from metal needles, and dpns in general. I eventually got over those fears though :-)
Like Jen mentioned, wood/bamboo needles are perfect for a new knitter. I still use wood needles once in awhile, if I find myself working on a tricky pattern.
3. When you move on to projects beyond washcloths use yarn that you wouldn't mind wearing. You do not have to spend a fortune on yarn (I have spent over $30 on a skein of indie dyed sock yarn to make a pair of socks), but you should stay away from anything that is so inexpensive that it hurts your hands to knit with it. There are many companies that make great inexpensive acrylic yarn like Lion Brand Vanna's Choice, and Knit Pick's Brava. Once you want to make something that you want to be able to shape and stretch you need to use something that contains and natural fiber. Acrylic doesn't block like other fibers.
I would like to add that even while learning, you don't need to knit with something that feels awful in your hands. There are plenty of budget friendly, lower end yarns that are great for learning and that won't make you feel like you are knitting with steel wool. Use what you love and makes you happy.
4. The best tip I can offer is to join Ravelry. It is a fantastic community of knitters, crocheters, spinners, weavers, and other fiber artists. You can get access to thousands of patterns many of them are free. You can keep track of your yarn stash, your projects, your needles and more. You can find local knitting groups and groups of people who have similar interests like the HPKCHC (Harry Potter Knit/Crochet House Cup). We even have a group there where we can share our projects with each other and host giveaways :-) Find us there too, Jess is SameOldKnit and I am jpester.
Another great source if you get stuck with your knitting is knittinghelp.com They have a large variety of video tutorials that can help you with pretty much any knitting technique. I can't even count how many times I went there to learn how to do a specific cast-on or bind-off.
These are just a few tips that I have for beginner knitters. We are hoping to start making tutorials to post on this blog soon.
1. Your first project should be something small. Most beginner knitting classes I have seen are for a scarf. A scarf?! A project that is 5-6' long! Most of these projects are all garter stitch too! So all you learn with that is a cast on, knit stitch, a bind off, and that knitting is incredibly boring. Don't get me wrong, there are great scarf patterns out there, and I am even going to be knitting a 12' garter stitch scarf for a Christmas present. I just think that when you are learning something new that it should be something you can finish relatively quickly so you get to experience success early in your learning! So I recommend a washcloth. Not only is it small project, it is a functional item you can use all year long! A washcloth can use knit and purl stitches. Increases and decreases. You can even do lace work in a washcloth.
Another good option for a beginner project is a hat. You learn how to use circular needles (which you can use even when knitting flat), you learn how to knit in the round, knit, purl, decrease. You can learn how to cable right away, do lace. The sky is the limit!
2. I prefer smooth metal needles to wooden ones, but as a beginner wooden needles can be your best friends. Wooden needles are more "grippy" and make it harder for the yarn to just go sliding off the needles. It is that reason that I use metal more than wooden now, I feel like wooden needles slow me down. I also am a tight knitter so I tend to bend wooden needles. When working on my first hat I changed to smooth metal dpns (double pointed needles) near the crown. I was almost done with this cabled awesome hat! The next thing I knew one of the needles was in my lap, and the stitches were starting to drop! It was a knitting EMERGENCY. Luckily I was able to catch as many of those stitches as I could and a woman at the local knitting shop was able to get everything back on the needles. This traumatized me from metal needles, and dpns in general. I eventually got over those fears though :-)
Like Jen mentioned, wood/bamboo needles are perfect for a new knitter. I still use wood needles once in awhile, if I find myself working on a tricky pattern.
3. When you move on to projects beyond washcloths use yarn that you wouldn't mind wearing. You do not have to spend a fortune on yarn (I have spent over $30 on a skein of indie dyed sock yarn to make a pair of socks), but you should stay away from anything that is so inexpensive that it hurts your hands to knit with it. There are many companies that make great inexpensive acrylic yarn like Lion Brand Vanna's Choice, and Knit Pick's Brava. Once you want to make something that you want to be able to shape and stretch you need to use something that contains and natural fiber. Acrylic doesn't block like other fibers.
I would like to add that even while learning, you don't need to knit with something that feels awful in your hands. There are plenty of budget friendly, lower end yarns that are great for learning and that won't make you feel like you are knitting with steel wool. Use what you love and makes you happy.
4. The best tip I can offer is to join Ravelry. It is a fantastic community of knitters, crocheters, spinners, weavers, and other fiber artists. You can get access to thousands of patterns many of them are free. You can keep track of your yarn stash, your projects, your needles and more. You can find local knitting groups and groups of people who have similar interests like the HPKCHC (Harry Potter Knit/Crochet House Cup). We even have a group there where we can share our projects with each other and host giveaways :-) Find us there too, Jess is SameOldKnit and I am jpester.
Another great source if you get stuck with your knitting is knittinghelp.com They have a large variety of video tutorials that can help you with pretty much any knitting technique. I can't even count how many times I went there to learn how to do a specific cast-on or bind-off.
These are just a few tips that I have for beginner knitters. We are hoping to start making tutorials to post on this blog soon.
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