Stranded Knitting, or: Learning New Things.

I've mentioned that I my next knitting project involves stranded knitting - that's something that has intrigued me for a while now, but I hadn't had a project for it. Until now. There is something that, design-wise, looks like a lot of fun to me; there is suitable yarn for what the final product is intended for, and there's a good reason to knit it. So.

The thing about stranded knitting is that you have two colours in one row, and they are used more or less alternatingly, so to work efficiently (which, we all know, is something that I tend to be rather obsessed about) you have to hold both yarns at the same time. In a way that makes each one easily available for knitting... and the nicest and most efficient way to do that, it seems, is to hold one yarn in the left hand and one in the right. Which means that you are knitting both Continental style (which is my usual style), picking the yarn from the left hand with the right needle, and English style (which I had not done yet), throwing the yarn on the right hand around the right needle tip.

This was... awkward. It still is, though I am getting better at it. I had the knit stitches sort of mostly down when the first purl row started, though, and it was awkward times eleven again. Which I found vastly, vastly enjoyable in some weird sort of way - the joy of learning something new, and with this, looking at the old things you are doing in a new way. It's a whole new finger dance to get into muscle memory (preferably in a way that is ergonomical and, yes there we are again, efficient right from the start). Since knitting is one of my non-work-related textile techniques (and for me counts as hobby only, even though there are a few slight digressions into work-related spaces), I have all the time in the world to learn this, and I can stumble and fumble as much as I want to, which is somehow delightfully fun for me.

Also - colours! Motifs! Great fun!