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? Take a look at a few knitting or crochet books and have a look at some of the skills mentioned in the patterns. Can you start your amigurumi pieces with a magic circle, have you ever tried double knitting, how’s your intarsia? If you are feeling brave, make a list of some of the skills which you have not yet tried but would like to have a go at, and perhaps even set yourself a deadline of when you’d like to have tried them by.
To answer the questions in the prompt, magic circle=yes, double-knitting=not yet, intarsia=quite good, though not frequently practiced.
To expand…
I’d love to explore some more traditional techniques, such as twined knitting from Scandinavia. I’m determined to try out steeking this year—possibly in the next two months, so I can combine my “Cut Your Knitting” badge with the “Bonus Colorwork Yardage Out” challenge at Yarn Snobs (yes, I did just create Girl Scout-type badges for knitting; I’m sure I’m not the first). I have plans to knit Elinor Brown’s Pod of Cetaceans for a friend’s young son, and it involves steeking the front opening.
Image © Elinor Brown, via the Pod of Cetaceans pattern page
I also have plans to try out double-knitting this year. I’ve been looking at this pattern from Cascade as inspiration, but I want to do a double-sided houndstooth pattern. Or maybe houndstooth on one side and herringbone on the other side. Obviously I’m still working this out.
Image © Cascade Yarns
I would consider myself an advanced-intermediate knitter. There are skills I have yet to try or would like to improve, but I’m pretty adventurous when it comes to trying out new techniques. Yes, I would be sad and upset if I screwed something up, but at the end of the day… it’s just yarn. There’s nothing to be afraid of. Except, perhaps, stabbing yourself in the eye with a DPN.
knitting skills bingo? i’d totally play!
We should definitely do this.
I’ll be interested in seeing how double knitting goes. I love the products, but it seems like it would be awfully confusing!
I’m pretty interested too! I will be sure to report back whenever I get around to it. 🙂